Library, special library, and documentation (Bibliotheka and documentotheka)

Abstract

From the point of view of library science, our age - according to Ranganathan - constitutes a transition from Library to Library-service. The special library - and to some extent the public library, too - is on the way of becoming from the library proper, as taken in the old sence of the name (bibliotheka), a library of the new type (documentotheka) performing the library-service involved by the work of documentation as well. A special library will fulfil its peculiar function - defined and exemined in detail by Ranganathan and Vormelker - if it developes more and more intensively from bibliotheka into documentotheka. One of the main characteristics of documentotheka is high "inforniation capacity" which it attains with collecting, analyzing, and communicating with the experts concerned a wide variety of documents (e. g. Research Reports) fit for the speediest publication of recent results. Such notions of the library service may be traced back to centuries before - of course in connection with books only (e. g. the life-works of Dury and Cotton des Houssayes), their reception and practical application on a large scale, however, are being realized in our days, and, unfortunately, even now in a way not quite so fast as would be desired. The change over from bibliotheka to documentotheka in the relation of the special libraries of enterprises in Hungary has also begun, but its rate of development should be increased by all means. Moreover, the most important duty for special libraries is to promote more effectively as hitherto the widespread use by research-work and national production the technical literature complied by documentation, thus doing away with one of the worst paradoxes in the field of documentation, the great disproportion between "supply and demand".