Problems and failures in library automation: Papers presented at the 1978 Clinic on Library Applications of Data Processing, April 23-26, 1978

The Fifteenth Annual Clinic on Library Applications of Data Processing was held April 23-26, 1978, at the Illini Union Building, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. At earlier clinics the papers were almost exclusively positive in their views of library automation. They reported successes rather than failures and benefits rather than problems. For the 1978 clinic, however, an attempt was made to find speakers willing to present the other side of the coin. The papers in the present volume, therefore, deal with problems or, in some cases, downright failures in the automation of various facets of library service. They range from Veaner's general survey of failures/limitations in library automation as a whole to case studies of failures or problems encountered in specific applications or environments. It is perhaps not too surprising to find that the most abject failures are attributable more to management ineptness and bureaucratic bungling than to inadequacies in existing technology. This volume is presented in the hope that the library profession can learn at least as much from its failures as it can from its successes.published or submitted for publicatio