The Library-Bibliographical Classification (LBC): current status and prospects

The chief editor of the LBC (from February 1997) talks about how he turned out to be in this position, what tasks he set for himself, what he managed to accomplish. LBC was highly appreciated by the world classification community. As the National Classification System of Russia, the LBC is used in the vast majority of libraries in the country – and not only in scientific or public, but also in many other libraries. By the end of the second decade of the XXI century the country has a new system, completely de-ideologized, updated, significantly different from the Soviet LBC. Published full, medium and abridged schedules, and specialized schedules version for school and children libraries. Complex and systematic scientific and methodological work were organized. Established a permanent consulting activity. The functions of the LBC have changed, but many librarians do not understand this, despite the constant explanatory work. Today the tasks of organizing an open library space and systematic arrangement of book collections provided to readers are put forward in the first place. The tasks of deep search in catalogs were relegated to the background due to the unwillingness of automated systems programmers to create an effective classification search. The quality of OPACs remains very low. Existing tools hardly provide a verbal search. Experts know that only a search using modern classification systems can be more effective – complete and deep. The author examines in detail the problems with which a small team of the LBC Development Research Center constantly meets. First of all, this is a misunderstanding of the importance of working with the National Classification System on the part of management bodies. The second most important problem is personnel training. If these problems are not solved, the country will not be able to maintain a unique system. In the final part of the article the author speaks about the medium-term program of activities in the field of LBC. 

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