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The origins of librarianship in Uganda are indicated and the legislation affecting bibliographic control in the country described. Issues are discussed including publishing, a national library and national bibliographic agency, information technology, education and standards. Factors affecting the current state of bibliographic control in Uganda are examined and relevant agencies and publications listed. Strategies for further development are put forward and recommendations made.

Information, owing to its nature, has numerous capabilities. Through utilizing these capabilities, information systems can add to the value of information. The purpose of this paper is to explain where and how added value emerges from the work processes in library and information professions.

The paper begins with a review of the related literature and then takes a conceptual approach to discuss different values of information and IR systems; elaborates on how each of the processes such as assessment of needs, selection, description/organization, storage/processing, search/retrieval, and dissemination generate capabilities that lead to added value.

The paper identifies that added value is generated through processes such as reproduction, exchange, transfer, refinement, analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and regeneration of information. Many such processes turn information into knowledge.

This paper is based on the author's reflections on the matter of added value generated by library and information practice. Further empirical studies are needed to substantiate the extent to which such values are generated through information systems and services in the real world.

Librarians and information specialists can find through their working practice how to design systems and services which can generate added value for information.

In the present evolving conditions, library and information professionals are able to add to the value of information by sharing their knowledge with the expertise of computer scientists and finding a variety of ways and up‐to‐date methods of optimizing existing systems, as well as designing new systems. These are the two strategies along which the profession should guide its educational, research and practical endeavors.

As the theme of this conference implies, librarianship itself is inherently an act of co‐operation. We are communications specialists bridging the gap between information and ignorance, by organizing information so that we can use it, and by organizing ignorance so that we can find information to match it. A part of this effort is the exploitation of the total resource of recorded knowledge, and the catalogue is one of the most valuable tools that we use in this exploitation, provided that, as with all tools, we keep it in good order, and know how and when to use it. In recent years and even in recent weeks, much has happened both directly and indirectly to promote co‐operation in the field of cataloguing; sometimes these developments have occurred because cataloguers have recognized a need and they sometimes form part of a larger movement for professional co‐operation. In this paper I should like to concentrate on an important aspect of the whole problem of co‐operation in cataloguing, and that is the nature of the relationship between the problem itself and its practical solution. I intend to offer a summary of the way in which the problem has developed and the way in which different kinds of solutions have been proposed, since perhaps one of the most important things we can do as librarians to ensure effective co‐operation in the future is to examine the very peculiar nature of the situation that faces us. We may then confirm the developments that are now taking place, or we may begin to wonder if some of them are not likely to suffer the same fate that has overtaken attempts at co‐operation in the past.

A recent new entrant on the library scene in the UK is a Danish library system called the Supermax Library System. A UNIX‐based turnkey system particularly suitable for large academic and public libraries, the Supermax Library System has become well established in Denmark. Its producers — Dansk Data Elektronik A/S (DDE) of Copenhagen are now looking at extending their marketing to cover other European countries. While particularly well designed for the Danish marketplace, DDE have successfully translated the system to English and their commitment to the UK market is clearly in evidence through their presence at a number of the big library exhibitions over the past year.

Although it will be natural for me, as a Unesco official, to talk of national and international bibliography with a special reference to the role which Unesco is playing in the development of bibliographical services, I do not propose to stress Unesco's work as if it had validity in itself, but rather to look at national and international activities from the somewhat favourable viewpoint of a person in Unesco whose duty it is to see the world picture as a whole and to contribute to the clarity of the picture by fulfilling certain planning functions. It has constantly been stated in our programmes that Unesco's role consists chiefly in stimulating, promoting and co‐ordinating activities, but in order to do these things well we have occasionally found it necessary to enter into the active field of bibliographical production ourselves. Where we do so, as in the production of Fundamental Education Abstracts, the new Index Bibliographicus and certain other bibliographical guides, it is only because we believe that by efficiently assuming responsibility for production, or for the actual organization of a bibliographical project, we may fulfil our major responsibilities of helping and stimulating national or international organizations to do whatever is necessary themselves. There are, in fact, few tasks which Unesco has undertaken which in other circumstances could not have been undertaken, or previously were not undertaken by independent or national agencies.

Although the “open access” and “bibliography” appear to be contradictory concepts, as the first applies to the idea of direct and unrestricted access and the use of the resources' content and the latter refers to the list of resources' descriptions, the issue of open access to bibliography is widely discussed by the librarians' community nowadays. This paper aims to elaborate on the subject of the Polish national bibliographic agency's approach along with its experiences and problems.

“Open Access to National Bibliographies: Best Practices and Business Models” was the subject of the Bibliographic Section's session of the IFLA World Library and Information Congress that took place in Gothenburg in 2010. This article is based on a discussion paper presented at the session.

The better realization of the idea of “open access” to bibliography needs more effort and further cooperation among the libraries, publishers and institutions of law especially in respect of copyright, legal deposit and press laws. International exchange of experience and popularization of good practice in this field is necessary for success and inclusion of the national bibliography into open bibliographic universe.

The Polish National Bibliography is a public good, i.e. a non‐commercial product. Its principal aim is to give complete and reliable bibliographic data about the intellectual and cultural heritage and to make them easily accessible not only for librarians and other actors of the publishing market, but also for the general public.

Formats for the exchange of bibliographic data use the ISO 2709 record structure which started out as the structure for the Library of Congress MARC format. The UNISIST Reference Manual was an early international exchange format developed by ICSU‐AB and Unesco and included cataloguing rules suitable for use by A & I Services. The national libraries developed UNIMARC under IFLA auspices as their exchange format since the national formats were not totally compatible. Unesco, concerned about the lack of compatibility between the major international exchange formats, sponsored a symposium, resulting from which a Common Communication Format was developed and ISO began work on a data element directory. International formats also exist for nuclear and agricultural information as well as for serials data. Other formats exist which are used internationally and have different structural characteristics. The International MARC Network Study Steering Committee has taken an interest in the exchange of bibliographic data and has organized a test of UNIMARC and supervised a UNIMARC Handbook to clarify the format. International exchange formats tend to acquire accompanying cataloguing rules: indeed they will only be really effective if there are internationally accepted cataloguing rules and authority files.

This paper reviews BIBLINK, an EC funded project that is attempting to create links between national bibliographic agencies and the publishers of electronic resources. The project focuses on the flow of information, primarily in the form of metadata, between publishers and national libraries. The paper argues that in the digital information environment, the role of national bibliographic agencies will become increasingly dependent upon the generation of electronic links between publishers and other agents in the bibliographic chain. Related work carried out by the Library of Congress with regard to its Electronic CIP Program is described. The core of the paper outlines studies produced by the BIBLINK project as background to the production of a demonstrator that will attempt to establish some of these links. This research includes studies of metadata formats in use and an investigation of the potential for format conversion, including an outline of the BIBLINK Core metadata elements and comments on their potential conversion into UNIMARC. BIBLINK studies on digital identifiers and authentication are also outlined.

This article describes a model for the standardisation of names in bibliographic databases. A prototype that was developed to demonstrate the feasibility of the model is described. Lastly, the impact of implementing this model is investigated. It was found that the new model will revolutionise name authority control. The literature supports such a change. It was also found that the prototype developed verifies the technical feasibility of its implementation.