Zusammenfassung: The SPECIESDAB manual describes the use of software created to assist in the retrieval of information relevant to species of interest to fisheries. Data on scientific and vernacular nomenclature, biology, fishing gears, and geographical distribution are included for species that belong to certain marine resource groups. This information is derived from the FAO Fisheries Department species identification and data programme publications and the software is designed to permit continual updating as new publications on other resource groups appear. To date, some 25 major resource groups are covered. Among these are shrimps, lobsters, cephalopods, sharks, marine turtles, and 20 families of bony fishes, which together form a significant component of world fisheries. The program uses a menu system to provide users easy access to the information contained in SPECIESDAB. The manual includes extensive examples of how to use the software. On-line help is also available. Extensive query and reporting capabilities are provided to access data on valid scientific names, synonyms, national and local names, official FAO trilingual names, size, habitat, behaviour, kinds of gear utilized in the fishery, and level of interest to fisheries. Geographical information may be obtained by species, by country, or by fishing area. Data may be extracted for either a single resource group or for all resource groups in combination. Furthermore, the user interested in using only the data of species occurring in a particular geographical area can create, with the Regional option, a sub-database including only the species found in the countries selected. This option can be useful for regional bodies and working groups. SPECIESDAB includes a bibliographic reference system, which may be updated by the user as well as utilities for exporting data.