East Sussex County Library's implementation of URICA

East Sussex are noted pioneers in library automation: they were the original users of BL (then BNB) cataloguing data under the BRIMARC project in 1974 and have also been running a Plessey hard‐wired circulation system since the very early 70s. It says something for the endurability of these systems that it was not until late 1986 that East Sussex's second generation system was installed; this was the URICA system from McDonnell Douglas Information Systems Ltd (MDISL). East Sussex is potentially one of the largest URICA sites in the UK, spread over a large county network; it is also a public library which has a long commitment to MARC cataloguing and to providing a relatively full catalogue record for non‐fiction materials. The Library is still in process of implementing the new system; however, after nearly a year's live running, information is to hand on the data conversion exercise, on how the progressive induction of branches into the system is proceeding and on features difficult to demonstrate outside an operational environment such as print runs, back‐up, recovery etc.