The future of reference librarianship as a viable and essential part of the library depends on developing a proactive, participatory, and hands-on approach to automation. This book pulls together the most important elements of change likely to influence library information services and explains them clearly. It covers both the conceptual context and practical real-life implementations of current automation in reference services. The automation technologies include OPACs, CD-ROM, international networks, expert systems, natural language processing, and virtual reality.

In addition to...

This reference identifies information resources concerning virtual reality and provides detailed instruction on how to use these resources in an effective research strategy. Most of the chapters overview particular types of information sources, such as periodical and citation indexes, conference proceedings, technical reports, dissertations, and monographs. The chapters explain how to use these tools to gather information about virtual reality, and discussions of key resources are always placed in the larger context of information-gathering strategies specific to the field. Most of the...