Information retrieval is the process whereby data or documents are found in the attempt to deal with inquiries that have been posed. The sophisticated retrieval systems like most online bibliographical search systems and complex card catalogues have made changes in the expression of inquiries. Online bibliographical retrieval systems are usually post-coordinate systems wherein complex searches are formulated from their constituent concepts at the time of searching instead of depending on selecting complex descriptions composed when the documents was catalogued. It is, therefore, comparatively easy to expand searches. As we move into the electronic era of digital objects it is important to know that there are new barbarians at the gate and that we are moving into an era where much of what we know today, much of what is coded and written electronically, will be lost forever. Enormous amounts of digital information are already lost forever. Many digital library collections will not have originated in digital form but come from materials that were digitised for particular purposes. Those digital resources which come to libraries from creators or other content providers will be wildly heterogeneous in their storage media, retrieval technologies and data formats. The present volume describes the characteristics, opportunities and issues of digital library systems. It also presents the methods, peculiarities and challenges in the retrieval of digital information.
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