Joanna,

You may want to ask your subscription vendor if they can supply a list of
your titles with a scale (1 to 5 is the most common) for ranking journal
titles.  You can also ask if your vendor can divide the list by your fund
codes or a subject arrangement of some kind, unless you want to send the
entire list to all users.  Also, if your vendor can provide your
subscription list on diskette you should be able to create a database
relatively easily for your titles.  If you use more than one vendor, its a
matter of merging the data or creating multiple databases.   Any database
management software, such as Microsoft Access, Paradox or DBase, will work.

Lisa A. Macklin
Head, Serials Control Dept.           Phone:  (404) 894-4517
Georgia Institute of Technology     FAX:  (404) 894-1723
Library and Information Center      e-mail:  lisa.macklin@library.gatech.edu
Atlanta, Georgia  30332-0900

Original message:

At 03:38 PM 2/16/98 +0100, Joanna Tousley-Escalante wrote:
>Our library will undertake a badly needed review of journal use/need
>this year.  As we consider instruments to weigh the "need" value, I
>would like to hear from those of you who have undertaken this exercise
>in the recent past, or who have a regular review set up for use
>periodically.
>
>We are considering how to ask them to rank their need and are
>considering offering them a scale of 1-3 [3 being need very much; 1
>being only some need].
>
>What other ranking or grading options do you consider that allow staff
>to indicate value to them while giving us the option to cut if budget
>requires this?
>
>Also, has anyone found software to assist in such an endeavor?
>
>Our thanks in advance for your thoughts on this question.
>
>Regards,
>Joanna Tousley-Escalante
>
>*       Head Technical Services Unit
>*       VIC Library - Vienna, Austria
>*       International Atomic Energy Agency
>*       j.tousley@iaea.org