European National Libraries and CD‐ROM: A cooperative project

Following pilot CD‐ROM projects in 1988 carried out by the British Library and the Bibliothque Nationale, Paris (jointly) and the Deutsche Bibliothek, Frankfurt (in parallel), 1989 has seen the publication of the national bibliographies of those three countries on CD‐ROM in compatible forms and with a commitment to keep the products in step wherever possible. This is, however, by no means the end of the story. Encouraged by the success of this cooperative venture and confident in the suitability of CD‐ROM as a distribution medium for bibliographic data, discussions have been taking place over the last twelve months on ways of ensuring a common development path and of sharing the expertise gained by these three national libraries with other national libraries. A project has now been set up and this article will give a brief description of its main aims and some of the expected results.