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In 2006/2007, the Canadian academic library community came together in the largest national LibQUAL+^® consortium to conduct ARL library service quality survey. This paper aims to address how and why the national consortial project came about, the challenges for recruiting and managing participants, and what was learnt, together with possible future directions.

This paper uses a case study approach.

The research touches on the challenges planning and implementing LibQUAL+^® with such a large, diverse consortium, with its bilingual mandate and multiple library types, and what made the project successful and its limitations.

The most apparent accomplishment of this project was successful collection of a large, diverse data set for comparative analysis of services and facilities – a meaningful data set both for individual libraries seeking appropriate Canadian comparators and for analyses by region, institutional categories, etc.

A valuable result of the project was to engage more Canadian academic libraries in the process of service assessment. CARL's bi‐lingual consortium approach will provide a valuable example for other national organisations attempting to carry out similar projects.

Fieldwork is one of the hallmarks of anthropology. Almost all students of anthropology have geographical and cultural specializations, ranging from a small group to a nation. Their interest areas are often identified or marked by real or putative boundaries; and it is within these boundaries that anthropologists have “founded” their own villages and tribes — “my village”, “my tribe.”

All items listed may be borrowed from the Aslib Library, except those marked, which may be consulted in the Library.

Provides an evaluation of the use of the electronic journals service of the library and information service of the University of Patras, Greece. Asks who these electronic journals service users are, how often they use the service, what their reasons for use are, where their access points for use are, and which search methods and services they use. In addition, invites users to choose between an electronic and print journal title subscription and indicate some factors that would discourage them from accessing an electronic journals service.

Few librarians think of U.S. documents as a source for professional reading, growth, and information, yet several agencies of the government are involved with library programs, services, and research. This bibliography is a compilation of some of the most recent documents about libraries published by these agencies. It is an eclectic group, ranging from scholarly research studies to descriptions of model programs. Most of these studies are known only to a small segment of the library profession and have not received wide distribution in the field. The quality of the documents is quite good, particularly the research reports being done out of the Department of Education's Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI) Library Programs Office. Much of the information contained in the surveys and research reports is not available in any other form.

The technical and economic feasibility of providing selective notifications of current books to specialised libraries by extraction from MARC tapes has been explored. An experimental on‐line system ‘MARCAS’ was used to test profile construction and the utility of the various elements in MARC records as search keys. The programs allowed both weighted and Boolean searching on the title and author, LC classification and subject headings, and the BNB Precis indexing terms and Reference Index Numbers. Test profiles were constructed for nine libraries covering a range of subject fields, and run on six weeks of BNB and six weeks of LC MARC tapes. The output was assessed for relevance and recall, and the results analysed in terms of precision and recall for various combinations of searchable fields. The best performance, with recall and precision both about 50%, was given by searching all verbal fields together—title and author, LC subject headings, and (BNB tapes only) Precis indexing terms. Costs for the experimental on‐line system, and a batch version of the system, are identified.

The work of the OSTI‐supported library housekeeping automation projects at the British National Bibliography, the University Libraries of Loughborough, Southampton, Oxford, Surrey, Lancaster, and Bath, and in the Birmingham Libraries' Cooperative Mechanisation Project and the South West University Libraries Systems Cooperative Project is described, and the state of progress of each as at Summer 1973 is indicated.

AFTER the most severe winter in living memory we can look at the position of libraries with some satisfaction. The almost impossible weather energized some libraries as never before and many report a circulation surpassing that of any previous winter. Many circumstances go to such a result. The failure of other types of circulating library, owing to the continuing scarcity of books, to meet demands formerly made upon them is one. The earlier closing than was the case of most places of amusement should also be borne in mind. The disappointing thing about the situation is that we are unable ourselves to supply the best fiction, for example, in editions of which we can be satisfied. We have not been able to take advantage of our opportunities.

IN THIS NUMBER we begin 1962 with articles from the Presidents of the Booksellers' Association and the Library Association. As will be seen, both writers devote some attention to the Net Book Agreement which will almost certainly boil up this year. We had hoped to make it a trilogy and indeed Mr. John Boon, President of the Publishers' Association promised us an article and got as far as drafting it. Then, at the eleventh hour, he wrote to say that it was not possible for him to submit it. Aware of his invidious position at the moment on account of the Net Book Agreement, our regret was tempered by understanding of his decision.

Libraries undertake mechanisation of serials records both as an end in itself to overcome the stresses of inadequate manual systems, and as a pilot stage towards an integrated overall system of automated processes. American Libraries have been experimenting in this field for some years now in both small and large serials holdings. The total systems approach for dealing with serials is recommended and a wide range of possible outputs of a machine system is described. Automation of accessioning individual parts has also been developed but is not regarded as worthwhile for beginners to attempt. Some writers prefer to concentrate on the catalogue outputs and to leave the administrative areas, subscriptions and binding control, to manual systems. Benefits are widely assumed as the result of an automated system but there is as yet little generalisation of relative costs of these systems within individual libraries and in comparison between libraries. Access to computers that have large memories and that operate at high speeds is considered necessary. The system brought in at San Diego between 1961 and 1964 and that is now being thoroughly revised on account of expansion of holdings and with a view to the use of the LC MARC format is the best developed system under review.