An Online Book-bank Monitoring System

Decisions around planning, funding, staffing, needs, training, IT infrastructure and marketing are some of the main issues facing libraries in the management of online journals. Identifying appropriate dedicated staff to administer and manage online journals is also critical. Some libraries have appointed dedicated librarians who are responsible for all e-resources. However, it is still seen as an additional task of the periodicals and/or cataloguing librarians in some libraries.
Marketing of online journals to users needs constant attention. Libraries that subscribe to full-text databases such as Science Direct have found that 99% of the online journals used by patrons, are the journals that the library subscribe to in print and only 1% access additional titles. I have focused mainly on academic libraries, because very few public libraries have the necessary information technology infrastructure in Africa to make online journals available to their users. Due to some of the issues listed above, it is difficult to really say what the impact of online journals is in facilitating access to information in Africa. African libraries must develop a management model that will suit our circumstances best. Models are being developed in some library consortia such as the Gauteng and Environs Library Consortia (GAELIC).

Thomas (1998) stresses that computerized monitoring has been used for decades to study the behavior of remote users of online library resources. The older method of using transaction log analysis to study how remote users interact with online catalogs and abstracting and indexing services recently has been complemented by the use of Webserver log analysis to study how remote users navigate into and through library-created and library-supported Web sites. The technique is particularly well suited to the task because the behavioral data can be gathered unobtrusively without interrupting the user’s search for information because, compared to in-library use, it is relatively easy to identify discrete search sessions, and remote users are much more reliant on computerized library systems than are in-library users. For remote library users, content, context, and assistance all are delivered through the same channel and interface. The diffusion of remote access techniques and behavior among the information-seeking population raises some fundamental questions about the nature of access. As indicated by (Thomas, 1998 [15]) in his argument above, it’s actually true that with the online monitoring the main library coordinator will be able to easily monitor the activities of other book-banks in the entire university. Besides that, because the library coordinator will be monitoring the activities of the other book-banks remotely, there will be no interruption in their daily
duties. This will help in turn help the top management to implement timely decisions
making processes.

2.4 Related Information Systems:
2.4.1 A Case study of the automation of the library at Moi   University, Kenya. (Kibet Bii and Wanyama, 2001 [16]) have examined what influence the automation has had on the job satisfaction among the staff of the Margaret Thatcher Library (main library). They conducted their study by interviewing the university librarian, his deputy and the system librarian. 24 librarians working in the library, with different positions, answered questionnaires. Due to the automation, the way of dealing with different services and information material is changing. Therefore the automation brings a change in the way the librarians relate to their work, which might affect how satisfied they are with the job.
Moi University Library was established in 1984, first shaped the idea of automating the Library was shaped in 1988. However, at this state, it was still only an idea and a proposal had to be written to get funding. In 1992 the Moi University Library got their proposal granted, the British Overseas Development Agency (ODA) agreed to finance the automation project. The same year, the library got two microcomputers that the library staff was going to use for training in cataloguing. Not until 1994 did the actual automation of the library start. A local area network (LAN) was established by 1996. 
(Kibet Bii and Wanyama 2001 [16]) claim that, in the beginning of the automation, the library did not have any official policy document or any prior objectives for the automation project. The major driving force for the change, the library team of the Moi University Library argues; resulted from “a global need for effective and efficient ways of processing and accessing information. When the library became financed by ODA, training was not a priority, and the library hoped to get funds from another donor for that issue. However, ODA eventually agreed to fund some training. Since a lot of staff at the library was not even computer- literate at this point, a basic computer-literacy course was arranged. One librarian was sent abroad to the UK for training in library automation, for twelve months. He then became the system librarian and the only one fully trained in an automated library system. The circulation and cataloguing modules have been fully automated in the main library, and also all the branch libraries have automated these operations. All governments and many international and private agencies invest in higher education.
However, although there is widespread commitment in principle to such investment in Africa, development of library and information services is generally perceived to be inadequate and inputs into library  development  have been  typically small scale, piecemeal and lacking in co-ordination. At the same time university libraries have remained central to the management of scholarly communication and for centuries they have been repository of the written record and a powerful symbol of human intellectual a chievement. Although traditionally libraries have been the most important of the university facilities in supporting advanced scholarship, today, perhaps as never before fundamental  questions  are   being  raised  concerning  their  nature  and  purpose  as institutions. A number of issues are at play. First, there is the explosion in the quantity of desirable published material and secondly rapid escalation of unit prices of these items. These jeopardize the traditional research mission of the university library of creating and  maintaining large self-sufficient collections for their users. The third is the rapid  emergence and development of electronic information technologies, which make it possible to envision radically more efficient ways of organising and managing collections but which present a big challenge of adaptation.  The central purpose of libraries is to provide access to information to support the objectives of their parent institutions or interests of the communities they serve. Information has become a key resource in contemporary social and economic life upon which countries, organizations, and individuals depend in managing their affairs. In this sense libraries take part directly in research process and hence are components of knowledge innovation, and are involved in the diffusion and conversion of knowledge thereby acting as bridges for turning the results of knowledge into realistic productive entities. Therefore libraries as centres for collection, processing, storage and distribution of information and knowledge represent a crucial link in the development of knowledge and are important ideological and cultural force with far reaching implications for the society.
In relation to the online monitoring system, the coordinator will be able to carry out his work efficiently during the process of monitoring the activities of other book-banks hence this will bring change in relation to their work and satisfaction.
2.4.2 British Library case study in the provision of bibliographic record in the UK Library Management The British Library currently maintains twenty-two databases accessible via the British Library Automated Information Service (Blaise), which was launched in 1977. Among these databases is the BNBMARC database. In 1974 British National Bibliography Ltd, a non-profit consortium of various bodies established in 1949, was absorbed into the new British Library, forming the nucleus of the National Bibliographic Service (NBS). The NBS continued to produce the printed British National Bibliography (BNB), which provided bibliographic access to the publishing output of the UK and the Republic of Ireland. The NBS also made machine-readable records available in UKMARC format on the BNBMARC database for those items, which would appear in the printed BNB. There are three routes by which records are created for the BNBMARC database.

Firstly Cataloguing-in-Publication (CIP) records are created by a contract agency, currently Bibliographic Data Services, and are upgraded to full NBS records when the British Library legal deposit copy is received. Secondly, records are created directly by NBS for items received by the British Library under the legal deposit laws. Thirdly, records may be created by the Copyright Libraries Shared Cataloguing Programme (CLSCP) partner libraries of the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford, Trinity College Dublin and the National Libraries of Scotland and Wales. These are later augmented by British Library staff with Dewey decimal classification and with subject headings on receipt of the BL legal deposit copy, (Chapman, 1997 [17]).