The Library IBM PC
NJM from Meckler sent a review copy of her new title, The Library
IBM PC: Volume 1 The Hardware: Set up and expansion. The goal is
“assist both the novice computer buyer who has selected the IBM PC
and those who have acquired a PC either as an M-300 Workstation or
other valued IBM PC Model.”
Technically it is an interesting reference, full of illustrations
of expansion boards and keyboards, rampant with precedent,
references and interesting appendixes with user groups and the
such. It ignores clones, which any sensible buyer would procure
before an honest to god blue. I also was unable to find an
explanation of “why” the M-300 was different from a plain vanilla
blue-it’s a character ROM for the ALA set-or alternative sources for
these same ROMS so that you could buy a cheapo clone and make it
look like an M-300.
The biggest problem I have with the Library IBM PC, as many of the
other “library guide” books, is that it is very little library. Why
use this hardware for a library application? What inherent in the
blue hardware architecture makes it a suitable library management
tool? Must be a foregone conclusion A For effort, B for content, F
for library. Boy am I going to hear about this.
Library Search and Solve and Library Micro Tools: Overdues
The good folks at K-12 Micromedia sent over a couple of their new
offerings. Library Search and Solve is a mediocre game designed to
reinforce using library reference tools. There are help screens and
a hall of fame disk for high scores, I can’t recommend this. It’s
contrived, and I much prefer the straight forward attack Ann Lathrop
did with How Can I Find It If I don’t Know What I am Looking For?.
In Fact they aren’t even in the same ballpark.
Library Micro Tools: Overdues is a template set for PFS
file/report. I can’t believe anyone would still be using the PFS
stuff (sorry to all my friends who live or die by it but it just
doesn’t cut it) and I have a real problem with folks who sell
templates (dya spose that’s why there is a Template Clearinghouse?)
Skoops, there still are a lot of folks starting at square one:
perhaps they can avoid the pitfalls we all made along the way.
The Primer FLAP
Howard Batchelor, from H.W. Wilson is all bent out of shape over
some remarks I made about Commonsense Cataloging in the Primer of
Library Microcomputing and the Apple Library User’s Group
Newsletter. Since the flap starts with a K-12 offering, there’s no
better place to deal with it than after a K-12 piece.
Howard’s loosing sleep because of my quote “nothing bugs me more
than using a micro to generate catalog cards based on Commonsense
Cataloging or any other standard than AACR2.” He goes onto to
explain that the latest release (1983) of CC handles AACR2. The man
don’t lie ‘cause I looked at it just to be sure.
The problem is that my comment is based on reviewing K-12’s
Catalog Card and Label Writer, which is worse than a mediocre card
production system. I can’t prove it because somehow the
documentation isn’t in the pile of junk library management software
that I am collecting for the Wired Librarian’s Museum and Good Place
to Pass some time. But I remember doing the original review in 1982,
and in the documentation specifically remember a reference to
Commonsense Cataloging. Anybody with simple subtraction skills will
only crucify me for not saying “the current edition of Commonsense
Cataloging.”
If Howard had stopped there, we probably could have been cool and
mellow and copesetic. He continues his attack by saying that
Commonsense Cataloging” is the leading text in the field at library
schools throughout the country.” It ain’t me place to judge library
instruction, but I sure as sheep wouldn’t hire a cataloger trained
only with CC. In my graduate work we were told to stay as far away
from the title as possible. WLN: not the bibliographic utlity does
not want to get involved in a heavey discussion of library education
philosophy, we gonna let the readers take the whole thing and make
up their own minds. I used to think DB Master was the greatest
thing since sliced bread but times change and things get better and
Howard can sell all of the copies of CC to whomever he cares. The
difference in the offense (he vs me) is that he has a product to
protect. I don’t. Shanti Howard, Live Long and prosper. Hey Dave-howbout
DB Master on a Vic20?
Some questions without answers
The mail has run a few items through our office that I felt I
ought to explain. First, there was a production screwup in the
March issue that caused two pages to be blank. Grab the crayolas
and go….
Several folks have complained that annual buying guide, our
December issue, was printed on red stock which fouled up a lot of
xerox machines. Besdie the fact that it was seasonal, there was a
reason for the red background. Previous buying guides have been
reproduced without giving credit to WLN: not the bibliographic
utility. I have no problem with free information for all but I
believe you have to give credit where credit is due. All that have
asked have been provided white backgrounded copies for duplication
and you can have one too-just give us the courtesy of crediting
Wired Librarian’s Newsletter.
Finally there is a reported bug in Broderbund’s Where in the World
is Carmen San Diego, highly touted in these pages (Sept 1985).
Bernadine Berry has reported the bug which keeps winning cases from
being recorded allowing the player to move to the next level-to
which both Broderbund and their newsletter and has had no response.
Those folks have a track record of good support, which makes a crime
against the state in our eues. Next time you go to a show and they
have a booth give them a little grief. No, give them a lot of grief.
ALUG
Word has reached the humble editorial offices here in des Mois
that the second Apple User’s Group Meeting will be held this summer
at ALA. Sources indiczte the meeting will be held on July 1 at no
other place but Lincoln Center. Mark you calendars now- be there or
be square.
Corrections
In the Red Suit Buying Guide I made a few errors for Catalog Card
and Label Writer. It runs on MS-DOS and C-64 as well. K-12 wrote
informing that their new address is 6 Arrow Rd., Ramsey NJ 07446. I
also blew the name of their overdue program: correct title is
Library Circulation Manager.
The Mac Page:Only in the Wired Librarian’s Newsletter
68000 Salvation
It’s been tough touting the Mac as a library management tool when
the only piece of library software was Vic Rosenberg’s excellent
PBS: The recent Midwinter meeting of ALA has changed all of that.
Your humble editor was blindfolded, taken to a room, and shown the
alphas of a system to be released in New York this summer. If the
folks can pull it off, all of the ][ and blue systems will have a
new standard to live up to.
I agreed not to mention the names of the folks involved, but their
integrity is above repute. What they showed me was an integrated
online circ system, online catalog, online ordering system, and
serials control system that has the possibility of blowing the rest
of the competition back to Boca Raton or other points east. It will
run on a 512 Mac with the Apple 20 meg drive, 160,000 items and
5,000 patrons. Those numbers will drop if I can convince the
authors to include MARC tags in the records, but still Horatio here
is a Hornblower.
The beauty of the Mac for this application is that it compounds
the ease of the user interface with the graphics and multi-tasking
capabilities built into the machine. The degradation of response
time you see in Corvus and other 8 bit mentality networks doesn’t
exist, and the cats writing the code make the 68000 stand on it’s
ear. Patron wants to search? Point and click. Clerk wants to add or
change a record? Point and click. Even if it ends up with only
100,000 items and 5,000 patrons in MARC formatted records it could
go into 10,000 libraries in a slide.
There will be a catalog card production module from this system
displayed at the Meckler Conference in March, and that tool alone is
going to change the way we do catalog cards. It will be offered
separately for about $70 bucks. It took two years to start the flow
of library management software, and this first offering could
outdistance the previous five years of work. More, later…….
Another Day, another way
Last month, when I shared with you all the cruel harsh reality
that my position at the State Library had been eliminated, I was
flooded with phone calls, letters, and just tons of support. Lots
of folks provided job leads, wished me well, and for the most part
kept me going when there weren’t a lot of chips to bet the next hand
with. There is no way I can express my gratitude for your good will
save a simple THANK YOU.
In a larger sense, that is really what the Wired Librarian’s
Newsletter is all about. I wish every piece of library management
software were perfect so we didn’t have to scream about how mediocre
of infantile certain titles are. I wish librarians had the skills
necessary t o make their own judgements, based on their own
knowledge, of the application of the microcomputer to their
library. I wish vendors didn’t push systems on folks just to have
systems. I wish people realized how much of an investment, both in
terms of time and money, automation really costs them and their
libraries. I wish people worried more about the folks that used
their libraries and focused library automation, be it micro or mini
or calculator based, on the stuff those folks could use. As me
sainted mother once said, (and oft quoted in these pages) “If
wishes were horses then beggars would ride.”
By the time you read this I will have assumed my new job as Access
Services Coordinator for the Sioux City Public Library in Sioux
City, IA. I am going to coordinate their media collection, manage
interlibrary loan and do a little reference work to boot. It’s a big
challenge-and a big chance. It’s going to be an opportunity to put
in place a great deal of the things I have spoken about and see how
well I can use the micro to provide the folks that use that library
a little more or a little better.
WLN: not the bibliographic utilitiy will not die. I appreciate
your support during these difficult days. It has reaffirmed my
belief that most folks are good folks; check that real good folks.
All we have ever tried to do within these pages is tell you what we
think.
Shanti
