Shelfmarks & Classification

Overview

Shelfmarks

Shelfmarks can be found on the book (sticker on the spine) and in the Online Catalogue OPAC [1]. Using the shelfmark you can find the books you have located in the Online Catalogue quickly and easily in the branch libraries [2].

Shelfmarks of the TUM University Library are structured as follows:

0003 MAT 005f 2009 L 23-1(12)+3

0003: The first four digits indicate the location. You can find out which location it refers to in each case by checking the "Holdings" tab in the OPAC under the individual entry.

MAT 005f: The letter/number combination is the so-called notation or classification number and stands for a specific subject area. Books on the same subject are therefore side by side and you can find what you need by browsing the shelves.
All classification numbers are detailed in the TUM Classification System [3].

2009: The number indicates the year of acquisition, not the year of publication of the book. On the shelves you will therefore find the new acquisitions at the end of a system location. Note that new editions are housed next to the older editions, regardless of when the later edition was acquired.

L: The letters A, B and C denote the size of the book; the letter L stands for books from the textbook collection.

23: is a sequential number.

-1: indicates the volume serial number of series or multi-volume publications.

(12): stands for the edition of the book (specified from the second editions onwards).

+3: The copy number for books where more than one is available under the same location mark.

TUM Classification System

The library holdings published since 1982 are indexed by discipline or field of study. The scheme which is used is the TUM Classification System. It consists of 52 main classes with up to 999 sub-classes. The system is (not strictly) hierarchical.

The classification system plays two roles:

Firstly, it facilitates subject access – in addition to verbal indexing with subject headings – by allowing the user to find out which items the library has on a certain subject.
Secondly, it provides information for shelf location in the reading rooms.

Notations

The main classes and sub-classes of the classification system are represented by so-called notations, a system of characters and numbers.
A three character mnemonic letter code identifies the main classes, a three digit numerical code the sub-classes, e.g. ELT 515f.
This example refers to the sub-class Signals Theory and Signals Processing. The key letter f denotes that this is a monograph.

You will find notations:

in shelfmarks [4]: for the shelving of library items in the reading rooms
in bibliographic data: for subject indexing, which you can use for your search in the online catalogue [1].

Link to TUM Classification [5]