The project consists of verifying the physical presence of more than 24,000 volumes on the shelves of the library’s storage and cataloguing approximately 14,000 volumes that are not yet recorded in the Integrated Library System (ILS).
Lille – Angers, August 4, 2026-10 A.M. AureXus today announced that it has been awarded a new inventory and cataloguing project by the Lille’s Public Library.
This project is unique because it combines an inventory, (récolement) phase with a cataloguing phase, both of which AureXus has integrated into an enhanced version of its MEDUSA INVENTORY and MEDUSA CATALOGUING platforms.
Remaining committed to developing advanced software tools and applications for libraries, museums and archives, AureXus has created additional MEDUSA modules to facilitate the identification of and spotting of missing items on the shelves and their selection for cataloguing.
The application creates a precise map of the collections to be processed and enables operators to quickly locate the items requiring verification and cataloguing.
AureXus operators use the application on tablets or smartphones while working deep inside the library’s storage areas, sometimes without Internet connectivity, allowing them to identify the required items efficiently.
The application visually displays the missing call numbers previously identified in the ILS (the "gaps") in the shelf sequence, providing their exact physical location.
The operator checks if the book with the designated missing call number is actually present on the shelf. If it is found, it is immediately placed on a trolley and marked as physically present in the MEDUSA application. If the item cannot be located, it is recorded in the application as genuinely missing.
Once filled, the trolleys are progressively transported to one of the 3 cataloguing image-capture workstations located within the storage areas.
There, an imaging operator uses the MEDUSA Cataloguing application to digitize the title page and other relevant pages required for accurate cataloguing within the MEDUSA processing workflow later on.
The images of the pages together with the data of the call number are sent and stored on the secured AureXus server. Automated processing then begins, using MEDUSA’s integrated OCR and Artificial Intelligence modules, significantly assisting the work of the AureXus’ cataloguing experts.
One of the first stages consists in checking, for each book, whether a bibliographic record corresponding to that book already exists in the Integrated Library System (ILS), by comparing it with all the notices already present in the library database.
The library expects that approximately 1,000 books will already have corresponding bibliographic records. In such cases, AureXus simply attaches the newly discovered copy of the book to the previously existing bibliographic record.
For all remaining items, the MEDUSA workflow attempts to derive bibliographic records from reference databases such as the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) or the Sudoc catalogue. When no suitable record can be derived, a new bibliographic record is created.
This entire process is supervised by AureXus’ professional cataloguing specialists.
The project has just started on site at the end of July 2026 and is expected to continue through the end of the year, with additional phases potentially extending into 2027.
