Cooperative Library Automation and the Pica Experience

Abstract

In 1969 a number of Dutch university libraries and the Royal Library decided to cooperate in the field of library automation by creating a consortium for a Project for Integrated Catalogue Automation (Pica). In 1978 an online shared cataloguing system came into operation. About five years later the Pica system began to be used to produce the Dutch National Bibliography and the Dutch Union Catalogue, and to process all the cataloguing activities for over 900 public libraries. The Pica Online Retrieval System (ORS) enables users to consult bibliographic databases and catalogue information from the central Pica database. These central systems, together with local systems such as the Online Public Access Catalogue (OPAC), the Acquisitions System combined with Serials Control, and the Circulation Control System, now constitute a ‘total library system’.