Intl. Inform. & Libr. Rev. (1995) 27, 225–235

CDS:ISIS: A Statistical Analysis of UsageIn Latin America and the CaribbeanKETTY RODRIGUEZ*

ABSTRACT

The article summarizes, from the literature, the history andevolution of CDS:ISIS. From a directory of 642 entries of databases from the Caribbean and Latin America, a descriptivestatistical analysis was conducted of a random sample of 50%of the entries to show the usage of CDS:ISIS software and itsvarious modalities. The results show that CDS:ISIS, and itsmodalities, is used in 60% of the data bases while D Base,and its versions, ranks second with 20% use. In addition, thedistribution of data bases is noted revealing that Cuba is theleading country in the production of data bases in Latin Americaand the Caribbean.

© 1995 Academic Press Limited

INTRODUCTION

UNESCO is recognized as a leading force in assisting developing countriesto acquire and improve their information infrastructure. Since the decadeof the 1970’s, UNESCO’s General Information Program has been activein assisting developing countries in meeting international standards and inthe creation of programs and techniques in the processing and transfer ofinformation. More recently the scope of UNISIST has been expandedbeyond the fields of science and technology and has made available tothese countries a computerized information system known as CDS:ISIS(computerized documentation system:integrated set of informationsystems). Originally this software was developed for use in the offices ofUNESCO, such as the information clearing house and the library. Thissoftware was later made available in three major languages (English,Spanish and French) to developing countries in Africa, Asia, Latin Americaand the Caribbean.

The impact of the use of this software in these Third World countries

* ALA Fellow 93–94, at the Carlos III University in Spain.Assistant Professor, Texas Woman’s University, USACorrespondence to: 1400 Kenwood Street, Denton, TX 76205, USA

1057–2317/95/030225+11 $12.00/0 © 1995 Academic Press Limited

K. RODRIGUEZ226

to develop data bases has been documented in literature elsewhere. Manyarticles, reports, conference papers and even in a dissertation have beenwritten about the use and development of CDS:ISIS and:or its modalities.This collection of literature can be categorized in three main groups: (1)those publications which deal with the history or evolution of the software;(2) technical literature which discusses the structural features of the softwareand the modifications which have been introduced; and (3) literature whichdiscusses the many varied applications, depending upon the determinedneed, of the software.

There have also been many references in the literature to the ‘‘popu-larity’’ or ‘‘wide use’’ of the software, even a numerical summary ofits distribution, which is easy to understand since the United NationsEducational, Scientific and Cultural Office (UNESCO) distributed it freeto the developing countries. However, there has never been any statisticaldocumentation of the use of this software for Latin America and theCaribbean, or to my limited knowledge for any other region of the world.This study will fill that void for Latin America and the Caribbean andperhaps motivate others to carry out a similar analysis for Asia and Africa.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Rather than attempt to cover comprehensively all which has been pub-lished on CDS:ISIS in Latin America and the Caribbean, this review willmerely touch on a sampling of literature in the three categories outlinedabove. In this article the term ‘‘modality’’ is used to refer to a distinctivetype of ISIS rather than the word ‘‘version’’ which is a particular editionwithin a modality. Therefore, for the purpose of this article, version andmodality are not synonymous. As will be seen, in the literature there arereferences to ISIS or CDS:ISIS, to MicroCDS:ISIS or MicroISIS and toMiniISIS which are three modalities, each unique in itself, and eachruns off a different type of computer. CDS:ISIS runs on a mainframe,MicroISIS runs on microcomputers and MiniISIS runs on minicomputers.

History and EvolutionIn 1975, the International Labor Organization (ILO), an organizationcreated by the United Nations (UN), decided that the ISIS software whichthey had developed could no longer be supported. As a result, the softwarewas made available to other organizations. UNESCO, another body cre-ated by the UN, accepted the offer of ISIS, as did the InternationalDevelopment Research Center (IDRC) of Canada. UNESCO wantedISIS for use on its mainframe computers which at that time were IBM

CDS: ISIS: A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS 227

360, 370, 303x, etc.1,2 The software had to be developed and thus adaptedto UNESCO’s needs. This revision, producing CDS:ISIS, took manyman-hours to carry out (verbal communication, del Biggio) and is con-sidered today as the standard for ISIS, particularly since the ILO no longersupported the ISIS software.

Independently, IDRC developed from ISIS its MINISIS program foruse on the Hewlett-Packard 300 minicomputers. This program, oncedeveloped, was distributed freely to developing nations but as will beshown, has relatively little use in Latin America and the Caribbean. In the1980s UNESCO itself developed MicroCDS:ISIS or MicroISIS for useon IBM Personal Computers and likewise distributed the program withoutcharge to developing countries.

The UNESCO modality underwent some minor modifications in thepreparation of versions in English, French and Spanish which even in thePC version can be loaded simultaneously but do not operate simul-taneously. The data loaded into the program which maybe be in English,French, or Spanish, is not automatically converted into the other twolanguages, but must be translated prior to loading.

More recently, there was another essential modification to MicroCDS:ISIS in response to complaints from librarians who wanted to useMicroCDS:ISIS in the local networks of their libraries but could not. Thenew revision permitted Micro CDS:ISIS to be used in a LAN environmentand thus dealt with the complaint registered by the affected librarians.

Technical LiteratureThe literature in this area is abundant. It describes, evaluates, and:orcompares ISIS and its three modalities and the many versions of each, orwith like-programs available in the marketplace. As indicated above therehave existed three modalities of ISIS, but only two of them are actively inuse since the first modality of the ISIS produced by ILO no longer exists.

While there may be many important differences within these threemodalities it is important to stress that all have evolved out of the originalILO modality of ISIS. The one major distinction which exists between theUNESCO CDS:ISIS and IDRC MINISIS, is that the latter uses relationaldata base functionalities but CDS:ISIS does not. This means that in orderto carry out data exchange, some conversion, which is only possible

1Valentin, R. L. CDS:ISIS and MinISIS: A Functional Analysis and Comparison (Ottawa:IDRC, 1981 pp. 88)

2Pobukonsky, M. ‘‘UNESCO—Cooperative Development and Promotion of theCDS:ISIS System’’ Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science 41 (New York: MardelDekkar, 1986) pp. 339–345.

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because both support the ISO 2709 format, must take place since the twomodalities treat sub-fields differently.1

Wilkinson3 has discussed the versions of MINISIS and recent enhance-ments since IDRC continues to support this modality. An evaluation andcomparison of MicroISIS can be found in Turmaine,4 Besemer5 andNieuwenhuysen.6 The latter author provides a critical comparison ofMicroISIS version 1 released in 1985 with the version 2·3 released in 1989.He concludes: ‘‘Despite the room for improvements in future versionsMicroISIS is a very impressive program in its present version’’ (p. 14).Some of the advantages which he and others identify are (1) an efficientuse of memory space; (2) powerful search capabilities; (3) the ability tohandle sub-fields, and repeatable fields; and (4) Goyal and Kumar7 discussfour out of the five indexing techniques available.

The five indexing techniques of MicroISIS had been singled out earlierby DiLauro (1988)8 as one of its distinguishing features of Micro CDS:ISIS.These indexing techniques are:

(1) the indexing word or phrase is built from the first 30 characters ofthe field;

(2) the word or phrase may be built from the first 30 characters of thesub-field;

(3) the word or phrase (limited to 30 characters) is enclosed in brackets,thus ð. . .Ł;

(4) the word or phrase (limited to 30 characters) is enclosed withinslashes, thus :. . .:;

(5) the indexing of every word in the sub-field or field.

Concerning the last technique Chaudhry9 provides an in depth dis-

3Wilkinson, Julia. ‘‘Medusa: The use of MinISIS in Building Design’’ Program (Vol. 23,1989, pp. 277–285).

4Termaine, Isabelle. Evaluation et Comparison de deux Logiciels Documentaires: Texto et CDS:I-SIS’’ Paris: Meniorie Institute National de Techniques de la Documentation:ConservatoireNational des Arts et Metiers, 1986.

5Besemer, H. et al (1987) Microcomputer Applications for Online and Local Information Systems:A comparison of 30 Software Packages Leiden: VOGIN (Netherlands Association of Users ofOnline Information Systems) Distributed by Johan Van Halm and Associates, P.O. Box688 38100A R Amersfoort, The Netherlands.

6Nieuwenhuysen, P. ‘‘Computerized Storage and Retrieval of Structure Text Infor-mation: CDS:ISIS version 2.3’’ Program (25 1991, pp. 1–18).

7Goyal, R. K. and Kumar, S. ‘‘DBase to CDS:ISIS: A Program to Convert Data fromDBase:FaxBase to CDS:ISIS’’ Program (24, 1990, pp. 181–186.)

8Di Lauro, A. IDIN Manual for the Creation and Management of Bibliographic Data Base UsingMicroISIS (Paris: OECD Development Centre, 1988).

9Chaudhry, Anwar A. ‘‘Adapting CDS:ISIS to Index Hyphenated and Numeric Wordsand Incorporating Case Sensitive Storage and Retrieval’’ Program (24, 1990, pp. 371–379).

CDS: ISIS: A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS 229

cussion on how to index hyphenated, numeric, and alpha-numeric wordswhich is a problem which has daunted many users of CDS:ISIS.

Other improvements of the version 2·3 (1989) of MicroISIS over earlierversions are a speedier file inversion (creation of indexes), programmingwhich allows free text searching, and the use of Pascal language mode forprogramming.9

Literature Concerning ApplicationsIn addition to the fact that UNESCO generously distributes the CDS:ISISprogram and continues to support it with new and more powerful versions,there is the added asset that UNESCO does not discourage users fromadapting the program to their needs. The literature discussing the appli-cations of the program around the world is very rich. Some interestingexamples are: an article by Jacso et al.10 describing a catalog preparedthrough the use of CDS:ISIS of broadcasting programs; another callingattention to the fact that all of Fidel Castro’s speeches have been compiledon a data base using CDS:ISIS11 and in the Ministry of Labour in Canadathere is an agency called The Evidentiary Centre of the Industrial DiseaseStandards Panel which has used CDS:ISIS to compile a data base ofscientific and technical documents of interest to the field of industrialdiseases.12

In spite of the widespread application of the CDS:ISIS UNESCO makeslittle effort to publicize the program. The sole exception is the publicationof the CDS:ISIS Technical Newsletter13or as it is sometimes cited in an abbrevi-ated form UNISIST Newsletter14 which is distributed without charge to thoselucky enough to be on the mailing list. Nieuwenhuysen6 has suggested thatperhaps this low-profile has been prompted by the desire not to offend,and thus provoke reprisals, from commercial software companies. What-ever the explanation, it is a well-known fact that the office of UNESCOwhich supports the use of the CDS:ISIS program is woefully understaffed

9See footnote 9 on p. 228.10 Jacso, P., Szucs, A and Varga, S. ‘‘Micro CDS:ISIS: A Bibliographic Information

Management Software from UNESCO’’ Microcomputers for Information Management (3, 1986,pp. 173–198).

11Raitt, David. ‘‘INFO ’88, October 17–22, 1988, Havana, Cuba Conference Report’’Online Review (Vol. 13, 1989, pp. 247–248).

12Gallina, Paul, Martin, Noella, Gerritsen, John ‘‘Micro CDS:ISIS for Scientific andTechnological Documentation’’, Canadian Library Journal (46, 1989, pp. 35–37).

13Lohner, W. ‘‘UNESCO’’: World Encyclopedia of Library and Information Services 3rd Edit.(Chicago: ALA, 1993, pp. 827–831).

14Hopkinson, A. ‘‘A MARC Database on Your Desk with CDS:ISIS’’ Catalogue and Index(96:97, 1990, pp. 5–7).

6See footnote 6 on p. 228.

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and is unable to answer inquiries from users around the world concerningthe varied uses of the program.

Articles are appearing in many professional journals and newsletters.Some of the more common ones are Alan Hopkinson’s column in theInformation Development and the CDS:ISIs User-to-User Column edited byHugo Besemer in the Quarterly Bulletin of the International Association of Agri-cultural Information Specialist. Also there is a discussion list on Internet con-cerning CDS:ISIS.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purpose of this study is to report on statistical analysis of the usage ofCDS:ISIS and its modalities in Latin America and the Caribbean. Inpassing, the use of other software packages may be noted and identifiedwhen possible and appropriate.

MethodologyIn 1992, the Autonomous University of Mexico compiled and publisheda directory, Directorio de Bases de Datos de America Latina y el Caribe,15 of databases in the area of the Caribbean and Latin America. This directory maynot be the only directory covering this area but it is the only directoryexclusively for these two related regions. The editors and compilers of thedirectory secured information from 21 of the countries of the two regions.Some nations are omitted because they did not respond to the ques-tionnaire or did not have data bases. The work contains 659 entriesdistributed rather unevenly through 19 fields of data. One of these fieldsasks for information concerning the software packages and its variations,utilized in the creation of the data bases. Among those software packagesfrequently mentioned was CDS:ISIS. The directory is alphabeticallyarranged by country. Other fields covered, in addition to the softwareused, include the institution responsible for the data base, the subjectmatter compiled in the data base, which is indexed in the directory andthe number of items in the data base.

Utilizing the information field on the software, contained in this direc-tory, this study will attempt a statistical analysis, using percentages andranking, based on a sample of the data base entries on this topic.

15Directorio de Bases de Datos de America Latina y el Caribe (1992) Coordinada por ElsaBarberena; Compilado por Julia de la Fuente, Patricia Hernandez, Margarita Lugo,Carmen Negrete y Jesus Valdez. Mexico: UNAM, Facultad de Filosofia y Letras.

CDS: ISIS: A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS 231

TABLE IFrequency of field completion

—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Number of fields per entry Frequency of Completion

—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––19 318 317 716 2015 2914 3113 5012 3911 3710 229 488 277 46 1

Total 321—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Limitations of the Study(1) The major limitation is the reliability of the source of information.

In the first place there is no way of knowing as to whether thedirectory has included all of the data bases existent in the tworegions.

(2) Although the editors mention 659 entries there are in fact only 642.It would appear that there is some duplication.

(3) The compilers of the directory could have produced a more reliabledirectory if they had been less ambitious and included fewer than the19 fields of information sought. Some replies demonstrate confusionconcerning the information sought. For example, not all repliesdemonstrated that they understood what was expected in the ques-tion concerning the type of hardware used by the compilers of thedata base.

(4) The same seems to be true of the identification of the software used.In case of doubt, the informant was instructed to leave in blank theinformation sought.

SampleIn order to compensate somewhat for the doubt raised by questionabledata, a large sample was selected randomly. Three hundred and twenty-one (321) entries or approximately 50% of the entries were randomlyselected out of a total of 642 entries. Table I shows the frequency of fieldcompletion in the sample.

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TABLE IIDistribution of data fields completed as a percentage of the sample—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Range of fields completed Number of entries %*—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

19–17 13 4·016–14 80 24·913–11 126 39·310–6 102 31·8Total 321 100

—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––* Distribution of data fields completed as a percentage of the sample.

As can be seen from Table I, the mode of the distribution is 13 with afrequency of 50. The range is also 13. These two measurements tell usmore about the characteristic of this sample than the mean which is 12·5.The median was 12·5.

In Table II is shown the distribution of the fields completed in thesample. A consolidation of the data contained in Table II shows that28·9% of the entries completed from 14 to 19 of the fields while 71·1%completed only 6 to 13 of the fields.

Further analysis of the data revealed that of the 321 entries or 50% ofthe population (642) only 163 completed the field requiring informationon the software. Only one of these entries was judged to be a duplicateand seven entries were discarded, since the information supplied was eithererroneous or confusing, leaving 155, or 48% of the random sample. Incompiling the entries answering in an acceptable manner the softwarefield, it is necessary to state that if several software were mentioned onlythe first reply was judged valid.

Table III shows the software rank and the percentage of use of the 155valid replies of the random sample.

Since the mainframe version of CDS:ISIS has been around for a longtime it is not surprising to see that 44·5% of the users have selected thismodality. It is somewhat surprising to learn that only 13·54% of the usersare using MicroISIS. Now that there is a version of MicroISIS for networksit will be interesting to see the growth in the use of this version over thenext 2 or 3 years.

The other 10 software packages appeared one or two times in thesample and are grouped in Table III under miscellaneous. The usage ofthese software packages accounts for 8·38% of the sample. The majorsoftware used, and selected 93 times or 60% of the sample was ISIS orsome variation of ISIS. In second place is DBase, when combined in itsvarious versions accounts for 31 times selected or 20% of the sample.

The Bibliographic Informatics Division of the Indian National Inform-

CDS: ISIS: A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS 233

TABLE IIISoftware rank and percentage of use

—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Number of

Name of software Rank times selected % of use—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––CDS:ISIS 1 69 44·51MicroISIS 2 21 13·54DBase III 3 13 8·38DBase II 4 12 7·74IBM Stairs 5 7 4·51DBase III Plus 6 6 3·87Find II 7 4 2·58Others* 7 4 2·58MinISIS 8 3 1·93Datatrieve 32 8 3 1·93Miscellaneous** NA 13 8·38—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

* In this category falls software devised by the database creator.** In this category falls 10 software packages which were selected at least once and

in some cases two times. The software is DayFlow, Minimax, Micrograsp, Lorka, ImageLotus, HypoC2, Dobis Leuven, Microbiblos Laser, Notebook, and SCIB (SistemaColombiano de Informacion Bibliografica).

atics Centre developed a utility program which converts data from DBase3 to the ISO 2709 interchange format which is acceptable to CDS:ISIS.The name of the program is DBTOISIS and is described by Goyal andKumar (1990).7 This program offers an alternative to those institutions(20%) in Latin America and the Caribbean should data base managersusing DBase decide to switch to CDS:ISIS.

In addition to the notation of the software field in the sample, furtheranalysis was conducted regarding the distribution of data bases by country.Table IV shows the distribution in rank order by countries in LatinAmerica and the Caribbean of the 155 entries. Table V shows the samedistribution for the Caribbean countries.

In the directory there are 21 countries represented, but the French andsome English nations from the Caribbean are missing as are El Salvadorand Honduras from Central America. In the random sample, 20 countrieswere present but the Dominican Republic joined Panama in failing tomake the valid sample. The entry of the Dominican Republic had to bediscarded since it failed to provide valid information. Random samplesproduce data which would appear to go against logic. Thus the firstcountry in rank is surprisingly Cuba, taking a prominent position overlarger countries like Mexico and Brazil, while Venezuela, which would

7See footnote 7 on p. 228.

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TABLE IVRank distribution of the sample by country

—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Country Data bases—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Cuba 52Mexico 26Brazil 16Argentina 14Chile 13Colombia 9Peru 6Venezuela 4Uruguay 4Costa Rica 2Bolivia 1Ecuador 1Guatemala 1Guyana 1Jamaica 1Nicaragua 1Paraguay 1Puerto Rico 1Trinidad and Tobago 1—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

TABLE VRank distribution by country for the Car-

ibbean region—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Country Data base—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––Cuba 52Venezuela 4Guyana 1Jamaica 1Puerto Rico 1Trinidad and Tobago 1—–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

apparently be high on anyone’s list of countries with data bases, is listedvery low in the random sample. There were 60 or 38·7% of the total inthe sample of the databases from the Caribbean region.

No effort has been made in this study to analyse the format of thesedata bases. Thus they may be available only in magnetic disks on mainframes, in minicomputers or microcomputers, or in CD-ROM format.The latter, CD-ROM format, has been somewhat slow in developing in

CDS: ISIS: A STATISTICAL ANALYSIS 235

Latin America and the Caribbean due to the initial high cost, but thereare some recent encouraging signs that the situation may be changing.

The University of Colima in Mexico has established a Center for CD-ROM Development and has produced, since 1989, more than 50 CD-ROM disks for Mexico and other Latin American countries. The softwareutilized by this Center has been CDS:ISIS and its modalities. One of thesemodalities has been developed for use in the library of the University ofColima. (Interview with Victor Rodrıguez, Director of the Center at theUniversity of Colima. December 5, 1992.)

In Nicaragua, CRIES (Coodinadora Regional de Investigaciones Econ-omicas y Sociales) is marketing a CD-ROM which contains 12 data baseson economic, social, and political material. These data bases in CentralAmerica originated at various times, some as early as 1970 and othersmore recently, after 1989. (Letter to the author dated June 10, 1993 fromBarbara Stewart, Director of the Center of CRIES.)

A world-wide survey conducted by UNESCO on the use and implemen-tation of the CD-ROM prototype shows a general positive attitude towardsthe acquisition and use of CD-ROM. The survey was marred by a lowresponse rate since only 97 responses out of 267 questionnaires werereceived. Of the 97 only 4% came from the Caribbean and Latin America([Paris: UNESCO] August, 1992 CD-ROM UNESCO: Evaluacion delPrototipo. Informe Sintesis).16

In conclusion, this study has shown that the availability of an affordableand appropriate software for developing countries in Latin America andthe Caribbean is critical to the creation of data bases in developing coun-tries.

16CD-ROM UNESCO: Evaluacion del Prototipo, Informe de Sintesis LSIT. Centro de Inter-cambio de Informacion, UNESCO, Agosto, 1992 (DII 92:WS-6) 43 pp.