What is the title of the definitive book that lists detailed lists
with an introduction that explains the Dewey Decimal Classification
(DDC)? (And the other three classification systems. Four Major
Classification Schemes: Library of Congress Classification (LCC),
Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC), Universal Decimal Classification
(UDC), Colon Classification (CC)
. http://alexia.lis.uiuc.edu/course/fall1998/lis380/week07/cls_scheme.html).
I would like to purchase these four books (from amazon perhaps),
understand the systems and organize my own special library. Or
organize a library by one of the four systems. (Besides the four,
which other systems exist?).

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Request for Question Clarification by justaskscott-ga on 04 Apr 2003 08:08 PST

I, or another Researcher, might be interested in answering your
questions.  However, I believe that answering these questions well
will require more time and effort than the average amount of time
andeffort associated with this price.  Here is a link to guidelines
about the pricing of questions:
    
http://answers.google.com/answers/pricing.html    
   
You might wish to split this into separate questions, so that we can
provide individual answers to these questions.
   
However, if you wish to keep this as a single question, you can raise
the price and also post a clarification here stating that you have
raised the price.

Also, you might wish to clarify: whether you are asking for one book
that deals with all four systems, or four books (one for each system);
whether your understanding is that there is only one book (or four
books) that would be "definitive"; whether you would need a book
relating to any other (presumably major) clarification systems that
might exist; and whether you need information on where to purchase the
book(s).

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Clarification of Question by courious-ga on 04 Apr 2003 11:39 PST

I'll split the question...

While Ranganathan's Colon classification was always held up to us as a
great idea during my library studies, I have never come across anyone
who uses it!

If your library is specialised in certain subjects, you may well find
that these general schemes are too broad, and may want to subdivide
some of the categories more finely, find a scheme which is restricted
to certain subjects, or construct one to suit your own needs.  My own,
perhaps prejudiced opinion, is that LoC is too subjective and
unintuitive, but again, being on the other side of the Atlantic, I
don't often come across libraries which use it.  I love UDC, but it
does take a lot of getting used to.  I needed a couple of months
before I was able to reclassify a small faculty library with UDC.  It
can get very involved if you get carried away!

Also, you need to take into account that purchasing the actual schemes
could be an expensive proposition. For example, the LoC schedules and
index for social sciences alone costs $130 on Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0837793505/qid=1049473942/sr=2-3/ref=sr_2_3/002-3999419-0076048
An abridged version of Dewey edition 13 for small libraries costs $90,
and the full current edition costs over $300 
http://www.oclc.org/dewey/products/index.htm#dewey22

Hi courious,

Have a look at these two books at Amazon:

Learn Dewey Decimal Classification 
Learn Library of Congress Classification
Two books from Amazon: $57.00
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0810836947/ref=pd_bxgy_text_1/103-5835827-9207812?v=glance&s=books&st=*

hummer

Thanks, Thanks, Thanks.