Introduction to the third Dawson's research seminar Available to Purchase

Three years ago, John Cowley, on behalf of Dawson's, agreed to provide funding for an annual one‐day research seminar to be held in the Department of Library and Information Studies at Loughborough University. When, in 1989, we began to plan for the third seminar in the series, I suggested we should devote it to workstations. It seemed timely, since they were becoming increasingly a topic of discussion within the information profession. It was, however, immediately pointed out to me by my better‐informed colleagues that ‘workstation’ was a very ill‐defined term. It would really be necessary to specify more precisely what ‘workstation’ meant in this context. For this reason, the seminar, held on 26 June 1990, was Finally entitled, ‘Integrated software workstations in library and information work’. Even given this limitation, the papers presented in this issue demonstrate just how wide a range of activities can be brought under the ‘workstation’ umbrella.