OZ 2011/4

M T 157 ORGANIZACIJA ZNANJA 2011, LETN. 16, ZV. 4 Mr. Kroller at the time had close contacts to two international library organizations, the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, IFLA, as well as to the Ligue des Bibliothèques Européennes de Recherché, LIBER. Through Mr. Kroller I learned how important it is to cooperate with colleagues, different libraries and library organizations. Learning is a continuous process furthered through courses and conferences for ourselves as we can help others to learn by teaching colleagues in our own or other libraries wherever they may be situated. Also the visiting of different library types in the own country as well in other countries is an interesting learning factor. After Mr. Kroller’s retirement I became the director of the library and held that position for fifteen years. In that time I was also the president of the Vereinigung Österreichischer Bibliothekarinnen und Bibliothekare, VÖB, the librarians union in Austria. In each function I needed to cooperate with colleagues of many other universities, taught courses or took part in courses myself. Teaching and learning on every level is a necessity especially in the field of Information. We also were partners in many European programs about digitizing, data archiving, preparing datas also for blind and handicapped persons. This cooperation with university-, national- and public libraries in many European countries was helpful for all participants. In Austria currently the library system ALEPH is being used. Information is distributed frequently to colleagues and exchanged between Germany, Austria and Switzerland in the so called DACH circle using the international country codes of these countries. Changes to another system are being discussed; they are complicated and require large amounts of money. Assessment of user needs in connection with the ability to provide professional development of personnel should help to find optimal solutions for library users. Very early in my career I had the opportunity to visit together with Mr. Kroller the University Library of Maribor. He had frequent contact with Bruno Hartmann, then director of the library, while I was in contact often with Irena Sapac and Zdenka Petermanec. I quite often had the opportunity to work with IZUM when the group was part of the University of Maribor and later when they were a separate organization. I remember the Online-Guide Project for which IZUM worked together with the Alpe-Adria-Libraries, the Austrian KI-Center (Cooperation and Information Center in Vienna). Figure 2: A-A University Libraries The names of Aleš Bošnjak, Franci Pivec, Branko Zebec , Marta and Tomaž Seljak remain in my memory; working with them was a great pleasure for me. I was able to observe and be part of many activities of libraries in the former Yugoslavia, cataloging or professional development within the involved libraries. I then compared these activities with those of OCLC of Ohio State in the US. That was in the nineteen hundred eighties. I notice that there are strong contacts and information transfer between OCLC and IZUM here till today when you signed a cooperation-contract to help users to get better library-services. 2011 " Free flow of bibliographic information" , the theme of this year’s conference, will require ongoing cooperation, education and Life-Long-Learning as part of our profession. Now I am retired, but I am honorary working in UNESCO-Memory of the World, in the Austrian BAM-Group ( B ibliotheken- A rchive- M useen, libraries-archives-museums), in the Austrian Information- Technology-Center (AIT) in Graz or as mentor. Each of these activities I like to do and bring me together with information specialists of different fields. This year for the first time COBISS offers a special postgraduate-librarianship-study-program to alumni, which is used by many of you, my heartfelt congratulations. Sigrid Reinitzer: FREE FLOW OF BIBLIOGRAPHIC INFORMATION