Discovery Systems librarian Susan Bond explains that the University of Toronto Libraries’ LibrarySearch blends results from Alma (the catalogue for items like books and journals) with a large database that can include chapter- and article-level content, and suggests AI’s most likely near-term impact is enabling natural-language queries instead of Boolean searching, rather than replacing the catalogue.
Host Jesse Carliner traces Robarts Library’s technological history from card catalogs to computer output microform (COM) catalogues and the Felix online public catalogue (launched 1987), highlighting early collaborations with Calvin “Kelly” Gottlieb, Ritvars Bregzis, and the IBM Toronto Data Center that helped shape the MARC record and produced the University of Toronto Library Automation System (UTLAS) in the early 1970s. Interviews with Carol Moore, Debbie Green, Patricia Bellamy, and Sian Meikle describe costs, resistance, database challenges, email and office automation, CD-ROM and dial-up searching, and the shift to user self-service.
More: uoft.me/robarts50; follow @unquietlibrary on Instagram, Blue Sky, and TikTok.
00:00 Opener- Susan Bond discusses AI and library searching
03:02 Introduction
05:30 Carol Moore- The early days of library automation
08:10 Carole Moore- The closing of the card catalogue
18:02 Debbie Green--The impact of technology on daily library work
21:35 Patricia Bellamy-- Early days of digital research tools
25:06 Sian Meikle- The early days of computing in the library
29:57 Conclusion
Robarts Library 50th anniversary exhibit: http://uoft.me/robarts50
Learn more about the history of automation and computing at the University of Toronto Libraries: Access & Discovery · University of Toronto Libraries at 125 · Exhibits
Bregzis, Ritvars, Calvin Gotlieb, and Carole Moore. \"The beginning of automation in the University of Toronto Library, 1963-1972.\" IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 24, no. 2 (2002): 50-70.
What is a card catalogue? Library catalog - Wikipedia
What is a microfiche/microfilm catalogue? https://lis.academy/organising-and-managing-information/microform-catalogues-space-saving-library-solutions/
What is the DIALOG search system? Milestones:DIALOG Online Search System, 1966 - Engineering and Technology History Wiki
What is a CD-ROM? CD-ROM - Wikipedia
Theme music:
Felipe Sarro, Bach-Siloti - Prelude BWV 855a
Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication
Sound credits:
2 08 Br Lib amb 5.wav by ERH -- https://freesound.org/s/51632/ -- License: Attribution 4.0
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