Some evaluation of the russian libraries online catalogs search capabilities

The problems of organizing the information retrieval in library catalogs both in the “historical” aspect (with reference to traditional card catalogs and printed catalogs) and in the modern aspect, conditioned by the development of information technologies, Internet, and universal search engines, are under consideration. The analysis is made and the shortcomings of the existing online catalogs of various scientific libraries of the country are revealed. A number of examples of incorrect query processing by catalogs of leading libraries of Russia are considered. The conclusion is made about the necessity of a new approach to the design of scientific libraries online catalogs. These catalogs should give the user all the information he/she needs without information noise. When creating software shells of modern online catalogs, on the one hand, it is necessary to move away from the traditional library ideas about catalogs, significantly limiting their search capabilities, and on the other hand — from the logic of the universal Internet search engines, giving the user thousands of percent of information noise.