Through its discussions on planning, using space, and selecting equipment and furnishings, this book, first published in 1988, provides guidance for those who have little or no experience in designing a facility for a special library - one that serves a corporation, government agency, non-profit organization, professional society, or a special subject-oriented library located in an academic institution or public library. Its text is stimulating yet sound, and will serve not only librarians planning new facilities but also those involved in remodelling or renovating existing facilities. The appendices contain descriptions and layouts of four typical libraries, each showing the result of careful, creative planning.

Planning Optimal Library Spaces: Principles, Process, and Practices demystifies library space planning, inspires creative thinking, and offers immediate how-to steps to rectify seemingly hopeless situations. It describes an approach to library space planning that introduces and combines a phased implementation strategy with traditional space planning to allow library transformations and renovations to be done as a single project or a series of smaller, separate, and more manageable phased interventions. It allows libraries to meet current needs sooner, as smaller funding opportunities arise, instead of waiting on completely funded projects to develop. Chapters cover the approach, the importance of community engagement meetings, collection storage strategies, the anatomy of a library project budget, recommendations for getting started, and case studies of both public and academic library planning projects with detailed phasing strategies. Printed in full color with 148 images, this is a must-have book for librarians, architects, government/education administrators, and anyone involved with, or even thinking about a library planning or renovation project.

Learn how sci-tech libraries are encouraging and training end-users to do their own online searching of sci-tech databases. In sci-tech disciplines, efforts to increase collegiate end-user training and on-the-job training in searching are more prevalent in many colleges and business/government organizations. This timely book includes information on how to train end-users to search with both natural language and controlled vocabularies in the sciences, describes a planning assessment for implementing end-user searching in a sci-tech organization, examines how the scientists at a major industrial research organization have begun to do more online searching with the encouragement of the information center, and explores the proactive role that medical libraries have taken in training health care professionals to search MEDLINE.

Here is a fascinating book that describes selected collections of sci-tech archives and manuscripts. Librarians will gain valuable information on the ways in which sci-tech archival material is being handled and preserved in various institutions and organizations. Sci-Tech Archives and Manuscript Collections is a helpful guide that also describes ways in which these often unique and irreplaceable materials are organized so they can be searched and used. Corporate, academic, and governmental organizations are represented, and some attention is given to the international scene. Topics include a description of the American Museum of Natural History collection, a survey of archival materials at zoos and aquariums, a description of the efforts of the American Institute of Physics Center for History of Physics to develop the international Catalog of Sources for History of Physics and Allied Sciences.

Illustrates the nature and use of sci-tech information in relation to the environment. Sci-tech librarians, government researchers, and compilers and editors of noted indexing/abstracting services describe the efforts of their organizations to compile, maintain, and disseminate the large body of sci-tech information devoted to environmental concerns. No index. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Managers from seven federally sponsored libraries in the United States describe in detail their roles and responsibilities. Each librarian writes about the management of his or her own facility and highlights significant features about its collection and services. Management of Federally Sponsored Libraries brings together in one place detailed descriptions of the scope and strengths of federal libraries, the kinds of services they provide, and the manner in which they function. The book provides readers with a unique opportunity to learn about such libraries from the manager's point of view and shows how these facilities are organized, how they use their resources, what equipment and services exist for interlibrary loans and for reference services, and what databases they use to serve patrons. Management of Federally Sponsored Libraries provides a record of the variety of information services being offered by federal libraries in the U.S. and contains insight into how federal managers view their roles and carry out their duties. Distinguished librarians present down-to-earth discussions of what actually happens in the course of business in their libraries. They discuss principles of management, but more importantly, show how these principles apply to the operation of their libraries. A final chapter summarizes the responsibilities of federal librarians and provides an insightful overview of ways to meet the goals and requirements of such organizations. The in-depth coverage of this book provides readers in the general public, as well as librarians, with an exceptional source of information on library services and management. Chapters view a cross-section of various types of libraries, discussing the: National Library of Medicine National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped Research Library of the Federal Reserve System Sixth Circuit Library for the United States Courts U.S. Senate Library Pentagon Library Redstone Scientific Information Center Management of Federally Sponsored Libraries is useful to librarians and information professionals in a wide sphere of disciplines, for those readers with much experience in their profession as well as for students just starting to get acquainted with the broad spectrum of libraries and information centers in existence. Among readers who will find this book a valuable and timely source of information are federal librarians, information resource managers, government researchers, special librarians, and graduate students in library science.

Here is an essential introductory guide on all aspects of law librarianship written especially for non-law librarians, library school students, and beginning law librarians. Although there are several excellent practical handbooks and numerous articles on specific topics of law librarianship for practicing law librarians, Basics of Law Librarianship is the only resource that addresses the information needs of the student or new law librarian. Author Deborah Panella, managing librarian of a large, prominent New York law firm, explores the major areas of law librarianship. She covers vital topics such as the legal clientele, collection development, research tools, technical services, impact of technology, and management issues, and describes what makes law libraries different from other special libraries. She has written a clear, readable volume without excessive detail or the use of special terminology. The bibliography of law library literature and the index add enormously to the book’s value as a major reference.

"An index to library and information science".