References for the digital library

There's a page on this site with a reading list of really useful resources. I think, though, that some of the books there deserve their own post.

One of these is Elaine Svenonius' book, The Intellectual Foundation of Information Organization (MIT Press, 2000. ISBN: 0-262-19433-3).

I can't summarize its rationale better than how it's described in the first two paragraphs of the Preface:

Instant electronic access to digital information is the single most distinguishing attribute of the information age. The elaborate retrieval mechanisms that support such access are a product of technology. But technology is not enough. The effectiveness of a system for accessing information is a direct function of the intelligence put into organizing it. Just as the practical field of engineering has theoretical physics as its underlying base, the design of systems for organizing information rests on an intellectual foundation. The topic of this book is the systematized body of knowledge that constitutes this foundation.

Much of the literature that pertains to the intellectual foundation of information organization is inaccessible to those who have not devoted considerable time to the study of the disciplines of cataloging, classification, and indexing. It uses a technical language, it mires what is of theoretical interest in a bog of detailed rules, and it is widely scattered in diverse sources such as thesaurus guidelines, codes of cataloging rules, introductions to classification schedules, monographic treatises, periodical articles, and conference proceedings. This book is an attempt to synthesize this literature and to do so in a language and at a level of generality that makes it understandable to those outside the discipline of library and information science.

She succeeds admirably in her goal. The book is first-rate, especially her discussion of subject languages.