Synopsis Modern descriptive cataloguing theory and practice has developed over the past 150 years as means of organizing information for retrieval in libraries. Library catalogues typically consist of a collection of bibliographic records that describe published materials, usually as the name implies in the form of printed books but also including cartographic materials, music scores and manuscripts. The standards and cataloguing codes originally developed to support this activity have expanded to include a range of newer publishing media, typically sound recordings, microforms, video recordings, films and computer files.