Eleventh Annual International Library Automation Perceptions Survey

On March 17, Library Technology Guides posted the results of its most recent International Survey of Library Automation:

"3,992 libraries completed this year's survey, providing sufficient data to focus the analysis more on each category of library type and size rather than aggregating across all responses. Libraries of different sizes and types bring different expectations to their systems, making it essential to segment survey results to make meaningful comparisons and extract trends. The functional requirements of public, academic, school, and other types of libraries overlap to a certain extent, but in other areas each has distinctive, if not contradictory, functionality. Some of the products represented in the survey have been designed for specific sectors. For those used by multiple types of libraries, the analysis of the survey results by size and type of organization provides an opportunity to observe any differences in satisfaction across these categories."

"Some interesting themes can be seen in the analysis of this year's survey results. Large libraries of all types have complex requirements and evaluate their systems on a much harsher scale than smaller organizations. Conventional integrated library systems dominate public libraries, with top scores going to proprietary products in the largest tier and to those based on commercially supported open source software in the mid-size category. Small and very small public libraries also favored proprietary ILS products. In the academic library sector, survey results reveal interesting patterns regarding the newer generation of library services platforms. These products received strong marks in most categories but are perceived as less capable for managing print resources than legacy ILS products. Small libraries give superlative scores to products able to meet their basic requirements without complex features they don't need."

The annual survey has been conducted every year since 2007. The results of all previous surveys are available on the Library Technology Guides website, which is maintained by Marshall Breeding, a well-known library automation expert.