Domsa Károlyné, Fekete Gézáné, Kovács Mária (szerk.): Gondolatok a könyvtárban / Thoughts in the Library (A MTAK közleményei 30. Budapest, 1992)

KÖNYVTÁR ÉS KORSZERŰSÉG – LIBRARY AND MODERNITY

E. Hakli development within the country itself, and even public libraries are now adopting them. International compatibility of the standards has been at least of equal importance and their role will continue to grow. (5) Automation business is not an issue for experts only. Automation will change the routines and procedures so deeply that it influences both policy and economy of libraries. Leadership of libraries must acquire enough knowledge of automation to be able to push through realistic solutions and to overlook the consequences of individual decisions. One of the big threats is obviously perfectionism, typical of all experts and maybe even more typical of library experts. The dominant role of experts has, of course, been understandable in earlier days, when automated systems were understood as the automation of individual routines. They were somehow isolated both from each other and from normal decision making in libraries. That is not the case any more; data systems have become an essential part of all activities in libraries. One question which has been discussed in Finland afterwards, is the development of the national Finmarc format. The format is internationally compatible and has traditionally been very similar to the U.K. Marc system. The latest changes have brought it a step closer to the U.S. Marc format. But why must we have a format of our own? What have we achieved by it? One answer is obvious, we have had to invest an enormous amount of work and later also money because of the Finmarc format. My feeling now is that it would have been possible to accommodate all our data e.g. to the U.K. Marc format. Libraries everywhere have discovered that the perfectionism of earlier days will no longer be economically viable. The Finnish format has also required plenty of work (=money) as the new integrated online system has been adapted to Finnish use. Unimarc e.g. was, unfortunately, not yet available in those days. (6) The Finnish way towards the situation of today was not too easy. The complicated offline procedures did not save much time in the libraries. Efforts in individual libraries were to a great extent investments for the future, and the benefits of these efforts have now become apparent. For the users, however, the local library catalogues, union catalogues, bibliographies, databases etc. were a substantial improvement of the library services. I still feel that we have done right when choosing the policy of small steps and by utilizing cheap and pragmatic solutions. The existence of powerful PCs today offers totally different and more efficient ways even in a situation similar to the earlier Finnish one. The main thing, however, would still be a distinct policy which links all the scattered efforts to one chain, and the adoption of common, internationally accepted standards. 148 Thoughts in the library"