Whether in western countries or in China, the formation and development of information science are closely related to the development of its information activities, information work and information undertakings. The theory and activities of modern information science mainly began after the Second World War, which is the product of the high development of science and technology. Shannon's "information theory", Weiner's "cybernetics" and the birth of electronic computer laid the theoretical and material foundation for information science respectively. The development history of information science can be divided into four stages:

Incubation and formation stage (mid-1940s to late-1940s)

Around the Second World War, the development of science and technology in western industrial countries gave the social demand and foundation for the birth of information science. Some countries, mainly Germany, Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union, have accumulated a large number of scientific and technological documents and research results that need to be processed and utilized. Western countries have substantially increased their investment in research and development; Computers came out and were used in the field of document processing; New academic ideas are active and new disciplines are constantly being born. These factors have become a powerful force that breeds and forms information science. American and British scientists V Bush and s·c· Bradford laid the theoretical foundation for the primary stage of information science. The former published "Sincere Thinking" in 1945, and put forward the idea of mechanized document microfilm retrieval for the first time; The latter published the article "Improvement and Expansion of the Content of Literary Works" in 1948, emphasizing the situation that literary works that had flourished since the 1990s had to be innovated in the 1940s. The combination of the two forms a historic transformation from literary work to information science. During this period, the most important international activity in the development of information science was 1948 International Scientific Information Conference organized by the Royal Society. At this stage, information science initially formed the research system and content: information organization, information storage and retrieval equipment, machine translation and information requirements. Americans M. Taubel, C. N. Morse, A. Kent, H. P. Luen and others have successively developed the principles or devices of unit word index, thesaurus index, combination index, subject keyword index and subject-specific information service, which laid the foundation for the development of information retrieval technology. Brits Bradford and B.C. Vickery studied the literature distribution theory, R.A. Fersan's classified retrieval theory and C.W. Claveden's evaluation of retrieval system performance around 1950s.

1957 is the turning point of this stage. American scientist C. Charry announced that American information science will unify all kinds of exchange research and activities. In the same year, in the United States, manual information retrieval began to turn to computer retrieval system more and more. Since then, information science has become more and more powerful as a new interdisciplinary subject.

China's information science started late, starting in the 1950s. From 65438 to 0956, the Institute of Scientific Information was established by China Academy of Sciences, which marked the beginning of scientific information in China. The publication of Scientific Information Work (later renamed Scientific Information Work) from 65438 to 0957 introduced the present situation and development of information work at home and abroad, which aroused the interest of scholars in discussing the theory of information work and was the beginning of information science research in China. 1958, the institute was led by the State Science and Technology Commission and renamed as China Institute of Science and Technology Information, which not only provides staff services for leaders' decision-making, but also faces scientific research units, universities, factories and mines all over the country. In the same year, Ding Ke and others studied, introduced and compiled the International Decimal Classification for the need of sorting out intelligence data, which was the early activity of the intelligence department to study intelligence theory. 1958 held a national conference on scientific and technological information work, and put forward the guiding principle of "wide, fast, precise and accurate" for the first time. From 65438 to 0958, information review and analysis began to appear in China. On this basis, it has gradually developed into an information research work with China characteristics, and its achievements are comprehensive, strategic and contemporary. China Institute of Science and Technology Information also established China University of Science and Technology Information at 1958, and later merged into China University of Science and Technology to set up the information major.

Development and expansion stage (1960s-1970s)

As far as foreign advanced industrialized societies are concerned, information science has become a mature and developing independent discipline in this period. Its research object, content, system, research methods and means, system and network entities, and the degree of intersection with other disciplines and engineering technologies have become more extensive, strict and complex. From 65438 to 0979, the Round Table of Information Science Research Plan held by information scientists from Britain, the United States, the Federal Republic of Germany, France, Japan and the Soviet Union in Atlanta called this stage the practical research stage of information science, with the emphasis on developing applicable information technology, supporting the establishment of national information systems, supporting and strengthening specialized information service systems, and solving the interaction and relationship between information users and information systems. For example, 196 1, the American chemical abstracts society realized the automatic arrangement of "chemical topics" with electronic computers. In 1962, NASA established a computerized reconnaissance information retrieval system. 1964 MEDLARS medical literature analysis and retrieval system was built in the National Library of Medicine of the United States, and it was launched on 197 1. The online retrieval systems of 1972 DIALOG of Lockheed, ORBIT of system development company and 1976 bibliographic retrieval service (BRS) have been put into use one after another. They bridge the gap between users and databases and promote the wide application of online systems. At the same time, there has been a corresponding development in theory. For example, E. Garfield of the United States invented the citation index and compiled the scientific citation index at 196 1. D.S. Price focuses on the study of scientific information from the perspective of history and sociology. 196 1 and 1963 published two books, Science since Babylon and Small Science and Big Science, which laid the foundation for the development of bibliometrics and put forward the law of exponential growth of scientific literature and the price index to measure the aging of scientific literature. Mikhailov and others published three books in 1965, 1968 and 1976 respectively, which greatly enriched the theory of information science. 1970, American T Sarah Sevik compiled Introduction to Information Science, which systematically introduced some viewpoints of American and British scholars on information exchange and information technology in the form of anthology. G. salton conducted an experiment of automatic indexing scheme with weighted words at Cornell University. The above research and practice show that information science entered the development and growth stage in the 1960s and 1970s. It is characterized by the development of information technology and the establishment of online information system.

During the development of information science in western countries, information science in China only developed briefly in the early 1960s. 1962, Yuan Hanqing, Cao Chang and other scholars 10 compiled the Lectures on Scientific and Technological Information Work, which made a useful attempt to establish China's information science theory. In the early 1960s, there was a great discussion about abstract and classification or thematic methods. After the debate, the direction of self-editing abstracts was affirmed, the advantages and disadvantages of the two methods and the scope of application were deepened, and the academic research atmosphere was enlivened. At the same time, China's information disclosure system has been established and improved, and three categories and nine subcategories have been put forward. 1963 China Institute of Science and Technology Information set up an information method laboratory, purchased a Boolean retrieval machine, and conducted experiments and research on mechanical retrieval and computer automatic translation. This is the beginning of planned information science research in China. In terms of information exchange, information websites have sprung up all over the country, and information exchange is carried out by holding meetings, publishing publications and holding training courses. In a sense, this has played the role of information system in developed countries.

Due to the destruction and influence of the Cultural Revolution, from 1966 to the early 1970s, information science research in China was at a standstill.

Improvement and enrichment stage (late 1970s to 1980s)

With the further development of computer technology, communication technology and high-density information storage technology, the research scope and depth of information science have been greatly broadened and improved. Information science and its research results have been regarded by the international community as a part of the theoretical and material basis of human information society. At this stage, the focus of information science is to design and develop national and international online information retrieval systems and networks, basic theories of information science, information science and information society. In terms of basic theory, British B.C. Brooks published a series of papers on the Basis of Information Science, proposing that information science should study the interaction between subjective spiritual world and objective spiritual world. The Information Science and Technology Division of the National Science Foundation of the United States has made a plan to strengthen the theoretical foundation of information science and information technology and systems. Kent began to study the economics of information dissemination. F.W. Lancaster's viewpoint of "paperless society", F. machlup began to study "comprehensive database based on scientific/academic communication" to provide the necessary theoretical structure for future information systems and technologies. At the same time, cross-border information online retrieval system has developed rapidly; CD-ROM technology, CD-ROM technology, electronic publications and electronic post are widely used for information acquisition and dissemination. Information science is facing the challenge of the information revolution and the arrival of the information society, thus entering a stage of comprehensive improvement and enrichment.

After 1978, China ushered in the spring of science, and information science also entered a prosperous situation. China Science and Technology Information Society was founded in 1978, and Journal of China Science and Technology Information Society was founded in 1982. By the end of 1990, the institute had held 59 academic seminars and received 4904 papers. Science and technology information societies (branches) of provinces, municipalities and ministries have been established one after another. Information Science, Journal of Information Science and Information Theory and Practice were published one after another, which made the research of information science very active. After 1978, dozens of institutions of higher learning, such as Wuhan University, Peking University University and Jilin University of Technology, set up information science majors, compiled textbooks or monographs with certain academic level, such as Information Science, Introduction to Information Science and Introduction to Scientific and Technological Information Work, and trained many graduates and graduate students. Many scientific and technological information research institutes and universities have set up specialized information science research institutions, which have made certain achievements in the research of information policy, information demand, information industry, information education and other topics. From the very beginning, information science in China paid attention to foreign exchanges and cooperation, absorbed advanced experience, and promoted the development of domestic information science research and scientific and technological information undertakings. 1978 translated and published the information science book Introduction to Information Science in western countries for the first time; 1979 China institute of science and technology information cooperated with UNESCO to hold the first national computer information retrieval training course; 1984 international online information retrieval terminal was first established in China Institute of Science and Technology Information. More than 1 10 terminals have been installed in nearly 50 cities, and more than 30,000 topics have been searched. Intelligence agencies at all levels have been equipped with more than 70 large, medium and small computers and more than 0/000 microcomputers. More than 4,000 people are engaged in the development, application, service and maintenance of information retrieval systems and databases. China Science and Technology Information System has established more than 300 databases. More than 50 foreign language literature databases have been introduced, and retrieval services on more than 30,000 topics have been provided. With the development of science and technology informatization in China, information science has gradually formed an independent discipline in China and started to keep pace with the development of international information science. Its signs are: establishing its own research object and basic concepts; The research content has been continuously expanded and deepened; The research methods began to be quantified; Has a research team of nearly a thousand people and a group of influential representatives; There are specialized academic institutions, monographs and publications, and corresponding departments or majors are set up in institutions of higher learning to train their own graduate students. Doctoral students 199 1 year began to enroll students. Information science, as a new interdisciplinary subject with strong vitality, is playing an increasingly important role in China academic circles.