SOME PROBLEMS OF THE INDEXING OF SPECIALIST MATERIAL DRAWN FROM SEVERAL DISCIPLINARY SYSTEMS

Some problems arising in the combination of discipline‐oriented retrieval systems for the purpose of constructing a specialized retrieval system for a multidisciplinary topic are considered. Data taken from a study of a proposed specialized system for the literature of Numerical Methods are used to estimate the extent to which the discipline orientation of the individual indexing schemes is likely to affect the performance of the specialized system. A compromise solution involving an augmented combined index is suggested.