Superintendent of Documents Classification System: What do those numbers mean?
Superintendent of Documents Classification System
Superintendent of Documents Classification System
The Superintendent of Documents (SuDocs) Classification System is a method
of grouping government documents so that they may be found easily on the
shelves. Rather than grouping them by subject, like the Library of Congress
or Dewey Decimal systems, SuDocs puts together publications by the agency
or department that has published them.
A SuDocs call number has two parts that are separated by a colon: the class number and the book number. Example: I 29.6/3: IN 2/6 ( I 29.6/3 is the class number, IN 2/6 is the book number )
Class Numbers
The first letter, or group of letters, in a SuDocs number indicates the
department or independent agency that has published the document (a list
of the current identifiers may be found at the end of this document). The
number before the period indicates the issuing bureau of that agency, and
the number following the period indicates the type of document. So the example
above can be read:
| I = Interior Department | |
| 29 = National Park Service | |
| 6/3 = Information circulars from the National Lakeshores |
Book Numbers
The book number might be based on the main word of the title, the series
number or issue number of the document. In the example above (IN 2/6), the
title of the document is Birds of the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore.
Since it is an information circular about the Indiana Dunes, Indiana is
the main word in the title. The numbers following the letters help distinguish
this document from other circulars about the Indiana Dunes.
Some documents are journals, works in a series or annual publications.
These have book numbers that have no letters in them. Years are represented
by the last three digits in the year, or four digits after 1999.
| I 29.1: 998 (1998 annual report of the National Park Service) | |
| A 67.7/3:11/5 (AgExporter journal, volume 11, issue 5) |
Shelving
The documents are shelved alphabetically by the first letters in the class
number, then numerically. It is important to remember that all numbers are
whole numbers in a SuDocs call number. So that the shelving of the following
documents would be in this order:
| A 13.1:998 | |
| A 67.1:998 | |
| A 67.2: A 2/3 | |
| A 67.2: A 3 | |
| A 67.2: IN 2/6 | |
| A 67.14: 16 |
Boards, Commissions and Committees
Agencies that have been established by Act of Congress, not completely independent
and are not under the Executive Branch of the government are all grouped
under Y 3. Examples of this would be the Consumer Product Safety Commission
and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Class numbers for these commissions
are: Y 3.C 76/3: and Y 3.N 88: respectively.
Congressional Publications
Class numbers for Congressional committee hearings and prints all begin
with Y 4. The first letters of the name of the committee follow the period
with a number distinguishing the House from the Senate committee following
the letter.
| Y 4.AP 6/1: (House Committee on Appropriations) | |
| Y 4.AP 6/2: (Senate Committee on Appropriations) |
The book number consists of the Congress and the serial number.
| Y 4.AP 6/1:106/2 (House Appropriations Committee of the 106th Congress, 2nd publication | |
| Y 4.AP 6/2:105/3 (Senate Appropriations Committee of the 105th Congress, 3rd publication) |
For a current list of SuDocs symbols, see http://www.valpo.edu/library/user/sudocsym.html
