The Inventory half course

The inventory of printed books in the Bibliothèque nationale, financed by the Etablissement public de la Bibliothèque de France began in February 1991. The starting period is now over - unexpectedly, it proved to be the object of an intense mediatization. Here are, at half course, the first results bearing both on the staff which proved to be much more stable than expected, and the advance of the project. With 4 millions records, the operation keeps within the time allowed by the initial calendar. It extended in scope when it was used for the Sycomore database : inventory is still the aim, but the call numbers of the documents on the shelves are recorded so that these informations can be identified by any user. As for the books whose absence has been established, the present research has not got far enough to allow us to give a statement of their exact number.
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