Analysis of the reference-retrieval aid of scientific libraries on the websites of agricultural universities

The web pages of libraries of 57 universities were studied. It has been found that only on the websites of 2 universities there are no data about the library. 2 libraries of agricultural universities do not have a web page on the Internet, and 10 libraries on the webpage have information about the availability of electronic catalog (EC) and its description, but there is no link to it, 2 have a link that does not work. The purpose of the study was to determine the status of the reference-retrieval aid presented on the webpages of libraries of agricultural universities. The main element of the reference-retrieval aid on the webpages of libraries of agricultural universities is EC. Libraries of agricultural universities strive to display their collections as fully as possible in the EC, including information about books, dissertations, periodicals, rare books, and works of employees, university publications, educational and methodological publications, Graduation qualification projects. Most libraries use modern software in the EC, which allows for a multiaspect search under various criteria, and use information retrieval languages and dictionaries as search tools. A system of prompts, instructions for working with electronic resources and EC, posted on the webpages of 26 libraries, helps the user to correctly compose a retrieval prescription and effectively use resources. Free access to the EC is organized in 30 libraries, in 8 - by authorization, login and password, which allows access to the EC in 24/7 mode, but 2 libraries can only access to it from the reading room. It is concluded that in modern conditions the EC and databases are the main elements of the reference-retrieval aid of a library of an agrarian university. The general picture of the availability and status of the EC in the libraries of agricultural universities is presented: composition, their search capabilities, accessibility, etc.