Functional requirements of e-book catalogs: From perspectives of library users

The amount of ebook publications has been grown rapidly, so does the ebook collection in university libraries. Users have different inquiry demands for ebooks and printed books. Therefore, internet bookstores and ebook stores have fully utilized the features of ebooks to offer a variety of information and value-added features such as full-text preview, cross-selling, etc. In order to understand readers' ebook searching behavior and their demands for bibliographic information, and provide references for university library ebook catalog design, the study selects the ebook catalogs of two academic libraries and two commercial companies, designs 6 kinds of searching tasks, and asks the users of academic libraries to search the catalogs. A researcher observes the searching behavior and interviews the users about their searching behavior. Finally, the study draws a conclusion and provides recommendations in four facets: "current status of search and acquisition of ebooks", "demand for advanced bibliographic information", "view of community sharing and marketing mode", and "demand and recommendation for the function of the library ebook catalogs".