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Gives an overview of marine scientific information and library services at local, national, regional and international levels. Discusses the Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Information System (ASFIS) and other international co‐operative programmes designed to improve information flow and exchange, and describes the activities and services of six regional networks. Identifies gaps and deficiencies in currently available services, and considers prospects for the future.

Readers of the current professional literature could be forgiven if they assumed that most library and information operations and services were computerized, and that only mechanized systems were able to cope with present‐day requirements. Perhaps it is right that the literature should concentrate on this rapidly changing and developing subject, but most of the library and information services of scientific research institutions known to the author—which include centres of excellence with worldwide reputations—are non‐mechanized. There are no reliable guidelines as to when it is economic, practical or opportune to switch to mechanized systems, and there are many variable factors to consider. However ‘non‐mechanized’ does not equate with ‘old‐fashioned’, and the present economic climate, with its limits on expenditure and ceilings on staff numbers, makes it likely that manual methods will be employed for many years to come. The following is a description of a non‐mechanized service, catering for the needs of a relatively small local user population, and also providing and offering a variety of services to outside users.

Describes the development and activities of BIASLIC, the Britain and Ireland Association of Aquatic Science Libraries, including the formation of EURASLIC, the European Association of Aquatic Sciences Libraries and Information Centres, and the provision of UK input into the Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts (AFSA). BIASLIC maintains links with several international agencies as well as providing its members with a support network and a collective voice. At a recent conference, concern was voiced about changes in the structure and funding of aquatic science research and the adverse effect this is having on library staffing. BIASLIC’s new Web site aims to become a focal point for disseminating information about its activities and about developments in the UK and Irish information sector.

Comments on the selection of books and journals in the collection, borrowing attitudes and facilities. Notes that a helpful librarian may spell the difference between project success and failure regardless of facilities. Concludes that it would be helpful if senior library users spoke up more vehemently at budget appropriation meetings.

GUEST editor of this South African issue of THE LIBRARY WORLD is Hendrik M. Robinson, Director of Library Services, Transvaal Provincial Administration, Pretoria.

In the past decade, more than 700 million people are affected by some kind of disability or handicap. In this context, the research interest in assistive robotics is growing up. For people with mobility impairments, daily life operations, as dressing or feeding, require the assistance of dedicated people; thus, the use of devices providing independent mobility can have a large impact on improving their life quality. The purpose of this paper is to present the development of a robotic system aimed at assisting people with this kind of severe motion disabilities by providing a certain level of autonomy.

The system is based on a hierarchical architecture where, at the top level, the user generates simple and high-level commands by resorting to a graphical user interface operated via a P300-based brain computer interface. These commands are ultimately converted into joint and Cartesian space tasks for the robotic system that are then handled by the robot motion control algorithm resorting to a set-based task priority inverse kinematic strategy. The overall architecture is realized by integrating control and perception software modules developed in the robots and systems environment with the BCI2000 framework, used to operate the brain–computer interfaces (BCI) device.

The effectiveness of the proposed architecture is validated through experiments where a user generates commands, via an Emotiv Epoc+ BCI, to perform assistive tasks that are executed by a Kinova MOVO robot, i.e. an omnidirectional mobile robotic platform equipped with two lightweight seven degrees of freedoms manipulators.

The P300 paradigm has been successfully integrated with a control architecture that allows us to command a complex robotic system to perform daily life operations. The user defines high-level commands via the BCI, letting all the low-level tasks, for example, safety-related tasks, to be handled by the system in a completely autonomous manner.

BY the time these words appear the majority of those who attend Library Association Conferences will have made tentative arrangements for their visit to Margate in June. Already, we understand, adhesions are coming in as many in number as for any September conference, and, if this is so, the fact will reassure those who have doubts of the wisdom of the change from September to June. We give on other pages some outline of the programme and in Letters on Our Affairs are presented with a Study of the subjects of the papers. Here we can concentrate upon one or two important points.

Smedleys Ltd v. Breed effectively disposes of Section 3 (3), Food and Drugs Act, 1955 as a defence in law in what nowadays constitutes the commonest source of all food prosecutions, viz., foreign matter in food. Their Lord‐ships' judgment is indeed a brilliant exposition of the law on the subject, but the result of their dismissal of the appeal can only be seen, as one of their number stated, that local authorities and magistrates for all practical purposes can ignore the subsection, and from the numerous reports of legal proceedings, this is what they have been doing for many years. It was resurrected in a case, similar in circumstance to that in Smedleys, a couple of years ago, in respect of a snail in black currant jam, in which the snail and black currants were identical in size and appearance.

ELSEWHERE in this number we list libraries which have Esent us copies of their annual reports which we are glad to have. Now and again we are able to elaborate on these, but in the present issue that has not been possible. We would say, however, that these reports are deserving of the attention of librarians generally, and of students at the library schools. They are records of work in progress, and they do suggest the development of library policy. The best of them are of textbook value.

ALL the auguries for the Bournemouth Conference appear to be good. Our local secretary, Mr. Charles Riddle, seems to have spared neither energy nor ability to render our second visit to the town, whose libraries he initiated and has controlled for thirty‐seven years, useful and enjoyable. There will not be quite so many social events as usual, but that is appropriate in the national circumstances. There will be enough of all sorts of meetings to supply what the President of the A.L.A. describes as “the calling which collects and organizes books and other printed matter for the use and benefit of mankind and which brings together the reader and the printed word in a vital relationship.” We hope the discussions will be thorough, but without those long auto‐biographical speeches which are meant for home newspapers, that readers will make time for seeing the exhibitions, and that Bournemouth will be a source of health and pleasure to all our readers who can be there.