COBISS: National Union Catalogue Online bibliography and gateway to other resources

In 1987, a shared cataloguing system as the common basis for the library information system of the former Yugoslavia was designed. Before Yugoslavia’s disintegration in 1991, the shared cataloguing system was renamed COBISS – the Co‐operative Online Bibliographic System & Services. It later became the synonym for the library information system of Slovenia. Today it connects over 220 Slovenian libraries. It provides the libraries with conditions necessary for shared cataloguing at a national level, including bibliographies and the automation of local functions. COBISS/OPAC enables the users to access information sources in the wider Internet environment. While COBISS software is used by some of the libraries in the territory of the former Yugoslavia, in Bosnia and Herzogovina too, COBISS/BIH, an independent co‐operative library system, was established in 1998. The COBISS system is an example of how to develop an efficient co‐operative library system as one of the vital segments of the information society in an environment primarily occupied with current problems of transition.