Need for Library Software

Industries were made automated and manufacturing got better with time. So why services sector will lag behind. The invention of the computer was a turning point. The computer was upgraded and it got better with each passing day. Gradually Computers made a place in everybody's lives. It made bigger changes in the manufacturing and services sector. As you know Library is one sector where each academician has to go through difficulties while retrieving information. The collection increases with time so you have to organize it. But doing all these things manually is not possible. A computer was brought into the library to manage the collection and provide better services. So Software development started in the field of library and information science in 1964 when INSDOC developed an alphabetization program for the Union Catalogue of Scientific Serials for running on the IBM 1620 model available at IIT Kanpur. So development process was initiated at other institutions. Government and private companies started developing software to automate libraries to increase the retrieval of resources. They wanted to achieve efficiency in library management through Library Software. It also helped to improve the existing library services and introduce new library services. Library Software avoided duplication of the work and provided services to users effectively. The ultimate benefit of using Library Software was to save the time of the users.

Need for Automation of Libraries :

The main motive of Libraries is to make information available in a convenient form at the right time. The following are the reasons for automating the libraries :

1. Information Explosion - As you know there is an information explosion. The amount of information published increased exponentially. The growth of the rate of information is quite high in the fields of science and technology and medicine. The research is going and so publishing is quite high.
2. Space Saving - Every Library faces a shortage of space at one time and moves to the new building but that is also not sufficient after a few years. The application of computers would reduce the pressure on this front of storage. Most of the documents can be digitized and stored in computers. This will help to reduce the space, which is occupied by hard copy.
3. Time-saving - Dr. S.R. Ranganathan's fifth law says "Save the time of user".If computers are made available in Libraries, databases will be created, and thus retrieval of documents will be quick, and thus time will be saved.
4. Availability of Information in Electronic Form - Due to tremendous growth in information technology, the quality of information produced in electronic form increased rapidly. Now many journals are switching from paper format to digital format. I used to subscribe to Journals from the Indian Academy of Sciences but this year 2020, they switched to digital format.
5. Cost-effectiveness - Automation of the library results in saving money in the long run. It will reduce the cost of library operations.
6.  Data Manipulations - The information once entered for one function can be used for other functions like citation analysis, subject index, bibliographies in classified order, etc. The same data can be used any number of times with the same speed and accuracy.
7. Exploitation of Computer Readable databases - The application of information technology can exploit for better advantage, the computer-based database services and internet resources.