The Munich 1990 Conference: The Case for Retrospective Cataloguing

Abstract

A first international conference on retrospective cataloguing, which took place in Munich in 1990, considered reports on retrospective cataloguing in a wide range of European countries and in North America. The conference sessions confirmed that the conversion of the catalogues of research collections into machine-readable form has a high priority in most of Europe, but also that many barriers hamper the transborder exchange of descriptive information about holdings of older books in European research collections. It was agreed that a mechanism was desirable for ensuring the compatibility of existing or proposed formats or the conversion of one format to another and that the costs involved should be established, so that a common pool of records could be created and unnecessary duplication of effort thereby avoided. A European Working Group on Retrospective Cataloguing was set up with the aim of enabling access to significant databases of records for printed materials (1500–1900) throughout Europe and to other countries that might wish to have access to European records.