ON THE GEOMETRY OF LIBRARIES

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Abstract
It is shown that to minimize access time to a library collection the items should be arranged so that the access point is distant from individual books in inverse order of their frequency of use. This is shown to lead to several interesting geometrical arrangements for library stacks. The library as a push‐down store would mean that after any book has been withdrawn it is replaced at the head of the shelf, all other books being pushed down to accommodate it. The frequency‐ordered arrangement leads to increases in access efficiency by as much as ten times. Finally an analogy is drawn between such a push‐down arrangement and and human memory as a push‐down store in the brain.

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