[11323] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
Re: Are backup catalogues needed?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Peter Graham, RUL)
Thu May 22 20:32:20 1997
Date: Thu, 22 May 1997 16:13:23 -0500
From: "Peter Graham, RUL" <psgraham@rci.rutgers.edu>
In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 21 May 1997 20:18:13 -0500
To: PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU
Reply-To: "Peter Graham, RUL" <psgraham@rci.rutgers.edu>
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
From: Peter Graham, Rutgers University Libraries
At Rutgers, we have been running a Geac 9000 also for some years (and will be
moving to a new vendor this summer). We have not provided a backup catalogue
and our downtime has been sufficiently low to justify this. A decade or so
this was a major consideration with many users. We took the stance here (as
others have) that an online catalog is a different creature from a card
catalog. It's true that a card catalog is always "up"--but only when the
building is open and if you can get to the library. Our online catalog is
sometimes down, but at other times it is far more accessible than a card
catalog. We took the position that the balance justified our not investing
in a costly backup system.
In fact we have had (for historical reasons) a fairly complete microfilm
catalog of most of our holdings up to the late 1980s. It is seldom used.
--pg
Peter Graham psgraham@rci.rutgers.edu Rutgers University Libraries
169 College Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08903 (908)445-5908; fax(908)445-5888
<URL:http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/pghome.html>
