Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 17, 1991 TAG: 9103150628
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: JUSTINE ELIAS CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
More and more libraries are investing in computer cataloging systems, which, along with automated circulation systems, are changing the way people find information.
At the forefront of this software revolution is VTLS Inc., which began as a research project at Virginia Tech nearly two decades ago.
"Our job is to throw the card catalog into the trash," said Jack Bazuzi, director of international operations for VTLS.
"Libraries are prime targets for automation," Bazuzi said. "Fifteen to 20 percent of libraries in the United States are automated already. The rest are likely to be automated within the next few years."
All of West Virginia's municipal libraries use VTLS-89. Smaller facilities use micro VTLS-89, which can be used with a personal computer.
The company's biggest project so far has been cataloging the 37 million volumes of the Soviet Union's State Lenin Libary, the largest library in the world.
Since VTLS Inc. was started in 1985, major research libraries in Finland, Scotland, Australia, Spain, Canada, Malaysia and the Caribbean have followed Tech in using the VTLS system.
The libraries of the U.S. Supreme Court, the National Gallery of Art and the National Library of Agriculture use VTLS-89.
VTLS representatives visit each prospective buyer to find out what each library needs. In Blacksburg, software engineers tailor the programs for the customer.
In the company's Tech Research Park offices, engineers are constantly working on ways to expand the use of VTLS systems.
"We have to stay on our toes," Bazuzi said. "One-third of our money goes into development."
Now being developed are features that will allow readers to look at pages of the book they are searching for. This way, people doing research can examine a volume's table of contents, bibliography, and contributor list before they find the book on the shelf.
Combining visual and audio information is another goal.
The term "hypermedia" describes the software's ability to store pictures, text and sounds separately - and its ability to use them together when the user asks for more information.
Research scientist Newton Lee, who recorded the sounds and programmed them into the computer, demonstrated how VTLS-89 will use the innovation.
The computer screen displayed a page from a book about water plants. He moved the cursor to a photograph of a water lily, and a voice described the plant in detail. Then the cursor was moved to a photograph of a waterfowl and the computer played the sound of a duck quacking.
"We won't have to live with silent terminals any more," Bazuzi said.
Another feature allows a reader to watch and listen as the computer displays pages of a children's book while a narrator reads the story.
VTLS is working on home versions of the program so personal-computer owners can link up to a library's computer with a telephone modem.
But nobody is ready to throw away the old Dewey Decimal and Library of Congress methods of filing books.
The Virginia Tech Library System, marketed under the name VTLS-89, stores catalog numbers, titles and authors - but the computer system makes information easier to get at.
Unlike the card catalog, VTLS-89 finds books by author, title and subject, tells if the book has been checked out, displays search results in seconds, cross-references and prints out bibliographies.
"It's easy to use and it's getting easier," Bazuzi said.
A map feature is particularly useful in Tech's Newman Library, where periodicals - bound paper copies or microfiche - are on three different floors.
The VTLS system started in 1974 when university officials tried to buy a software system to automate Tech libraries. They found nothing on the market that suited their needs, so within a year a Tech research team had developed its own system.
VTLS has developed a program that allows users to do their research in many languages, a necessary function in European libraries.
"One of our innovations is the use of different character sets so users can switch back and forth between languages," Bazuzi said.
"It's exciting that this is happening in a small town in Appalachia," he said. "We have tentacles that stretch all over the world."
by CNB