Library Technology Guides

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Volume 2 Number 10 (October 1982)

Development of private files: in-house or data base service?

Several libraries wishing to create data bases of their journal literature and in-house documents have asked us to comment on the differences between developing a system on an in-house computer and using the private file facilities of data base services such as BRS, Dialog, and SDC.

Either option has similar software requirements: a Data Base Management System (DBMS) and hundreds of applications programs which create the file formats, thesaurus master files, screen display formats, menus, prompts, report formats and updating procedures, etc. A DBMS is part of the systems software--the set of general purpose programs which enable a computer to function and to control its own operations. A DBMS makes it possible to access information using any one of a number of search keys without having to create different files for each different approach. It also permits the independent modification of the applications software or the data base design without changes in one impacting on the other. Most DBMS also provide data security techniques and procedures. The applications software consists of programs, each containing hundreds of lines of code, that take advantage of the DBMS to create and utilize specific files. The applications software developed by commercial data base services typically represent an investment of more than $500,000 in programming costs.

Each of the major data base services-SDC, Dialog, and BPS-offer confidential private file services which permit an institution to create and access its own data bases using the vendor's mainframe computer installation. Many libraries use these services for mounting online indexes and catalogs. However, this approach has its draw-backs, particularly when heavy usage incurs high telecommunications charges.

In the face of such drawbacks, some libraries with access to local computing resources that are equipped with appropriate DBMS have considered developing their own applications software. Several special libraries which have secured bids for the independent development of software to support a single bibliographic data base have received quotes of $75,000 to $150,000 and more.

It is not generally known, but at least one of the major data base services-BPS-makes its software available for use on a customer's own mainframe and has recently announced a new version of the software to operate on minicomputers and micros. Initially, the new product has been designed for use on the Onyx microcomputer but there are plans to adapt the programs for smaller micros. The software will also be available for minicomputers such as the DEC 1170 and IBM's Series I. The BPS applications software incorporates a DBMS so it is not necessary to purchase that separately. The computer must have the UNIX operating system. The mini/micro software has some new features not available in the mainframe version of the product.

Commonly an organization will begin the development of its files on a data base service machine and move on to purchase the software for use on its own equipment once it has determined that it is satisfied with the software performance and its data base is large enough to warrant the investment. [Contact: Bibliographic Retrieval Services (BPS), 1200 Route 7, Latham, NY 12110 (518) 783-1161.]

Videodisk updates

On the entertainment front, manufacturers are reporting an upturn in player sales to dealers in ten weeks this summer, RCA moved more CED players than it had since the product was introduced in March 1981, and sales of the Pioneer LaserVision system have also increased. Analysts estimate that in the consumer market RCA' s grooved capacitance technology is outselling Pioneer's optical, noncontact system by 10 to 1. Commercial and industrial customers seem to prefer the more expensive Pioneer product.

In what appears to be a conflicting trend, Montgomery Ward and Co. has dropped the CED videodisk player from its fall-winter catalog and has been heavily discounting the units in its stores. The price of Pioneer VP-l000 LaserVision players has also been extensively discounted. The Federated Group is reported to have cut VP-l000 prices in its 11 stores from the $749 list price to $288. Sansung Electronics America Inc. announced that it is shelving its plans to market a CED player this year, ostensibly because of the greatly eroding prices of the players already on the market.

Consumer disk sales continue to out pace projections with the average player owner purchasing more than 30 albums in the first year they own a player. It is expected that more than 5 million disks will be sold this year, up from last year's 1.4 million.

Pioneer Video is releasing a number of new LaserVision videodisks in an effort to regain a significant share of the entertainment disk market. "Star Wars," which will be priced at $34.95 heads the list, but other titles likely to be popular include "On Golden Pond," "The Jazz Singer," "Ragtime," "Sound of Music," and "West Side Story." In addition to these popular film titles Pioneer will also release the Royal Ballet's performance of "Swan Lake" and "Claude Bolling: Concerts for Classical Guitar and Piano."

At recent meetings in Detroit and Montreal, the National Library of Canada has exhibited a demonstration videodisk which introduces the Library and its services and, through sequences on topics such as "O Canada," illustrates the potential of the disk for library orientation applications.

The Library of Congress is also actively pursuing videodisk applications. With a new image storage and retrieval system with optical disk digital storage being tested by the Cataloging Distribution Service, the Library is now evaluating responses to a request for proposal for two more optical disk based image storage and retrieval pilot projects.

Utilizing technology similar to that in the NEC disk and in many business and training applications, part of the project entails the conversion of images from film, magnetic tape, photographic stills and graphic materials to analog storage on optical disk. The Library will assess the use of the technology for the storage and handling of nonprint materials concentrating on preservation aspects, the reference potential for serving public and staff needs and the increases in storage density made possible by using the disk technology.

The other part of the proposal targets the use of the disk for the storage of digitized images of printed library materials. The technology in this application will be similar to that used in the DEMAND system being implemented by the Cataloging Distributions Service. The system configuration will include an input scanning and keyboard entry subsystem, a direct read after write (DRAW) optical disk recording and play back subsystem, and an output system with high resolution CRT displays and printers. During the pilot project the documents input will be serials.

The successful implementation of such an approach could well be the first step towards a situation in which a user searches an online data base to identify relevant citations and then accesses a facsimile of the required item stored remotely on optical digital disk. Such an approach would appear to the user as similar to that used by Pergamon in its Video Patsearch system for accessing patent diagrams. The applications differ in that the data on the Patsearch disks is recorded in analog form and copies of the videodisks are held at the user workstation. In the Library of Congress proposal the images would be stored in digital form and transmitted to the user from a central location.

Electronic mail protocol adopted

The National Bureau of Standards' Specification for Message Format for Computer Based Message Systems mentioned in the February 1982 issue of LSN has been adopted by six of the major electronic mail systems. InfoMail, Comet, Dialcom's Electronic Mail System, DECmail, Telemail, and OnTyme have each adopted the standard which enables the exchange of electronic messages among different messaging systems. The standard covers the format of messages-requiring that a message contain fields such as destination, origin, and date, but does not fix display or transmission formats. Adoption of the standard assures compatibility but allows for diversity in the services provided by each system.

Reliability in automated library systems

In the next few months Digital Equipment Corporation's program of guaranteeing 96-99% uptime on certain systems is likely to be followed by other minicomputer manufacturers according to trade sources. Welcome as such guarantees may be, they are unlikely to be of particular significance in the library automation market as central processing unit (CPU) failure accounts for only a small proportion of the problems libraries experience with their systems. As outlined in the first issue of LSN, peripheral devices tong to be less reliable.

The review of a number of recent specifications for library automated systems reveals that reliability levels of 98% for the first three years of installation are now commonly accepted. However, this does not relieve a library of the need to define reliability requirements when specifying a system, monitoring system performance to insure that the requirements are met, and seeking redress when performance falls below the contracted levels.

In contracting with the turnkey market for an integrated automated system comprising circulation control and related functions such as acquisitions, patron access catalog, and serials control, the following requirements are common, although the reliability percentage is subject to vigorous negotiation:

• The automated system shall be 98% reliable for the first three years after initial installation and 97% from the beginning of the fourth year through the end of the fifth year after initial installation.

• Reliability shall be determined by deducting down time from the total number of hours the library is in operation.

• Downtime shall be that period of time when it is not possible to perform scheduled activities due to equipment or software malfunction or when the system is released to the vendor for remedial maintenance.

• Downtime shall be calculated to the nearest one-tenth hour and calculated as a percentage of the library's total operating hours. For example, if the library is in operation a total of 400 hours monthly, seventeen hours of downtime of the total system or the equivalent combination of individual components or features would reduce the reliability level to 98% for the month.

• The following table of coefficients shall be used to compute downtime:

Loss of charge-discharge capability	1.00
Loss of hold feature	1.00
Loss of patron file inquiry	1.00
Loss of item file inquiry	1.00
Loss of file-update online	1.00
Loss of report printing for more than six operating hours	.25
Other software problems which affect system performance	.10
Loss of terminal	.10
Loss of single disk, if system is operating	.50
Loss of tape drive	.25
Loss of console printer	.25
And, in addition, as the related functions are installed:
Loss of acquisitions function	1.00
Loss of patron access catalog	1.50
Loss of serial control function	1.00

• Errors which do not affect current system performance shall not be counted until the 50th operating hour after report to the vendor. At that time they shall be calculated at a coefficient of .10 from the 50th hour.

Failure of the automated system to perform at the contracted levels of reliability frequently results in a library withholding 10% of the monthly maintenance fee for each 1% that the system falls below the contracted reliability level. Although such expectations and penalties may be spelled out in the contract, many libraries are failing to benefit from their inclusion because they neglect to log and record system failures.

Portable backup for VTLS

The Southern California Software Company (SCSC) is now marketing the portable bookmobile/backup terminal software it developed for the Tempe (AZ) Public Library to interface with its Virginia Tech Library System. MSI Data Corporation portable data terminals are used. The battery powered (main battery and memory backup) terminals are about the size of a portable cassette tape recorder. They are easily stored at the circulation desk or can be carried to and from the bookmobile. The units come with plug-in light pens to read barcodes.

The software in the portable terminal allows check-out, check-in and renewal of items. For bookmobile use information can be pre-keyed into the terminal causing visual and audible warnings when the number of a delinquent patron or book on reserve is "wanded" in, for example, "HOLD/ RESERVE" is displayed on the alpha-numeric LED display.

At the end of the day the transactions are transferred to the main computer via a separate modem phone link and the on-line library system updates the patron and circulation records. A printed copy of the transactions is also run on a small separate printer as an additional back-up. The Tempe Public Library has three units, each with 64KB of memory. Each unit will hold approximately 3,800 transactions. The units will read all major barcodes and can communicate with a wide variety of computer systems.

SCSC has priced the software at $2,000 which includes minor modifications that may be required to adapt to different VTLS applications. SCSC will also supply the system as a package including the software and hardware. The software and hardware, including an MSI terminal, acoustic coupler, printer interface and printer would cost about $3,500. [Contact: Larry Jeffrey, Southern California Software Company, 1605 Fairview Drive, Corona, A 91720 (714) 734-6205.]

High-capacity "Winchesters" cause reduction in low-end prices

"Winchester" is a generic term applied to the majority of rigid 8-inch and 5.25-inch fixed media disk drives. The Winchester disk drive was first introduced by IBM in 1973 with the initial shipment of the IBM model 3340 disk drive. The 3340 had two spindles, each storing 30 Megabytes. After numerous references to it as the 30-30, it was nicknamed the "Winchester" because of its resemblance to the similar caliber of a popular Winchester rifle dating back to the Old West.

Even though the market for low-end 5.25 inch Winchester disk drives for micros has yet to hit full stride, designers are already looking ahead to new applications for their hardware, and are planning to introduce second generation high-capacity, high-performance rigid-disk drives with storage in the range of 30 to 50 megabytes. The new units may cost as little as $3,000. Several vendors are scheduling volume shipments of the new Winchesters during the first quarter of 1983.

The new Winchesters are characterized not only by increased capacities, but also by significantly enhanced performance. The average positioning times associated with the small Winchesters now available cannot meet the needs of the multi-user environment required in most library applications. In order to provide the response times library systems need, designers must move up to the big-drive performance that the new Winchesters will offer.

Simultaneously, prices of the low-end Winchesters-the small 6 to 20 Megabyte (MB) storage devices used with many micros are dropping rapidly. The smallest drives for Apples and TRS 80s now cost less than $2,500 retail and only $650 wholesale-a 40 percent drop since late 1981. Strong demand has been a major factor in the price decrease but the appearance of the larger drives for $3,500 or less has probably had the greatest effect. Prices may drop still further later this year when several Japanese imports become available on the U.S. and Canadian markets.

Word processing systems to disappear?

Several speakers at Syntopicon X, an annual office automation conference recently concluded in Kansas City, predicted that single function word processing systems will be obsolete in another five years. Integrated systems supporting several functions are expected to take over. Already the major word processing vendors are offering limited data processing and telecommunications capabilities. Interfaces to larger computers will be the greatest area of activity in the next two years according to a majority of the presenters. Word processing on micros is expected to remain popular because it offers flexibility and reliability. Software changes are not dependent on their place on the lengthy priority list as is common with large systems, nor are they subject to downtime when the larger machine is out.

The exhibits confirmed the speakers' predictions: most of the systems stressed financial and business applications while taking word processing for granted.

Some of the speakers also stressed that the shakeout of vendors is continuing. In the last five years as many as fifty companies have dropped out of the word processing market, including 3M. Another forty may drop out in the next two or three years. Cliff Walker, whose firm, Word Systems, specializes in used word processors, stressed that marketing rather than the uniqueness of the product is the key to survival. Products that establish large local customer bases as the result of aggressive marketing are likely to be around five years hence and, even if they cease to be manufactured, service will probably continue to be available for them.

Mead Data making money

Philip Abelson, Editor of Science Magazine told attendees at the American Society for Information Science meeting in Knoxville that Mead Data, the producer of LEXIS and NEXIS, is the only data base proprietor making a profit at this time. The company now has more than 30,000 searches a day against its full-text files. Negotiations are underway to mount Science on the Mead service, although there is a problem in getting the software to accommodate tables and diagrams.

Abelson expects the demand for full-text services to increase because access to information online increases the productivity of professional and managerial staff. He forecasts much greater utilization of online data bases in business than in academic institutions because of the much greater emphasis on productivity in the for profit environment.

Glass slides for digital storage

A California company, Omex, is developing the first installation of its Slide-Store system which utilizes glass slides/plates as the digital data storage.

Conceptually related to the use of optical disks for digital storage, the Omex technology uses five inch square glass slides as the storage medium. The slides are of a sandwich construction and data is recorded using the direct read after write (DRAW) technique and a gas laser. Each slide is capable of storing 397 megabytes of data.

The company says that the slide/ plate approach is superior to the use of optical digital disks for digital data storage because it eliminates the problems inherent in rotating a disk, both during recording and retrieval. [Contact: Omex, 2323 Owen Street, Santa Clara, CA 95051; (408) 727- 5801.]

OCLC RETROARC prospects faint

Despite pleas from a number of libraries for OCLC to undertake a RETROARC-the copying of all retrospective archival tapes for libraries which lack tapes of all or part of their OCLC files-none is in the offing. OCLC's hesitancy is due in large part to the massive workload involved in the task. The OCLC data base now comprises some 4000 reels of magnetic tape. A planned compression project will reduce the number of tapes by 75% later this year, but a RETROARC would still be an overwhelming undertaking. OCLC may seek to meet the demand by segmenting the task and performing a number of smaller RETROARCs over a period of time. It is unlikely that any project would begin before the second half of 1983. Prices have not yet been determined, but would be higher than those for the current subscription tapes because the costs associated with producing RETROARC tapes are higher.

MARC II, the all-purpose format

Some librarians have said that they will not adopt the MARC II format because it doesn't accommodate all of the information they wish to record. While we've usually heard the complaint that MARC includes too much, we believe there is a solution for those who want more or different information.

The concept of the MARC II communications format is the inclusion of specified information on the tape leader and the tagging of each data element with a specific tag that will match the same data elements in other files maintained on other systems. Should an organization wish to include data elements not provided for in the MARC II format, it is possible to use "vacant' numeric tags or to add alphabetic tags which are distinguishable from those used in MARC. The important thing is to have the elements which are commonly used for searching and matching records-author, title, series, subject-properly tagged so that the records will be compatible with any others created using the MARC "standard." In the data processing context a standard is a set of protocols which have been adopted by several institutions so they can exchange data and programs-it is not just internal consistency. An organization which creates a non-MARC data base closes off not only avenues of future software and computer service support, but also handicaps future data sharing among libraries.

To minimize this limitation, libraries which opt to "extend" the MARC format to meet their individual needs must invest a degree of effort in developing, implementing and documenting the use of the non-standard fields. Consistency and documentation are essential prerequisites for future processing of the records as might be required for the creation of a shared data base or the output of a COM catalog.

The importance of documenting local, nonstandard expansions of the format has been stressed in several recent forums exemplified in Dennis Reynolds' article on the entry of local data on OCLC in the March 1982 issue of Information Technology and Libraries and the activities of groups such as the DataPhase Users' Group's establishment of a Bibliographic Standards Committee to advise on inconsistencies among the MARC records output by the different utilities.

Card Datalog adds acquisitions capabilities

DTI Data Trek of Encinitas, CA, has added an acquisitions module to its Card Datalog system. The new subsystem automates publication ordering, statistics, invoice tracking and processing, and collection maintenance. The subsystem also generates monthly and annual reports of all titles received and prints purchase orders and follow-up letters to publishers. The acquisitions software is priced at $2,000 and can be integrated with other Card Datalog subsystems-circulation, catalog, serials and lab notebook. Card Datalog is now installed in six libraries and more orders are on-hand. Depending on the equipment configuration, the system will support collections of from 5,000 to 55,000 volumes. It does not accommodate the MARC format and record size is limited to 1,000 characters.

The software, which runs under DEC's CP/M or MP/M operating systems, is suitable for a range of microcomputers from Apples to a Molecular capable of supporting 32 terminals. DTI will supply either the software or an appropriate package of hardware and software.

Total system prices begin as low as $6,990 for an Altos micro with dual floppies, a CRT terminal, printer, data base management software and one Card Datalog software module. Additional modules cost $2,000 each. Software maintenance is available for $500 per module per year.

[Contact: DTI Data Trek, 121 West E Street, Second Floor, Encinitas, CA 92024; (714) 4365055.]

1982 Edition of The Sourcebook now available

LTRs microfiche publication, The Sourcebook of Library Technology, 1982 Edition is now ready.

The Sourcebook, issued in alternate years is an edited compilation of Library Technology Reports 1965-1981 contained on 38 microfiches with a hard copy index. In addition, the 1982 Edition contains the 1981 issues of Library Systems Newsletter also with a hard copy index. The Newsletter has been indexed by subject, by companies named and by libraries mentioned. Current addresses for most companies are also given. The Sourcebook is available from LTR at ALA Headquarters, 50 East Huron Street, Chicago, IL 60611. The price is $75.00.

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Publication Information

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Publisher	Library Systems Newsletter was published by the American Library Association.
Editor-in-Chief:	Howard S. White
Contributing Editor:	Richard W. Boss
ISSN:	0277-0288
Publication Period	1981-2000
Business model	Available on Library Technology Guides with permission of the American Library Association.