Library automation and Open source software in Italy: an overview :
“Library automation in Italy started in 60s in order to computerize the managing process in specialized documentation centres. Between the late 60s and the early 70s library automation started within the two National Libraries (Florence, and Rome) too. During the 80s the National Library Service (SBN) was taking shape, but the process would finish ten years later only. From that time, the world of library automation in Italy is divided into those who joined SBN and those not, with rebounds on the software market. The analysis is focused on the scarce diffusion of open source ILS, although in the history of Italian library automation can be found both products without commercial distributors, and attempts to create native OS products or to release source code files previously of a file owner. Hypothesis are put forward in order to find the reasons of the lacking development of OS ILS advance. The results are compared with figures on other European countries.”
URL : http://eprints.rclis.org/17599/