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Resources and News for Information Professionals
ResourceShelf is Compiled & Edited By Gary Price, MLIS Gary Price Library & Internet Research Consulting gary@ resourceshelf.com Gary's Bio Shirl Kennedy, MLIS Contributing Editor Dan Giancaterino, MLIS Contributing Editor Steven Cohen, MLS Contributing Editor Looking For More Info? News? Search Help? News Tips?
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Wednesday, December 31, 2003
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Lists & Rankings + Books: Top 50 Bestsellers of 2003 (Amazon.Com) ||| Additional Amazon Lists + Books: Top 100 Bestsellers of 2003 (Barnes & Noble.Com) |||| Additional B&N Lists are Listed on Right-Side of Page + Books: The Best Sellers of 2003 [Canada] (The Globe and Mail) ||| Lists also Available via Amazon.Ca --- + Movies: Box Office Grosses [United States] 2003 (BoxofficeMojo.Com) ||| All Time Box Office Worldwide Grosses + CDs: 100 Top-Selling of 2003 (Amazon.Com) + DVDs: 100 Top-Selling of 2003 (Amazon.Com) + Video: 100 Top-Selling of 2003 (Amazon.Com) -- + Top Albums of 2003 (Billboard) + Top Singles of 2003 (Billboard) + Additional Billboard Charts + ARIA End of Year Charts [Australia] -- + 2003 Year End Top 20 Tours (Pollstar) --- + News: Most Read Stories on BBC News --- + Top 10 Space Science Images (Space.Com) -- + Lake Superior State University Banished Words List From the site, "Hardly looking 'metrosexual,' a 'shocked and awed' Lake Superior State University Word Banishment selection committee emerged from its spider hole with its annual List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness. LSSU has been compiling the list since 1976, choosing from nominations sent from around the world. This year, words and phrases were pulled from more than 5,000 nominations - a record. Most were sent through the school's website. Word-watchers pull nominations throughout the year from everyday speech, as well as from the news, fields of education, technology, advertising, politics, and more. A committee gathers the entries and chooses the best in December. The list is released on New Year's Day." --- See Also: Price's List of Lists (via SpecialIssues.Com)
Total Information Awareness Program Privacy--United States Source: Office of Inspector General, U.S. Department of Defense Full Text Report, Total Information Awareness Program See Also: DARPA ignored privacy concerns (via FCW) Tuesday, December 30, 2003
Information Retrieval Web Search Compilation: Recently Awarded Search-Related Patents and Patent Applications, December 2003 I've compiled the November list of just-awarded or published search patents from the USPTO. This list is not comprehensive. Companies awarded patents include Google, IBM, and Phillips.
Professional Reading Shelf (2 Items) Instant Messaging Source: ACM Queue Beyond Instant Messaging From the article, "The recent rise in popularity of IM (instant messaging) has driven the development of platforms and the emergence of standards to support IM. Especially as the use of IM has migrated from online socializing at home to business settings, there is a need to provide robust platforms with the interfaces that business customers use to integrate with other work applications." See Also: Social Networking Vendors Aim for the Enterprise (via eWeek) -- Academic Libraries Source: Association of Research Libraries Now Available: 1) ARL Preservation Statistics 2001-02 (PDF, 59 pages) 2) ARL Supplementary Statistics 2001-02 (PDF, 41 pages)
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (2 Items) Employment--Canada--Lists & Rankings Source: The Globe and Mail/Hewitt Just Released, The Best Employers in Canada, 2004 See Also: Story in The Globe and Mail -- Amusement Industry--United States--Directory Source: Consumer Product Safety Commission Full Text, Directory of State Amusement Ride Safety Officials "This Directory identifies the individual state offices dedicated to ride safety to encourage communication among the states and the federal government.... We also include contacts for various amusement ride industry organizations and associations, whose interests include ride safety."
Briefly Watch those Reference Books: FBI Issues Alert Against Almanac Carriers Source: AP, via IHT From the article, "The FBI is warning police nationwide to be alert for people carrying almanacs, cautioning that the popular reference books covering everything from abbreviations to weather trends could be used for terrorist planning." See Also: Almanac Publishers Respond To FBI Bulletin (via AP) Monday, December 29, 2003
Web Search--Yahoo Just Released, Top Yahoo Searches 2003 Also includes the five most common misspellings of Arnold Schwarzenegger. See Also: Lycos Announces Its List of the Most Popular Search Terms of 2003
Ready Reference Source: InfoPlease.Com Just Published, 2003 Year in Review A handy compilation of facts. Reviews are also available for 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, and 1998 are also available. See Also: 2003 Month-By-Month
Web Search--Google Source: San Jose Mercury News Google chief coy on IPO rumors From the article, "Search engine Google's Chief Executive Eric Schmidt shook his head in wonderment. Almost like clockwork, he noted, the U.S. economy always expands rapidly when headed into a presidential election year. Schmidt was responding to the buzz circling Silicon Valley about an imminent return to strong economic growth -- and what it means for Google and other start-ups. Schmidt, wearing his habitual quirky grin, declined to say what it meant for Google's allegedly pending initial public offering. The IPO is widely expected to take place next year, and guesstimates have the value of the company at more than $15 billion." See Also: Is Google good for you? (via BBC News) BBC Commentator Bill Thompson writes, "In my opinion, Google today is far from the great search engine it was in those far-off days, yet I still use it. Even knowing that it indexes only a small proportion of the web using a technique that too often gives precedence to pages that lack authority or coherence, that it is skewed by multiple blog links and can be manipulated by unscrupulous advertisers, doesn't stop me typing search terms into my toolbar and feasting on the results. What's worse, I've let both of my children believe that 'search the web' and 'Google' are roughly synonymous, even though I teach my journalism students at City University that they should never rely on a single source, online or off. How has it come to this? Perhaps it is simply that Google has become the Coke of the web. Sweet, available everywhere, and the first choice of the consumer. Well part of the reason, obviously, is that I'm as lazy as most other web users, and having found something that sort of works, at a URL that I can easily remember, I stick with it." I agree with just about everything Mr. Thompson has to say in the column about except his point that Google needs to be regulated by the government. If you don't like Google, it doesn't work for you, or you want to see what else is available, plenty of other good general web engines and many wonderful specialized database resources exist. Also, taking a little time time to learn how to fully exploit a few key resources (including Google) can make your online research much more productive. Of course, it's also important to remember that it's not all on the open web. Bottom Line? A little education goes a long way.
Information Industry--FAST Search & Transfer Wireless Searching FAST Search & Transfer Will Power Vodafone's Mobile Search From the announcement, "The new search facility on Vodafone live! enables customers to use their mobile handsets to search across an extensive portfolio of content and an index of worldwide WAP content using a hosted installation of FAST Data Search. This enables Vodafone to quickly connect its customers to relevant services within the Vodafone live! offering, as well as to the mobile Internet. The service is already live in Egypt, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Malta, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland, with the UK scheduled for early next year."
Uniform Resource Indicators Source: OCLC Research OCLC hosts “info” URI registry From the announcement, "The recently proposed 'info' URI scheme enables the URI referencing of selected categories of legacy information-asset identifiers. OCLC Research has developed, and is hosting, NISO’s 'info' URI registry, built on an enhanced OAI-PMH 2.0 repository." The OCLC announcement also provides several links with background info about URI's.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (2 Items) Employment--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Full Text, Census 2000 Special Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Tabulation Summary/Highlights ||| Full Text From the announcement, "How many New York City taxi drivers and chauffeurs live in Jersey City, N.J.? What do they earn, how old are they and what is their gender and race? And how about geological and petroleum technicians living in Arlington, Texas, who work in Dallas? The answers can be found in the Census 2000 Special Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Tabulation released today by the U.S. Census Bureau." -- Population--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census News Brief, Projection of U.S. Population on January 1, 2004 Sunday, December 28, 2003
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Children--United States--Statistics Source: Annie E. Casey Foundation KIDS COUNT Census Data Online Demographic data regarding children and their families, for states, counties, cities, metro areas, and Congressional districts. Topics include age, sex, race and ethnicity, and living arrangements. Based on Census 2000 short form data (Description from EconData.Net). You can also "create a ranking table from one of over 21 population indicators. Use the "Quick Rank" feature to easily rank all geographic areas of one type (i.e., all states, all congressional districts, etc.) or use the "Custom Ranking" feature to choose your own geographic areas." Raw data can also be downloaded for offline use.
Public Libraries Source: Denver Post Library books play second fiddle to videos, CDs From the article, "The good news for movie fans is that their local library looks more and more like a Blockbuster. The ominous news for book fans is the same: As budget-squeezed public libraries rush to buy DVDs for an insatiable public, branches must act more like multimedia centers and less like temples of the printed page...And while they run to keep up with customers flooded with cheap new DVD players this Christmas, Jefferson County [Colorado] libraries already have their eye on the next big thing: Song and video downloads, without a hard copy, that may have consumers walking into a branch asking where they can plug in their MP3 player...'So many of us are attached to the text, and the paper, and the binding. It's so tactile,' said Beth Elder, senior collection specialist for Denver Public Library. 'But many of our customers are leaving text behind." The article also contains a statistical chart. Saturday, December 27, 2003
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Sports--Canada--Directory Source: SIRC (Sport Information Resource Center) CanadianSport.Ca Browse a variety of resources by topic or sport. Searchable databases of experts, organizations, and events are also available. Friday, December 26, 2003
Online Archives Source: Fortune "Louis Borders Turns the Page" Another story about KeepMedia. This company offers the consumer full-text access (about $4.95/month) to an archive of content from about 150 titles. Back in July, when the service first launched, ResourceShelf offered several posts and comments about KeepMedia. I said back then (I'll say it again now) that many public libraries offer FREE remote access to databases that offer searchable archives of THOUSANDS of publications. Unfortunately, these free services get little to no media coverage. Sad. - See Also: Those of you who don't know what I'm talking about regarding libraries offering FREE remotely accessible access (no need to visit the library building) to thousands of publications and other high-quality databases might want to take a look at a few examples of these services. All you need is a library card for that particular library. Contact your library to find out what you have access to. Here are five examples: NY Public Library, Los Angeles Public Library, King County (Washington) Public Library, Fairfax Cty (Virginia) Public Library, Hamilton (Ontario) Public Library. School, academic, and other types of libraries also provide these services. Just ask!!!
Web Search--Google A Webliography of Papers Written by Google Engineers Plenty of interesting reading for the search geek! Thursday, December 25, 2003
Legislative Information--United States Source: GCN Six Senators Call for Library of Congress to Upgrade THOMAS From the article, "The Library of Congress’ Thomas portal is inadequate in giving citizens access to House and Senate information, six senators said in a letter to the Librarian of Congress yesterday. Sens. John Cornyn (R-Texas), Jon Corzine (D-N.J.), Russell Feingold (D-Wis.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) told James Billington that Thomas was a “bare-bones” site with limited searching tools. “In our view, the current form of Thomas is insufficient as a portal to the Congress,” the senators said. “We urge you to upgrade the Thomas Web site in order to make available to the public the nonproprietary services that are available on the Legislative Information System.” See Also: Direct to THOMAS
Online Images--Databases Useful, Cool, and Interesting Database (Perfect for Testing New Computers), Terrafly Virtually "fly" across the U.S. using satellite and aeriel imagery. Images are also returned with census data and other statistics. You can search (by location) or browse the database. Have fun!!! Wednesday, December 24, 2003
Unstructured Information--Text Mining Source: Computerworld "Digging Into Documents" What is text mining? What is information extraction? Learn about these and other topics in this interview with ClearForest's President and chief scientist, Ronen Feldman. See Also: "The Word on Text Mining" (via Intelligent Enterprise) (first posted on ResourceShelf 12/1/03) See Also: A Roadmap to Text Mining on the Web -- Controlled Vocabularies--MeSH Source: NLM Full Text, Introduction to MeSH-2004 -- Web Design Source: Jakob Nielson's Alertbox Top Ten Web Design Mistakes of 2003 "Sites are getting better at using minimalist design, maintaining archives, and offering comprehensive services. However, these advances entail their own usability problems, as several prominent mistakes from 2003 show." See also: The Ten Most Violated Homepage Design Guidelines Tuesday, December 23, 2003
Congressional Research Service Source: Toledo Blade Toledo Blade Editorial Weighs In on Public Access to CRS Materials The editorial is titled, "The Arrogance of Power." From the editorial, "How do you know when a United States congressman has been around too long? When he starts to believe that he owns and controls what the American public pays for with its tax dollars. A case in point: Rep. Bob Ney, Republican of St. Clairsville in southeastern Ohio, a former state legislator now in his fifth term in Congress. As chairman of the House Administration Committee, Mr. Ney has denied a request that the public get full access to information distributed by the Congressional Research Service, an arm of the Library of Congress." See Also: Copy of A Recent CRS Memo About Public Access to the Material (via Secrecy News) See Also: Much More About What's Happening in these Two ResourceShelf Postings #1 ||| #2
Government Information--United States Source: AP U.S. Blurs High-Tech White House Images From the article, "Deferring to Secret Service worries about terrorists, the government is deliberately blurring its highest-quality aerial photographs over Washington to hide objects in plain view on the roofs of the White House, Capitol and Treasury Department. The government also obscured aerial views of the Naval Observatory compound where Vice President Dick Cheney lives. It made no effort to blur detailed photographs showing the Pentagon, Supreme Court, CIA headquarters, Justice Department or FBI headquarters." From a recent article on on SecurityFocus.Com, "It is not as if aerial imagery of the White House is hard to come by," says Stephen Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists. Aftergood adds, "Except in the case of unacknowledged government facilities, it is hard to see what is gained by this policy, and the downside, I think, is that it encourages public paranoia." The SecurityFocus also correctly points out that "overhead images of the same sites taken as recently as last year are still easily found online and in print -- a detailed shot of the White House roof even adorns a glossy government brochure on the National Aerial Photography Program."
Briefly UC Berkeley's Bancroft Library Receives $5 Million Gift (via Oakland Tribune) -- Talk of New Academic Library at the University of Wyoming (via Caspar Tribune)
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (4 Items) Federal Bureau of Investigation Intelligence--United States Source: U.S. Department of Justice Just Released, Full Text Report, The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Efforts to Improve the Sharing of Intelligence and Other Information This is an unclassified and redacted version of the report. -- Healthcare--United States Source: Department of Health & Human Services Just Released, Full Text Reports: 1) A Summary Of Both Reports 2) The National Healthcare Quality Report 3) The National Healthcare Disparities Report -- Healthcare--United States Source: HHS New Web Site, QualityTools From the site, "...a clearinghouse for practical, ready-to-use tools for measuring and improving the quality of Americans' health care." -- Anthropology--Database Source: Department of Anthropology, California Academy of Sciences California Academy of Sciences Anthropology Collection Database "Our entire collection database is online and searchable with approximately 17,000 objects and over 8,000 images." Includes materials "from the indigenous cultures of western North America (exclusive of Mexico) and the Pacific Rim, including all Pacific islands and East Asia." Database is updated monthly. Search by category, object name, materials, maker's name, collection, catalog number, culture, global region, country, state/province/district, county. See Also: Direct to Search Interface Monday, December 22, 2003
Education The Educator's Reference Desk is Now Online AskERIC is gone (other ERIC Clearinghouses have also closed). However, many of the important resources AskERIC provided are now available via The Educator's Reference Desk. ERD is a service of The Information Institute at Syracuse University. From the site, "Through The Educator's Reference Desk (http://www.eduref.org) you can access AskERIC's 2,000+ lesson plans, 3,000+ links to online education information, and 200+ question archive responses. While the question answer service will no longer be active, The Educator's Reference Desk provides a search interface to the ERIC Database, providing access to over one million bibliographic records on educational research, theory, and practice." I have also compiled a list of where some ERIC Clearinghouse material can now be accessed. ---- ---- See Also: ERIC Database will not be accepting new material until "later" in 2004. "Beginning in January and until the new ERIC model for acquiring education literature is developed later in 2004, no new materials will be received and accepted for the database. When the new model is ready later in 2004, the Department will communicate with publishers, education organizations, and other database contributors to add publications and materials released from January 2004 forward. The ERIC database will continue to grow, as thousands of documents selected by the ERIC clearinghouses throughout 2003 will be added. Database vendors will receive updated database files containing the newly added records."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (2 Items) Business--United States--Lists & Rankings Source: Entrepreneur Magazine New, 25th Annual Franchise 500 Links to the 2000-2003 lists are available. -- Broadcasting--Canada Source: Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission New, Full Text, Broadcasting Policy Monitoring Report 2003 Numerous statistics and charts about broadcasting in Canada. This is the fourth annual report. Summary ||| Full Text (HTML) ||| Full Text (PDF)
Business--United States--Databases Source: GCN Two U.S. Goverment Business Databases Will Combine Beginning Jan. 1, 2004, SBA's Pro-Net database and DOD's Central Contractor Registration (CCR) database will be integrated into a single point for searching and compiling small-business sources..." See Also: Announcement from Small Business Administration
Internet Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project Just Relased, Full Text, America's Online Pursuits: The changing picture of who's online and what they do Summary ||| Full Text
Industry Briefs FAST Search & Transfer...Company Announces Marketing Deal With IBM -- Dialog...Upgrades to NewsEdge Product Announced Sunday, December 21, 2003
The Patriot Act Source: American Libraries Survey Shows No Illinois Libraries Contacted by FBI From the article, "A recent survey of public and academic libraries in Illinois indicates that none have been visited by FBI agents looking for records under the auspices of the USA Patriot Act since September 2001. The results also show that few of the nearly 600 libraries responding to the online survey, conducted in September and November by the Library Research Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, have adopted formal guidelines for dealing with a search warrant or subpoena from law enforcement." See Also: Full Text of Chicago Tribune Story Referenced in Article (registration required)
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (2 Items) Festivals--United States--Database Festival Network Online (FNO) Adds New Search Functionality Festivals Network Online is a "nationwide craft show, art fair, music, festival & event guide." A new feature on the web site allows you to access event info within a certain mile radius of a any zip code. Searching and basic info is free. To view full event details, a subscription (fee-based) is required. The database has info on more than 14,000 events. --- Christmas--United States Source: PNC Bank Christmas Price Index, 2003 "While stiff import competition is driving deeper discounts on merchandise sold in the United States, skilled labor cost is on the rise, resulting in a 16 percent increase in this year’s PNC Advisors Christmas Price Index – the biggest jump the Index has seen in its 19-year history. " Costs have dropped for pear trees and golden rings. However, prices are way up for calling birds, French hens and swans a-swmming. Says a PNC investment strategist, “The low inventory of calling birds and swans this year, combined with a resurgence in demand, has boosted prices – a sign of consumer confidence returning.” See Also: Flash Presentation of PNC Advisors Christmas Price Index Saturday, December 20, 2003
News Resources News Aggregator NewsNow Currently Crawling More Than 15,000 Sources On October 16th, ResourceShelf noted that NewsNow, a favorite aggregator of open web news sources, had just passed the 13,000 source mark. It's now mid-December and we can report that NewsNow has passed the 15,000 source mark. Impressive and very useful! I said in October that NewsNow offers limited search functionality (only single words) for non-subscribers (the company offers several fee-based services). This is still the case. However, the hundreds of prefabricated categories, accessible via pull-down menus on the left side of the page, make NewsNow a very usable tool containing content not found from other news aggregators.
Professional Reading Shelf Microsoft Research A New Article About the MyLifeBits Project from Microsoft Research Full-Text article, The MyLifeBits Lifetime Story From the MLB home page, "MyLifeBits is a lifetime store of everything. It is the fulfillment of Vannevar Bush's 1945 Memex vision including full-text search, text & audio annotations, and hyperlinks. There are two parts to MyLifeBits: an experiment in lifetime storage, and a software research effort." -- From the article abstract, "Storage trends have brought us to the point where it is affordable to keep a complete digital record of one’s life, and capture methods are multiplying. To experiment with a lifetime store, we are digitizing everything possible from Gordon Bell’s life. The MyLifeBits system is designed to store and manage a lifetime’s worth of data. MyLifeBits enables the capture of web pages, telephone, radio and television. This demonstration highlights the application of typed links and database features to make a lifetime store something that is truly useful." See Also: More on the MyLifeBits Home Page
Web Search--Google Source: Baltimore Sun Sergey Brin To Give Commencement Address at the University of Maryland Google's co-founder, Sergey Brin, will give the commencement address at the University of Maryland in College Park today. The Baltimore Sun article discusses Brin's relationship with the university. The article quotes his father, Professor Michael Brin in a couple of places. -- From the article, "But there are challenges looming for [Sergey] Brin, several of which were outlined in a critical cover story in this month's Fortune. Giants including Microsoft, America Online and Amazon are developing competing search engines, and there are reports of rifts within the company. "It's not all pinky," Michael Brin observed." Thanks to P.W. for the link. See Also: Another Lengthy Article About Google, This Time in Time Magazine Key Passages: + "Some analysts — Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineWatch.com, for example — believe there are plenty of other companies capable of matching the quality of Google's search results." (Editors Note: No argument here) + "Google's greatest asset right now may be not its technology but its brand — and Internet brands are notoriously volatile." Friday, December 19, 2003
Spam Source: Brightmail Spam Trends of 2003 From the report, In 2003, Brightmail saw spam surpass legitimate email – growing to more than 56% of all Internet email, up from just 40% a year ago. The report also lists the most popular spam mail subject lines.
Professional Reading Shelf Government Information--United States Just Released, GPO (Government Printing Office) Posts Its FY 2003 Annual Report
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (7 Items) Iraq Source: National Security Archive Updated: The Saddam Hussein Sourcebook "Declassified Secrets from the U.S.-Iraq Relationship" -- Religion Source: U.S. Department of State Just Released, International Religious Freedom Report for 2003 "This, the fifth annual edition of the International Religious Freedom Report, is issued in accordance with the mandate of the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act. The report attempts to establish a baseline of fact about the status of religious freedom worldwide, both to illuminate the problems that exist and to provide a primary source for U.S. religious freedom policy." Report viewable in sections, geographically divided: Africa, East Asia and Pacific, Europe and Eurasia, Near East and North Africa, South Asia, Western Hemisphere. Appendices include the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and The Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief, Training at the Foreign Service Institute Related to the International Religious Freedom Act, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA), and Overview of U.S. Refugee Policy. See Also: Preface, Introduction and Executive Summary See Also: Access to reports from 2003, 2002, 2001 on one page -- Health Source: World Health Organization Released Today, The World Health Report 2003 Summary ||| Direct to Full-Text ||| Direct to Statistical Tables -- Congressional Research Service Source: CRS (via FPC) Two New Reports + Drug Trafficking and North Korea: Issues for U.S. Policy + Japan-North Korea Relations: Selected Issues -- Crime--United States--Statistics Source: NCES Web Version Now Available, Indicators of School Crime and Safety: 2003 -- Labor--United States--Statistics Source: BJS Just Released, Work Experience of the Population, 2002 (Annual) -- African--Americans--Directory A Roadmap to African-American Resources A massive directory of over 2000 resources. It was compiled by Sherry Sherrod Dupree, Santa Fe Community College. Ms. Dupree is a researcher, consultant, and historian whose primary focus is African-American resources.
Professional Reading Shelf Libraries and Librarians Source: Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (UK) Selected Full Text Articles from the January Issue of CILIP's Library + Information Update Are Now Online + Inside out: the Big Book Share by Tricia Kings + Young people and the internet by Alison + Making your website more interactive by Robin Yeates + Phil Bradley's Internet Q&A Column Thursday, December 18, 2003
Web Resources of the Week 1) Search Tools Harness the Power of Any Search Engine Onto a Cool Toolbar This week, it's time for a free web search tool that I recently discovered called NeedleSearch. It allows you to capture the basic search functionality from any web engine, site search tool, or specialized database and make it readily accessible at any time via an easy-to-use toolbar. -- For some of you, the only issue in trying NeedleSearch is the fact that it only works with the wonderful open-source web browser, Mozilla. If you've never tried Mozilla, by all means do so. Like NeedleSearch, it's completely free and offers all sorts of features including a pop-up blocker. Mozilla also allows you to open and view multiple pages in the same browser application using tabbed windows. Very useful! Mozilla is available for several platforms, including Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and more. -- Now that we've got that out of the way, let's move on to NeedleSearch. This piece of freeware is the work of a Dutch software developer. In a nutshell, NeedleSearch operates like other toolbars BUT this one allows YOU to easily (and I do mean easily) and at any time harness the search functionality of any search engine directly into the NeedleSearch application. No need to wait for a developer, you can do it yourself! -- You're then able to run basic searches without first having to go directly to the database or web site you need to search. Allow me to share a couple of examples. But before getting started, I can report that NeedleSearch installs quickly and easily. -- Once installed you'll see that a few search engines have been "pre-programmed" for you. You can edit them, remove them, etc., the choice is yours. Editing or removing these choices is easily accomplished by selecting the "edit" button (second to last button on the toolbar). Ok, now let's add a rapidly expanding general web engine, Gigablast, to NeedleSearch. + Go to the Gigablast home page and turn on the NeedleSearch auto-adder (button with the "plus" sign on it). + In the Gigablast search box type: NeedleSearch. You should see a message that Gigablast has been added to NeedleSearch. That's it, you're done! + Now, the next time you want to run a basic search with Gigablast, simply enter your search terms into toolbar, pull-down to Gigablast, and click the search button. -- Now for my favorite reason for using NeedleSearch. Not only can you use it to search general web engines, but you can also use it with specialized databases. Here's an example. I'm always searching Peter Scott's wonderful Libdex database of library web sites and OPACS. With NeedleSearch I can search the database without having to first go to the Libdex site. This will not only work with Libdex but with just about any site or specialized web engine with search functionality. Here are the steps I followed to add Libdex to the NeedleSearch toolbar. + Go to Libdex.Com and find the search box. + Turn on the NeedleSearch auto-adder (button with the "plus" sign on it). + In the Libdex search box type: NeedleSearch + An alert box notifying you you've added Libdex should appear + You're done. Now, no matter where you are on the web, you can search Libdex without first having to and find the Libdex site. -- Of course, many other features are included. For example, you can open results in a new window or Mozilla tab, highlight search terms, and more. A button is also available to find your search term(s) on the results page or the underlying web page. -- Those of you with experience "tweaking" urls can set up more sophisticated queries by editing the url string with NeedleSearch. Like most web tools, the best way to learn about NeedleSearch is to download a copy, have the documentation nearby, and experiment. I think you'll find this free tool easy to use and very useful. Once again, NeedleSearch is free to download and use. -- One final note for the Googleaholics out there. I think some of you will question the fact that your original download of NeedleSearch includes Dutch language versions of Google. Changing it to the www.google.com version can be accomplished by either removing this version via the edit/remove buttons and adding a new entry direct from Google.Com OR by simply editing out the <&hl=nl> from the url. --- --- 2) Television--History Reference Tools Source: The Museum of Broadcast Communications, Chicago Full Text Book: The Encyclopedia of Television From the site, The Encyclopedia of Television includes more than 1,000 original essays from more than 250 contributors and examines specific programs and people, historic moments and trends, major policy disputes and such topics as violence, tabloid television and the quiz show scandal. It also includes histories of major television networks as well as broadcasting systems around the world and is complemented by resource materials, photos and bibliographical information. The book is not searchable but does contain hyperlinked cross-references.
Web Search Source: The Register "A Quantum Theory of Internet Value" The always controversial Andrew Orlowski writes about how "Google sucks." Some of you might think that I would agree with him, but I don't. Google works fine for some types of searches, but so does AlltheWeb, Gigablast, Teoma. Each tool has its strengths and weaknesses. For certain types of seaching, specialized databases like Citeseer and SmealSearch are essential. Maybe a tool like Vivisimo or Grokker could help the searcher find what they need. It all depends on the information need. Luckily, information professionals have the skills not only to help the searcher decide what they need (reference interview) but to also suggest a wide variety of resources that might help satisfy the need. We can also help teach the searcher to do this on their own. What I think Mr. Orlowski is saying is that Google or any web engine is not the be-all to end-all and relying on only one tool is not a good idea. This is something I absolutely agree with. The problem for some people is that they have no idea about what else is available. This is why the library world must do a better job of marketing. Change starts with each one of us. If nothing else this article might wake up a few people to the fact that librarians, libraries, books, and electronic resources other than Google are still vital. Included in the article are several positive comments about the libraries and librarians. Orlowski writes, "Taxonomies also have been proved to have value: archivists can justify a smirk as manual directory projects dmoz [Open Directory] floundered - true archivists have a far better sense of meta-data than any computerized system can conjure. If you're in doubt, befriend a librarian, and from the resulting dialog, you'll learn to start asking good questions. Your results, we strongly suspect, will be much more fruitful than any iterative Google searches."
Professional Reading Shelf (2 Items) Online Behavior Source: AScribe Newswire Keeping Found Things Found: Web Tools Don't Always Mesh With How People Work "People have devised many tricks - such as sending e-mails to themselves or jotting on sticky notes - for keeping track of Web pages, but William Jones and Harry Bruce at the University of Washington's Information School and Susan Dumais of Microsoft Research have found that often people don't use any of them when it comes time to revisit a Web page. Instead, they rely on their ability to find the Web page all over again." The researchers have been examining how Web users "keep found things found" when seeking information online and -- by understanding how and why people do what they do -- hope they can develop more useful information management tools. The project is funded by the National Science Foundation. Thanks to SDK for the link and blurb. See Also: Keeping Found Things Found (Research project of the Information School at the University of Washington) See Also: Keeping Found Things Found Survey of Web Keeping Methods (MS Word; 104KB) See Also: KFTF Publications and Presentations -- Librarians Source: LIScareer.com Librarians in the Information Age: Alternative Uses of MLS Degrees Darwin McGuire, a student in the Library and Information Science Program at Wayne State University, researched alternative careers for librarians, which he then broke down into six categories: libraries (outside the traditional functions), corporate, freelance, technology, government, and “way-out-there." Lots of interesting ideas about what you can do with an MLS degree.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (4 Items) Population--United States--Statistics Source: US Census Just Released, Official U.S. Population This announcement includes fast facts and several Excel tables. -- Software Industry--Lists & Rankings Source: Software Magazine The Software 500 Background Article ||| List and Database (Registration Required, Free) "Top 500 Software and Service companies." See Also: The 2002 Software 500 -- Health Information--United States--Calendars Source: Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion /U.S. Department of Health and Human Services National Health Observances, 2004 -- African--Americans--Directory A Roadmap to African-American Resources A massive directory of over 2000 resources. It was compiled by Sherry Sherrod Dupree, Santa Fe Community College. Ms. Dupree is a researcher, consultant, and historian whose primary focus is African-American resources.
Web Search--Vivisimo Vivisimo Gets into the Toolbar Game Ok, NeedleSearch (this week's Resource of the Week) doesn't work for you. Not a problem! ResourceShelf, web searching, and online/print research are all about options and choices. So, it's time for a brief post to announce that Vivisimo, the very useful clustering search tool, has now entered into the toolbar game with a beta release. The new toolbar (for IE only) offers direct access to the engine, a pop-up blocker, word find, keyword highlighting, a cookie eraser, and several other features. One of these features is called "Auto-Query Catching." What is it? From the site, If you complete a search on sites such as Yahoo!, Google, MSN, WiseNut, Teoma, AltaVista, and others, the Vivisimo toolbar will automatically detect your query and insert the same terms into the toolbar search box. Vivisimo has also released a smaller app that they're calling a MiniBar. It offers some but not all of the features available with the toolbar.
Citation Analysis Scholarly Publishing Source: ISI + Science in Mexico, 1998-2002 + Psychiatry: High-Impact U.S. Universities, 1998-2002 + U.S. Universities with Highest Concentrations in Agriculture/Agronomy, 1998-2002 Wednesday, December 17, 2003
Professional Reading Shelf (2 Items) Digital Information--Preservation Source: OECD Observer "The great digital information disappearing act" This article was written by Deborah Woodyard, Digital Preservation Coordinator, The British Library. From the article, Simply saving all the bits and bytes is a good start, but it will not necessarily be enough to be able to use the information again in the future. Managing large amounts of data is a considerable challenge also. You need to understand the technical profile of your entire collection, as well as be able to efficiently find a single piece of information within a huge storage system – a needle in a virtual haystack...Preservation needs to be addressed throughout the life cycle of digital material in order to be effective. Appropriate steps must be introduced to acquisition and cataloguing, for example, to ensure the capture and management of technical details and preservation information, and guarantee the digital files are not altered in any way. Ignoring preservation and not performing these tasks at this stage would be like putting a book on the wrong shelf and never being able to find it again, or as bad, storing the book under a water drip. The information may still be between the pages, or in a digital file, but you cannot see or use it anymore. -- RLG The December, 2003 Issue of RLG DigiNews is Online Feature articles: + PDF/A: Developing a File Format for Long-Term Preservation, by William G. LeFurgy + Research Agendas Set Course for Digital Archiving and Long-Term Preservation, by Margaret Hedstrom
Web Search--Google Another Day and More Google News It looks like Google has launched a beta of its book search program to compete with Amazon's "Search Inside the Book." Early word of Google's venture "leaked" out just a few hours after Amazon launched SITB in October. From the FAQ, "Google's mission is to provide access to all the world's information and make it universally useful and accessible. It turns out that not all the world's information is already on the Internet, so Google has been experimenting with a number of publishers to test their content online. During this trial, publishers' content is hosted by Google and is ranked in our search results according to the same technology we use to evaluate websites." The FAQ also solicits the participation of publishers to provide content and explains that Google Print pages are surrounded with context sensitive advertising via Google's AdSense program. You can learn more by going to the Google Print FAQ page. -- You can browse a bunch of Google Print titles by running this search. You'll notice that unlike Amazon's SITB where you actually see an image of the page, here you only get ASCII text. Presently, you can print the excerpts but it will be interesting to see if they disable printing if/when the excerpts become longer so the company can avoid problems with the writing community. The length of excerpts varies from just a short blurb to a portion of a chapter. - This means that at least for the time being, the primary Google database grows larger and larger. Without the proper techniques to create more advanced queries or limit a search (skills most searchers don't have but we can teach them), competition for those first 10 spots on a results page becomes even more intense. In other words, we're getting increased recall and lowered precision. We know that an average searcher only looks at the first few results and submits queries containing around 3 terms. As the database grows, determining relevance and sharing it in the first few results becomes an even greater challenge, even for Google. All of this new cotent once again illustrates that the information professional should have solid understanding of Google's advanced features as well as those from other web engines. Thanks to S.C. for the news tip. See Also: Search Day Offers Commentary Chris Sherman with info about where Google Print results fall on a results page. See Also: "Google Experiment Provides Internet With Book Excerpts" (via NY Times) From the article, "Google executives have also discussed with university librarians the possibility of converting library collections into a digital format but they have declined to comment on any plans." -------- PublishersLunch is a free subscription newsletter aimed at members of the publishing industry. Today, the newsletter ran a lengthy story about Google Print. ResourceShelf has been granted permission to reprint the full text of the article. You can find it here. I've also prepared a summary. - * What we now see at Google Prints is a "shadow" of what's being "sold" to the publishing industry. * A Google spokesperson told PublishersLunch that the program is open to self-publishers. "They want to be as comprehensive as possible." * Google has been holding "formal" conversations with publishers for months. * Adam Smith, "a key player" at Random House in electronic publishing, has left the company and taken a position at Google. * The article also reports that this is part of a larger plan by Google. "The goal seems to be to truly "Google" book content, or as much as they can get their hands on. Launching in the first q of 2004 the program would allow registered users to access up to 10% of the full text of an available within a month. * They are offering publishers a revenue arrangement. * Finally, the article cites a recent post on PaidContent.Org that Google is considering taking on Factiva, LN, etc. by providing access to fee-based content in an arrangement that appears similar to what Google is doing with IEEE. Again, the full text of the article is available courtesy of PublishersLunch. ------ ------- and while we're on the Google beat... "Google Here, There, and Everywhere" (via Business Week) This article spends time discussing Google's new direct links to a few numerical databases. However, the author makes no mention of the fact that this idea is not new and AltaVista, Ask, and Yahoo offer similar "shortcuts." In the case of AV, they've been online for almost two years. Examples of all of these resources in this post.
Digitization Projects--Canada Canada's Digital Collections Adds Several New Resources You can find blurbs and links about each new collection on this page. + Vancouver's Golden Years: 1900-1910, Photographs by Philip Timms + The Waldren Studios: Images of Nova Scotia, 1870-1940 + Centuries of the Image + Fire + Earth + Louis-Auguste Guillemette, maître d'orgue + Performing Our Musical Heritage
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (7 Items) Population--United States--Statistics Just Released, The Foreign-Born Population: 2000 Summary/Fast Facts/Tables ||| Full-Text -- Births--United States--Statistics Source: CDC Just Released, Births: Final Data for 2002 Summary/Fast Facts ||| Full Text (7.8 MB; pdf) -- Volunteerism--United States--Statistics Source: BLS Full Text, Volunteering in the United States -- Climate--United States--Year in Review Source: National Climatic Data Center New Report, Climate of 2003: 2003 in Historical Perspective ||| Chart -- Economy--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Department of Commerce Full Text Report, Digital Economy 2003 "Digital Economy 2003 (DE2003) is the Department’s fifth annual report on conditions in U.S. information technology (IT) industries and the effects of IT on national economic performance." In a nutshell, the technology industry is recovering slowly, but hiring and salaries are lagging somewhat. See Also: Direct to Full Report (PDF; 2.26MB) -- Homeland Security Source: The White House (via FAS) White House Publishes Two New Homeland Security Presidential Directives 1) Critical Infrastructure Identification, Prioritization, and Protection 2) National Preparedness Thanks to S.A. for the resource tip. -- Cable Television--United States--Statistics Source: National Cable & Telecommunications Association Cable Television Industry Overview "NCTA is the principal trade association of the cable industry in the United States, representing cable operators serving more than 90 percent of the nation's cable television households. It also represents more than 200 cable program services as well as equipment suppliers and service providers to the industry." The Statistics and Resources section contains state data (% of households that are cable subscribers), the top 25 cable systems, and the top 20 cable networks. See Also: Mid-Year 2003 Cable & Telecommunications Industry Overview (PDF; 903KB) See Also: Cable & Telecommunications Glossary See Also: Cable & Telecommunications Organizations Tuesday, December 16, 2003
Congressional Research Service Source: Copley News Service "Ney draws line at public access to research" More on the fate of public access to CRS reports. From the article, Ohio Rep. Bob Ney, R-St. Clairsville, has played a decisive role in the argument by potentially expanding access to some degree while leaving the basic restrictive policy unchanged. As chairman of the House Administration Committee, which has jurisdiction over the CRS, Ney launched a new service that allows lawmakers to make reports of their choosing available via a link in their congressional Web sites. “It used to be nothing went up online” for the public to see, Ney said. “Now we’re telling members if you want to do a work product and put it online, that’s fine.” At the same time, Ney called a halt to efforts to provide greater public access to the research. He ended a two-year pilot project, which allowed the public to search through the otherwise inaccessible CRS database via links on the Web sites of participating congressmen. Some lawmakers believe the public is entitled to all or most of the reports. “It seems to me that (CRS) work ought to be available to whoever might find it to be helpful or useful,” said Ohio Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Lucasville, who favors complete disclosure. “This work is being done at taxpayers’ expense. What we’re talking about is just research.” Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Reps. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., and Jay Inslee, D-Wash., have introduced legislation that would make most of the reports available on congressional Web sites, while excluding research requested by individual lawmakers. Btw, access to CRS material on the House.Gov via Congressman Chris Shay's and other members of Congress remains unavailable. A note explaining the situation has been posted. See Also: More in this November 2003 ResourceShelf E-Mail Reminder Post See Also: A List of CRS Sources Still Offering Some Content is at the Bottom of this October 2003 Post
National Library of Medicine Source: GCN Congratulations to MedlinePLUS from the National Library of Medicine From the article, A health library and the online application for federal college aid topped the latest quarterly survey of e-government customer satisfaction...The survey, released today, looked at 35 federal sites that use the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) developed by the University of Michigan. The main site of MedlinePlus, a medical information portal run by the National Library of Medicine at medlineplus.gov scored 86 out of 100 points on ASCI. The Spanish-language counterpart to MedlinePlus, at medlineplus.gov/esp, scored an 82. See Also: ACSI Scores
Information Industry--netLibrary/OCLC Online Books New Version of netLibrary to Launch on January 14th, 2004 A new look and new features (non-English language options, better access for users with disabilities). An online preview is available. See Also: and speaking of online books, some info about the new Ingenta/Oxford University Press Project, OxfordScholarship.Com "The complete text of over 700 carefully-selected Oxford books." See Also: More Libraries Sign-Up for Overdrive's eBooks Service
Professional Reading Shelf Metadata Institutional Repositories Source: RLG Presentations, To Have and to Hold: Metadata and Institutional Repositories This RLG Members' Forum took place on December 9th and 12th, 2003. Powerpoint presentations include: * Description and discovery (EAD, MARC21, XML, MODS, OAI) * Selecting and implementing an open source software digital repository * Mixing and matching—part 2: combining open source options and customized management systems (D-Space and customized digital repositories)
Books Source: AP "MIT scientist forms world's largest book" From the article, 133-pound tome about the Asian country of Bhutan that uses enough paper to cover a football field and a gallon of ink has been declared the world's largest published book. Author Michael Hawley, a scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said it's not a book to curl up with at bedtime - "unless you plan to sleep on it...Each copy of "Bhutan: A Visual Odyssey Across the Kingdom," is 5-by-7 feet, 112 pages and costs about $2,000 to produce. Hawley is charging $10,000, to be donated to a charity he founded, Friendly Planet, which has built schools in Cambodia and Bhutan. See Also: Here's the Amazon Entry for the Book
Motion Pictures The Library of Congress LC Announces 2003 Additions to National Film Registry See Also: Complete List of Films 1989-2002
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (6 Items) Privacy--Canada Source: Privacy Commissioner of Canada Resources: "Canada's New Private Sector Privacy Law" Canadians' personal information will be protected by a new law — the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents (PIPED) Act. The new law goes into effect on 1/1/04. See Also: An Introduction To Protecting Personal Information Collected By Charities (via the Association of Fundraising Professionals) Provides a general overview of the Canadian federal privacy law, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents (PIPED) Act, including the principles behind the privacy legislation, how the bill will work, what constitutes personal information, the complaints process and resources for further information. See Also: Privacy 101 - A Guide To Privacy Legislation For Fundraising Professionals In Canada (via AFP) -- Internet--United Kingdom Source: e-Envoy Just Released, Full Text, Annual Report: UK Online 2003 -- Homeland Security--United States Documents in the News Source: Gilmore Commission/Rand Corporation Full Text, 5th Annual Report, Forging America’s New Normalcy: Securing Our Homeland, Protecting Our Liberty -- Crime--United States--Statistics Source: FBI Just Released, FBI's Preliminary Semiannual Uniform Crime Report Summary ||| Direct to Full Text -- Health Care Industry--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Just Released, 2002 Service Annual Survey: Health Care and Social Assistance Services Summary ||| Direct to Full Text -- Economics--United States--Statistics Source: National League of Cities Full Text, Cities' Fiscal Challenges Continue to Worsen in 2003 (PDF; 424KB) "In the National League of Cities’ latest annual survey of city finances, more than four in five respondents (81%) said their cities were less able to meet financial needs during 2003 than in the previous year. It was the highest negative response to the question since the annual fiscal conditions survey first started asking it in 1990." See Also: Press Release
Industry Briefs West/Thomson Awarded $25 Million Contract by IRS -- World Tourism Organization Launches E-Library Powered by Ingenta ||| Direct to WTOeLibrary Note: This new service offers the option for non-subscribers to purchase basic tourism stats at $5/U.S. per country. Other reports can also be purchased by credit card.
Web Search--Google Source: Chilling Effects Selected Compilation of Recent DMCA/Cease and Desist Requests Sent to Google + Microsoft Requests Blogspot [Google] Removal of Product Keys + Google Asked to Remove Links to Story "Seduction" (#12) + Merry Prankster Photos to Geocities (#2) + Christian Polygamy Site Claims Unauthorized Copying Monday, December 15, 2003
Information Visualization Personal Searching Source: San Jose Mercury News New Version of Grokker Available Today Grokker2, a visual search tool, was released today and allows you to not only search web content but also all of the material on your computer. This new version also offers dynamic categorization. You can download a 30 day fully functional version of Grokker2 here. A version for the Mac will be available in Q1 of '04. Much more in this article from eWeek and the "official" release announcement. I've downloaded a trial version and will report back asap. The original Grokker release has been mentioned on ResourceShelf several times including this July 2003 in The Economist and this October 2002 (when Grokker launched) article in The New York Times.
Open Access Source: SciDevNet "Information summit endorses key role of 'e-science'" From the article, The first session of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) ended on Friday (12 December) with endorsement of a broad list of principles intended to guide the future development of information and communication technologies (ICTs), and of a 'road map' showing how these should be put into practice...Included in the first of these is a statement recognising that science has a central role in the development of the information society, and that there is a need to ensure that scientific data remains widely accessible...The declaration also makes an explicit reference to the need to promote open access initiatives for scientific publishing as part of support for "universal access with equal opportunities for all to scientific knowledge". See Also: Full-Text of Declaration and the Plan of Action
Goverment Documents--United States Source: National Archives "The National Archives Announces Results of 'The People's Vote'" Nearly forty thousand Americans cast more than 300,000 votes as part of a national initiative titled: "The People's Vote: 100 Documents that Shaped America," cosponsored by the National Archives, National History Day, and U.S. News & World Report. The results of the vote were announced in a ceremony in the National Archives Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom at 9 a.m. on Monday December 15, Bill of Rights Day. The following is a list of the ten documents that received the most votes and the percentage of votes each received: -- The Declaration of Independence, 75.9 percent -- The U.S. Constitution, 69.3 percent -- The Bill of Rights, 67.9 percent -- The Louisiana Purchase Treaty, 34.3 percent -- The Emancipation Proclamation, 33.5 percent -- The 19th Amendment to the Constitution, 31.4 percent -- The 13th Amendment to the Constitution, 30.1 percent -- The Gettysburg Address, 25.4 percent -- The Civil Rights Act, 25.2 percent -- The Social Security Act, 20.9 percent * Much more info in this news release.
Information Industry--FAST Search and Transfer FAST Search and Transfer Announces Two Major Deployments FAST Now Powering Japan's Largest E-Commerce Portal |||| FAST Data Search Being Utilized on Norway's Public Information Portal Note: FAST technology also powers FirstGov.Gov in the U.S. See Also: FAST CEO Conference Presentation, Digital Libraries: What Should We Expect from Search Engines Slides from an August 2003 presentation by FAST CEO John Lervik.
Professional Reading Shelf (4 Items) Digital Libraries The February 2004 Issue of D-Lib is Now Online Articles Include: + Fair Publisher Pricing, Confidentiality Clauses and a Proposal to Even the Economic Playing Field + Search and Retrieval in the European Library: A New Approach -- Health Information--United States Source: Pew Internet & American Life Full-Text Report, Wired for Health: How Californians compare to the rest of the nation: A case study sponsored by the California HealthCare Foundation Summary ||| Direct to Full-Text -- Digital Libraries The December, 2003 Issue of Digital Libraries Magazine is Online Articles include: + Comparing Library Resource Allocations for the Paper and the Digital Library: An Exploratory Study by Lynn Silipigni Connaway, OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc.; and Stephen R. Lawrence, University of Colorado + NEP: Current Awareness Service of the RePEc Digital Library by Heting Chu and Thomas Krichel, Long Island University + Open Archives Data Service Prototype and Automated Subject Indexing Using D-Lib® Archive Content As a Testbed by Larry Mongin, Yueyu Fu, and Javed Mostafa, Indiana University + (Book Review) Metadata Fundamentals for All Librarians Reviewed by: Stuart A. Sutton, University of Washington -- Full Text Books Digitization Projects Source: Wired Full Text, "The Great Library of Amazonia" Interesting but sad article. Sad? No mention of netLibrary, ebrary or other services aimed at the researcher and often available at no charge via an academic or public library. I e-mailed the author asking why no mention of these services and projects. His e-mail response to me: "You are right, I ignored the Netlibrary piece of the story, which perhaps was unjust!" See Also: Free Access from ebrary to the full text of 100 Books About the Middle East
Briefly Potty Training at Google HQ: Company Installs "State of the Art" Digital Toilets (via San Francisco Business Times) Note: I've said on many occasions that no matter what Google does they seem to receive press attention for it. This might be the new extreme. Also, I wonder if/when Google becomes a public company the Board of Directors and shareholders would be happy with this type of spending? Sunday, December 14, 2003
Web Search--Lycos Lycos Announces Its List of the Most Popular Search Terms of 2003 Here come the year-end lists! The ball gets rolling with a look at the 100 most popular searchs terms on Lycos. Btw, Aaron Schatz offers daily analysis of popular search terms via his Lycos 50 page. The primary search database at Lycos is provided by Fast Search and Transfer. Other year-end rankings as well as the 2002 and 2001 lists are linked on the far-right side of the Lycos 50 "Web's Most Wanted" page. See Also: Summary and News Release from Lycos
Fine Art--Databases The AMICO (Art Museum Image Consortium) Database Now Available for Individual Subscribers Until this point, subscriptions were only available at the institution level. The new individual subscription service is made available via David Rumsey's Cartography Associates. What's in the database? * Content from 39 arts institutions worldwide * Over 118,000 high-quality images in the database, new material added regularly * Individual subscription: $15/month, $150/year * Do you already have access? Here's a list of institutions already offering AMICO access * Institutions can also subscribe via Cartography Associates. See Also: Via the AMICO site, you can run sample searches and learn more about the database Saturday, December 13, 2003
Scholarly Publishing Source: The Guardian UK Government Preparing Investigation of Scientific Publishers From the article, Reed Elsevier faces a serious challenge to one of its main revenue drivers as a committee of MPs prepares to investigate the growing academic backlash against scientific publishing - a market worth more than £4.5bn a year...Increasingly, universities are reluctant to pay the large fees demanded by publishers and are turning to so-called open access journals, where the costs of publication are paid by the authors. Yesterday the House of Commons science and technology committee said it planned to conduct an inquiry into scientific publications early in the new year. The committee will look at access to journals, with particular reference to price and availability. Specifically the committee will ask about the importance of open-access journals and whether the government should support the trend towards free scientific information. See Also: "UK probes scientific publications" (via The Scientist) See Also: Official Announcement From UK Parliament
Specialized Search Congrats and Kudos to Dr. Lee Giles The work of Penn St. Professor Lee Giles is frequently mentioned on ResourceShelf. It's very interesting and (lucky for us) very useful. Included on his list of accomplishments are the three "niche" search resources. * CiteSeer Focus on IT material * eBiz Search Focus on e-commerce material * SmealSearch Focus on business material This week we learned that Dr. Giles has been awarded the 2003 IBM Distinguished Faculty Award. Congratulations!!! See Also: Learn Much More About Dr. Lee Giles and His Research (Links and Interview)
Professional Reading Shelf Metadata Announcement: Dublin Core Metadata Initiative Annual Conference The 2004 International Conference on Dublin Core and Metadata Applications will be held October 11-24 in Shanghai (China). ---- and while we're on the topic of metadata, we missed this interesting report when it was posted a few weeks ago... Report: "Metadata and Search" This preconference workshop (prior to the 2003 Dublin Core Conference), "addressed the challenges of using metadata to help users find information, particularly when using site- or domain-specific search engines."
Briefly (3 Items) LexisNexis Will Begin To Roll Out New Technology Platform in Early 2004 The new platform will first be available for customers in Australia, France, Germany. -- Enhanced Functionality Plus Access to More Data in the NLM (National Library of Medicine) Gateway's Latest Release See Also: Direct to the NLM Gateway -- LookSmart to Lay Off Half of Staff In November, LookSmart relaunched its FindArticles service. Friday, December 12, 2003
Professional Reading Shelf (5 Items) World Summit on the Information Society Source: IFLA (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions) IFLA Has Posted Three Reports From the World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva Report #1 Report #2 Report #3 --- Metadata--Dublin Core Source: OCLC Research ISO Publishes Dublin Core Metadata Element Set From the announcement, Titled "Information and documentation—The Dublin Core metadata element set," the document is available in English or French for purchase in print or electronic formats; an identical version is available in English for free download from ANSI/NISO. The Dublin Core metadata standard provides a core set of 15 metadata elements for cross-domain information resource sharing. -- RSS Source: Special Libraries Association Information Technology Division RSS? What is it? The November/December issue of b/te, the bimonthly bulletin of SLA's Information Technology Division, focuses on RSS. Three articles -- by Marie C. Kaddell, Greg Kaplan and Steven M. Cohen -- do a good job of demystifying the technology, explaining current and potential uses, and discussing customization options that are possible in the next iteration. Also included in this issue is Eli Edward's, "Partial reflections:the issue of incomplete digital archives on fee-based subscription databanks." Thanks to SDK for the link and annotation. -- Libraries and Information Source: CLIR (Council on Library and Information Resources) Just Published, The November/December 2003 CLIR Issues Articles include: + "Changing Scholarly Communication" by Abby Smith + "DLF Forum Hears Project Updates and Collaborative Digital Plans" by Jerry George + "Digital Opportunity Investment Trust: A Digital Promise?" by David Seaman -- Dictionaries Source: Oxford English Dictionary The December, 2003 Issue of the Oxford English Dictionary Newsletter is Now Online
Web Search--Google Google Launches New Search By Number Options, Direct Links to Access Airport Delay Info I was starting to wonder when Google would announce something new. Well, here it is. You can now enter several types of numbers into the Google search box (with some you must also use a specific word to trigger) and be given a direct link to a specialized database preconfigured for your search string. Google has also started to offer a airport delay info feature for U.S. airports. By entering an airport code (e.g. SFO for San Francisco) into the search box, you'll then given a direct link to the FAA airport delay database. Useful and cool? You bet! The concept of offering direct links to specialized databases is nothing new. Other web search companies have been also working in this arena. For example, Ask Jeeves has been developing with Smart Answers for about six months and AltaVista with Shortcuts for even longer.Yahoo also launched a program this year. Google also offers a few other direct link options. For example, enter a ticker symbol and get a link to access a stock quote. In some cases, Smart Answers from Jeeves and other services not only offer you a link to a specialized database but also place an answer (or a guess at the answer) at the top of the results page. Make sure to check OUT all of these other resources. They provide a good hint about where we might be headed. ---- Here are examples from what's new from Google direct from the help page: • UPS tracking numbers example search: "1Z9999W999999999" • FedEx tracking numbers example search: "fedex 999999999999" Remember to put the word "fedex" before your tracking number. • Patent numbers example search: "patent 5123123" Remember to put the word "patent" before your patent number. • FAA airplane registration numbers example search: n199ua An airplane's FAA registration number is typically printed on its tail. • FCC equipment IDs example search: "fcc B4Z-34009-PIR" Remember to put the word "fcc" before the equipment ID. -- Travel Conditions • search: ord airport
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Economics--United States Source: GPO New, GPO Now Offering Search/Browse Access to Economic Indicators Available from April 1995 forward, this monthly compilation is prepared for the Joint Economic Committee by the Council of Economic Advisors and provides economic information on prices, wages, production, business activity, purchasing power, credit, money and Federal finance.
Briefly UK's National Health Service Developing a Dictionary of Medicines and Devices (via KableNET) It will help promote information sharing. -- "Emerald Launches Digital Signatures" (via ManagingInformation.Com) -- The New York Times Names Recipients of 2003 Librarian Awards Thursday, December 11, 2003
Web Resources of the Week Two entries this week. ----- Elections--United States Election 2004 Resource Compilation #2 The first compilation of Election 2004 related material was a big success. I'm glad so many of you found the items useful. Compilation #2 includes more than 11 items. Thank you to ResourceShelf Contributing Editor Shirl Kennedy for her assistance in preparing this compilation. Compilation #3 will be available next month. +++ 1) *Campaign Finance Laws Chronology (via AP) * Table: Summary of the Supreme Court Decision (McConnell v. Federal Election Commission) via FecWatch.Org * Full-Text of Supreme Court Decision (McConnell v. Federal Election Commission, 298 pages) * BCRA Documents (via Federal Election Commission) ||| BCRA Backgrounder (via Legal Information Institute) +++ 2) Presidential Primaries Map Source: National Association of Secretaries of State A pdf file. Color. +++ 3) Printable Maps: Presidential Elections 1789-2000 Source: National Atlas of the U.S. All maps are available in either pdf or gif files. Interesting and useful. +++ 4) State Election Laws & Administration Issues Source: National Association of Secretaries of State Handy charts. Topics include: * Absentee Ballot Deadlines * Absentee Voting * Automatic Recounts * Counting Absentee Ballots * Definition of a Valid Vote on Optical Scan Systems * Definition of a Valid Vote on Punch Card Systems * Early Voting * Polling Place Accessibility and Voter Assistance * Voter Registration Deadlines +++ 5) 2004 Presidential Campaign Sites Source: WebArchivist.Org Chart allows you to easily compare features of presidential candidate web sites. +++ 6) The Political Pages Source: Campaign and Elections Magazine "The world's largest circulation directory of political consultants, products and campaign services published by Votenet Solutions' Campaigns & Elections." +++ 7) Election Statistics Source: Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives "Since 1920, the Clerk of the House has collected and published the official vote counts for federal elections from the official sources among the various states and territories. These documents, out of print for many years, have been collected and scanned in a format to make them once again available to researchers and students." PDF; since 1992, also available in HTML. +++ 8) Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections "...detailed national results for the major and minor candidates for U.S. President in the general (November) presidential elections from 1789 through 2000" and "historical details (such as election dates, electoral votes by state, the electoral college, etc.), Presidential Election Law from the U.S. Constitution and United States Code, Articles, and a description of the election process." +++ 9) U. S. Electoral College Homepage (via National Archives) 2000 Presidential Election vote totals and box scores back to 1789. +++ 10) Leip's Electoral College Calculator - 2004 The Electoral College also offers a calculator. +++ 11) Stats from the Federal Election Commission * Voter Registration and Turnout 2000 ||| In XLS Format * National and State Voter Registration and Turnout in the Congressional Election - 1998 * National and State Voter Registration and Turnout in the Presidential Election -1996 * Voter Registration and Turnout in Presidential Elections by State - 1960-1992 * Voter Registration and Turnout in Presidential Elections by Year - 1960-1992 * National Voter Turnout in Presidential and Congressional Elections 1960-1996 See Also: ResourceShelf Election 2004 Compilation #1 ----- ----- ----- Art History Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art Timeline of Art History "The Timeline of Art History is a chronological, geographical, and thematic exploration of the history of art from around the world, as illustrated especially by the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection.... First launched in 2000, the Timeline now extends from prehistory to 1800 A.D., and will continue to expand in scope and depth. The Timeline will span art history up to the present day by the fall of 2004."
Online Databases Source: The Virtual Chase Boolean, Online Database Training, and Other Thoughts The Virtual Chase is hosting a discussion about the value of "teaching" Boolean. I've shared a few thoughts and they're now posted on the TVC web site. Others sharing comments include ProQuest VP Stephen Abram and Cindy Carlson, an Electronic Resources Librarian at Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (5 Items) Business--Europe--Lists & Rankings Source: Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Just Announced, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Technology Fast 500 (2003) "...ranking of the fastest growing high-technology companies." A CEO survey is also available. Additional resources on the Fast 500 homepage. See Also: FAST Search and Transfer was ranked #2 on the list. -- Business--Europe--Lists & Rankings Source: Bureau van Dijk Company Profiles for the Top 20 European Companies Material comes from the BvD AMADEUS database. -- Almanacs Source: The World Almanac The December Issue of The World Almanac E-Newsletter is Online Contains a November chronology, holidays, "This Day in History," and much more. See Also: Back issues and subscription info (free) -- Cost of Living--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Fast Facts, The Cost of Living Adjustment Also available as a pdf. -- Christmas--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Fast Facts, Christmas 2003 Also available as a pdf. A few (just a few) of the facts included in the document: $466 million...The amount the nation’s Christmas tree farmers received from tree sales in 2002. $30.6 billion...Retail sales by the U.S. toy industry in 2002 46,438...Number of malls and shopping centers dotting the U.S. landscape in 2002.
Web Search--Google Two Quick Google Items 1) Google IPO Stuff (via News.Com) The same scenario described in this article was first discussed in a Barron's article a couple of months ago. 2) Company to Open Engineering Office in India (via WSJ)
Information Quality Possible Bug in Internet Explorer Could Cause "Fake" Sites to Appear Legit Isn't it always something! From the article, Microsoft on Tuesday said it was looking into reports of a potential bug in its Web browser that could help malicious hackers design convincing Web site spoofs. The bug, according to security alerts by a bug hunter and a Danish security company, Secunia, could let hackers use a technique to display a false Web address on a fake site...Savvy Web surfers often figure out the ruse from irregularities in the Web address. But in the method described by Secunia, IE could allow the address bar for the spoofed eBay site, for example, to read "ebay.com." While we're on the subject of web browsers, I've been using both Mozilla and Mozilla Firebired more and more. Wonderful stuff and worthy of your time. The price for both products? Free!!!
Scholarly Publishing Source: SciDevNet The Case for Open Access Made at World Summit on the Information Society From the article, Delegates from 176 nations attending the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) have heard a strong plea that they should support campaigns to secure open access to scientific information...Open access has now been clearly identified as a win/win proposition to bridge the digital divide," said Shu-Khun Lin, founder and director of the Swiss-Based Molecular Diversity Presentation International, a non-profit organisation for the deposit and exchange of molecular and biomolecular samples....The next step, said Lin, was to persuade all those who fund research that is reported in scientific journals — including governments, research agencies, philanthropic foundations, and private companies — to ensure that authors publish their results in open-access journals. Wednesday, December 10, 2003
National Libraries--United Kingdom Source: BL New Study, Impact of the British Library on the UK's Economy From the announcement, The study shows – taking conservative estimates – that for every £1 of public funds the Library receives it generates over £4 of value to the UK economy. In addition, the findings show that the Library adds £363 million of value each year – £304 million indirectly and £59 million directly – and that, without the Library, the UK would lose £280 million of economic value a year...Whilst there are no direct comparisons to this study, examples from other cultural sectors show that a value of 4.4 times investment is good. A study of the Royal Theatre in Copenhagen found that the value of the theatre was broadly equal to the public funding; a study of the National Bibliographic Database of the National Library of New Zealand estimated it was worth 3.5 times its cost; whilst a study of the St. Louis Public Library found that it produced value of between 2 and 10 times its public funding. See Also: Direct to a Six Page Document with Methodology and Findings
Information Industry--Elsevier Source: The Scientist BioMedNet to close? Scientific and medical publishing behemoth Elsevier is reportedly closing its Web portal for the life sciences, BioMedNet, along with other portals [ChemWeb and ElsevierEngineering.com], apparently after deciding they cost more to run than they are worth to the company.
Professional Reading Shelf (3 Items) Librarians Source: Library Journal Vision of New IFLA Secretary General: Librarians as Leaders of Change From the article, IFLA's [International Federation of Library Associations] focus over the next few years, in [R] Ramachandran's view, should be three-fold: to build a strong financial base, to promote the library and librarianship scene in developing countries as effective agencies for change, and to develop and train librarians as leaders of change. -- Information Education Source: Council on Library and Information Resources Just Announced, Post-Doctoral Fellowship to Help Create "A New Kind" of Scholarly Information Professional From the announcement, The Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) announces a post-doctoral fellowship program, offered in conjunction with a consortium of academic research institutions, that will establish a new kind of scholarly information professional. It will educate new scholars about the challenges and opportunities created by new forms of scholarly research and the information resources that support them, both traditional and digital. The program will offer postdoctoral fellowships to individuals who have earned their Ph.D.s in disciplines in the humanities within the past three years (or who will complete it before starting the program) and who believe that there are opportunities to develop meaningful linkages among disciplinary scholarship, libraries, archives, and evolving digital tools. Ten to fifteen fellowships, of one to two years in length, will be awarded in 2004. See Also: Additional Information and Applications -- Intellectual Property Source: NISO Full Text, White Paper, Patents and Open Standards A 16 page pdf by Priscilla Caplan. Ms. Caplan is the Assistant Director of the Florida Center for Library Automation. This paper was originally published in Information Standards Quarterly, October, 2003.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (4 Items) Parliament--Australia Source: Department of the Parliamentary Library, Australia Just Released, E-Brief: Codes of Conduct in Australian and some Overseas Parliaments -- United States Government--Computer Security Source: Just Released, Full Text Report, 2003 Federal Computer Security Report Card Report and other materials linked on right side of page. Additional info and background in this Computerworld article. -- Documents in the News--Iraq Source: U.S. Department of Defense/Findlaw Full Text, Iraq Contracts and Coalition Partners -- Small Business--United States--Statistics Source: SBA Just Released, "Small Business and Micro Business Lending in the United States, 2002 Edition" Summary ||| Research Bulletin ||| Direct to Full Text
Briefly Watch those DVDs (Or Don't)...Tests Measure Compatibility Of DVD Disks and Drives From the article, Initial tests conducted by researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in collaboration with the DVD Association and the Optical Storage Technology Association show that compatibility between recordable DVDs and DVD drives is only 85 percent. This means that if a recording is made on 10 different brands of DVDs, the odds are that at least one will not work. -- Information Industry--ProQuest ProQuest Signs Distribution Agreement with The New England Journal of Medicine A new agreement with The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) to distribute the full text of the respected medical journal electronically to libraries, hospitals and educational institutions...Backfile rights dating back to 1996 are included in the agreement. Content in XanEdu CoursePacks will be current with the print edition of NEJM. Other databases will be embargoed 90 days. Full text and Text+ Graphics™ formats will be used in all services. Tuesday, December 09, 2003
Agriculture--Databases Source: National Agriculture Library Just Released, NAL Upgrades Web-Based AGRICOLA Catalog From the announcement, The new version of AGRICOLA provides improved access--many new search and retrieval capabilities, with daily updates--to over 4 million bibliographic records, the world’s largest compilation of agricultural information. The new AGRICOLA catalog, which replaces AGRICOLA98, is one of several modules implemented in NAL’s migration to Endeavor’s Voyager library system. In addition to a search and retrieval engine for AGRICOLA, the new Voyager system supports NAL’s acquisitions, serials control, cataloging, indexing, and circulation operations. Key Features of the new system: * Users may search the catalog of books, journals and non-print items; search the catalog of article records for the journals indexed; or search the two catalog databases combined. * Users may choose either to display results of searches, or to e-mail the search results to themselves. * Hotlinks enable users to obtain the full text of resources, where available electronically. Finally, note the NEW url for the AGRICOLA catalog: http://agricola.nal.usda.gov/ See Also: Direct to AGRICOLA Search Interface
Professional Reading Shelf (3 Items) Digitization Projects Medical Librarianship Source: NLM Cool, Digital Access to the Complete Run of the Bulletin of the Medical Library Association Now Available via PubMedCentral Full text/full image of all issues back to Vol. 1 No. 1 (1911) are now available online. Articles are delivered as pdf files or can be viewed a page at a time by selecting the "page browse" link. By using this advanced interface you can keyword search content and limit your search to BMLA articles. Direct to Bulletin of the Medical Library Association (Vol. 1 No. 1 (1911) - Vol. 89 No. 4 (1998) Direct to Journal of the Medical Library Association (Vol. 90 No. 1 (1998) - Present -- Unstructured Information Source: Intelligent Enterprise "Unstructured Information Management" A brief overview about what unstructured data is all about. -- Libraries--United Kingdom Source: Resource UK...Agreement to Create a Joint Forum For Collaboration and Cooperation of Museums, Archives and Libraries Issues "...for collaboration and cooperation on museums, archives and libraries issues."
Natural Language Technology Source: Technology Review "Software Paraphrases Sentences" From the article, We paraphrase all the time, often without thinking about it. Try to give a computer the means to reword a sentence, however, and it becomes apparent that figuring out how to say it differently is complicated. Cornell University researchers have tapped a pair of unlike sources—on-line journalism and computational biology—to make it possible to automatically paraphrase whole sentences. The researchers used gene comparison techniques to identify word patterns from different news sources describing the same event. See Also: Summarization Software Demos, Newsblaster (Columbia University) and NewsInEssence (Univ. of Michigan) Learn More: Homepage of Dr. Regina Barzilay, co-author of article discussed in Tech Review article
Government Documents--United States National Archives--United States United States--History 240 More Hours of Nixon White House Recorded Conversations To Be Released Tomorrow By NARA From the announcement, The National Archives and Records Administration will open approximately 240 hours of White House tape recordings from the Nixon Presidency. Included are approximately 3,000 conversations that were recorded at the White House from July 1972 through October 1972. These conversations comprise the fourth of five chronological segments to be released. See Also: The Nixon White House Tapes-NARA Finding Aids (Current through May, 2002) Listen Online: RealAudio and Transcripts (Watergate Trial Tapes and Transcripts) Made available via the Media Resources Center, Library, UC Berkeley. Listen Online: Watergate Tapes (Washington Post) A sampling of coversations, See Also: Search Nixon Presidential Materials See Also: Nixon Presidential Materials
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (3 Items) Influenza--United States Source: Center for Disease Control New Web Site, Flu in the United States -- Trademarks--United States--Databases Source: USPTO New Resource, Trademark Assignments on the Web System Direct to the database at: http://assignments.uspto.gov/assignments/ Material in this fielded database dates back to 1955. Patent Assignments on the Web is scheduled to be deployed on January 26, 2004. Thanks to GT at TVC for the news tip. -- Digital Government--United States--Lists & Rankings Source: The Center for Digital Government New Rankings, 2003 Digital Cities Survey (Top 10 Digital Cities) Summary ||| Complete Report Monday, December 08, 2003
Newspaper--Archives Search, Purchase Articles, View Page Images from The New York Times back to 1851 ResourceShelf friend P.W. informs us that you can now search on an "as needed" basis the full-text of the NY Times (including advertisements) back to 1851 and purchase material for $2.95. The content is a digitized version of the material delivered in pdf. The material is being made available via ProQuest's Historical Newspapers program. The company has also completed retrospective conversion of the following papers: * The Wall Street Journal- 1889-1987 * The Washington Post- 1877-1988 * The Christian Science Monitor- 1908-1991 * Los Angeles Times- 1881-1984 An archive of the Chicago Tribune is in the process of being digitized. Hopefully, all of these publications will make pay-per-article search available on their public web sites. Btw, it is also possible to browse all articles between two dates. For example, if you would like to review all of the articles between 7/4/76 and 7/5/76 simply set your date limits and enter an * in the "search for" box. Entering the same date in both boxes will also work. The full implementation of the historic newspaper archive (available at some libraries) offers additional access points (including subject) not available via the public interface on NYTimes.Com.
Web Search--Northern Light Source: Info Today NewsBreaks Northern Light Plans Reintroduction of Business Search Engine Paula Hane writes, Northern Light, the company named for the innovative 19th century clipper ship, has announced it is bringing back its business Web search engine and the premium document library (previously known as the Northern Light Special Collection) on Jan. 15, 2004, for enterprise customers. The service, called the Northern Light Business Research Library (http://www.nlresearch.com), will be offered first to the 75 or so former customers of the NL Special Collection. According to CEO David Seuss, the company already has "tentative sales to two potential enterprise customers and a half dozen prospects in the queue. Individuals will be invited to come back to the popular subscription offering in March 2004." On the subject of Northern Light as a free, open web search tool, Hane reports that the company will no longer compete in the free Web search arena. "'Nothing is free anymore,' he [NL CEO David Seuss] added."
Public Libraries Source: Daily Herald (Suburban Chicago) Full Text article, "Why value of libraries is going up" Although this article is very positive about public libraries (for good reason!) I also would have been thrilled to read more about the professionals who work in library buildings. I wish the headline read "Why the value of libraries AND Librarians is going up." Today, the skills of an info professional are not only accessible inside the building but in many cases they can also be accessed by phone, e-mail, and using virtual tools. We need to remind people that the reach of all libraries and librarians extends beyond the four walls of a building. In ANOTHER Public Library News... "Self-checkout saving money at local libraries" (via King County Journal) Saving $ outside Seattle.
Web Search--Google More Odd or "Less than Relevant" Google Search Results Last week I listed several Google results that made little to no sense. Here are a few more. What's most surprising to me is that these results are listed in the highly coveted top 10 results for the given search strategies. These are also examples of how a keyword search might not be very precise. 1) Search term: shopping Result #5 is for Fedstats.gov and Result #10 is for the Mississippi Chapter of the NEA. The term "shopping" is not found on either page. Note: The Fedstats result is also listed in the top 10 of an AlltheWeb results page. The Fedstats page DOES NOT appear in the Teoma top 10. 2) Search terms: online shopping mall Result #2 doesn't contain the words shopping or mall. Note: Searching "online shopping mall" as a phrase also contains this site as the #3 result. None of the search terms is on the page. 3) Search terms: middle east peace Result #10 doesn't contain any of the search terms. 4) Search term: travel The #8 result is for the Webcrawler homepage. Search term not on page. Since the url itself is for www.city.net (a one-time travel site) you can understand that many travel-related links to this page remain online. However, City.Net has been referring to Webcrawler for almost one year. 5) Search terms: shakespeare hamlet Result #6 is for metasearch engine and doesn't contain either search term. The term hamlet is in the url. 6) Search terms: web directory chicago Result #7 doesn't contain the words Chicago or directory. See Also: Forget "Weapons of Mass" Destruction, Another Example of How Google Rankings Have Been Manipulated (via Sydney Morning Herald)
Electronic Records--United States Source: NARA Program for Permanent Preservation of U.S. Government Records Continues From the announcement, On Friday, December 5, Archivist of the United States John W. Carlin announced a major milestone in the National Archives plan to build a permanent archives for the Federal Government's electronic records. The National Archives may award up to two contracts to prime system integrators to design an electronic archives that will preserve and make accessible the records of our digital government to anyone, anywhere, anytime-well into the future, long after the hardware and software used to create the records has been replaced. By the end of the preliminary design phase, the National Archives will select one of the two contractors, largely based on the merits of their design submission, to build this ground-breaking electronic archives. The first increment of the operational Electronic Records Archives is scheduled to be on line in 2007, with four more increments to follow.
Information Retrieval Two Seattle Area Companies You Might Want to Know About 1) Think Tank 23 Their Nav4 product promises "conceptual navigation" to various IR environments. You can demo Nav4 software with the Waypath search engine that focuses on weblog content. -- 2) Nervana Building semantic-based tools to find relationships and related documents. Learn more in this Puget Sound Business Journal article.
Scholarly Publishing Source: Technician Online (Student Newspaper, North Carolina State University) "Senate backs libraries" From the article, Student senators passed a resolution supporting the NCSU Libraries position not to renew a journal subscription...David Shuford, a master's student in genetics, said that Reed Elsevier is offering NCSU Libraries, along with the Triangle Research Libraries Network (TRLN), a contract deal that is unfavorable in light of budget problems that the libraries are facing. "[The contract] doesn't allow us to effectively manage the journal subscriptions, in terms that the library feels it can support," Shuford said. See Also: More in this article from Library Journal
Travel Information Source: Reuters Some People Like it In Print From the article, Today, despite travel Web sites and systems that send alerts to those on the road, there are still thousands of travelers who buy those printed guides and wouldn't think of leaving home without them, their publishers say.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (5 Items) Terrorism--United States Criminal Justice--United States--Statistics Source: TRAC (Transactional Records Clearinghouse) New, Released Today, Criminal Terrorism Enforcement Since the 9/11/01 Attacks Summary ||| Full-Text Report See Also: Dept. of Justice Comments About the Report -- Campus Crime--United States--Statistics Source: BJS Just Released, Violent Victimization of College Students Summary ||| Full-Text and Other Files -- Health Information Four New Topic Pages/Compilations from MEDLINEplus 1) Carbohydrates 2) Dietary Proteins 3) Dietary Sodium 4) Occupational Health for Healthcare Providers -- Federal Income Tax--United States Source: IRS Recently Updated: IRS Publication 17, "Your Federal Income Tax" -- Energy--California Source: EIA Full Text Report, 2003 California Gasoline Price Study This is the final report to Congressman Ose describing the factors driving California's spring 2003 gasoline price spike and the subsequent price increases in June and August. See Also: Inquiry into August 2003 Gasoline Price Spike Sunday, December 07, 2003
Information Age Source: IMLS IMLS Director Robert Martin Heading to World Summit on the Information Society From the announcement, Director Martin will speak on museums and libraries' contribution to education in the information age in a forum entitled "Role of Science in the Information Society (RSIS)." Sponsored by CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research, and the world's largest particle physics center) with UNESCO and others as co-sponsors, this pre-conference December 8-10, explores how the open exchange of information has revolutionized everything from global commerce to how we communicate with friends and family. Among the plenary speakers are Tim Berners-Lee, Inventor of the World Wide Web, and Ismail Serageldin, Director General of the Library of Alexandria. See Also: Learn More About RSIS See Also: Learn More About the World Summit
Professional Reading Shelf National Libraries Source: Library of Congress Full Text, Library of Congress Mission To Baghdad: Report on National Library and the House of Manuscripts The trip took place from October 27-November 3, 2003.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (3 Items) Hunger--United States--Statistics Source: Food Security Institute, Center on Hunger and Poverty, Brandeis University Various Statistics about Hunger in the U.S. National Statistics Statistics by State Guide to Recent Studies on Food Insecurity and Hunger -- Military--Australia Source: Department of the Parliamentary Library, Australia Research Note: Australia's New Main Battle Tanks -- Australia Source: Department of the Parliamentary Library, Australia Research Note: Protecting Australia's Borders Saturday, December 06, 2003
Professional Reading Shelf Online Information World Wide Web Source: OCLC Research Stuart Weibel from OCLC Interviews Tim Berners-Lee From the page, This interview with Tim Berners-Lee, Director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) was conducted by OCLC Researcher Stuart Weibel. Tim agreed to discuss his perspectives on major trends in the information landscape and their impact on use and access to public information. This interview was conducted in support of the OCLC environmental scan of the Library and Information communities, developed for strategic planning purposes for OCLC and its members.
Public Libraries--United Kingdom Source: The Register "e-Minister will make every public library a WiFi hotspot" From the article, Government minister Stephen Timms opened today's Wi-Fi & 3G summit in London by listing the achievements of the "light touch regulatory policy" he's been able to put in place since taking over at the Department - and confirmed that his plan to put an open Wi-Fi hotspot in every public library was "going ahead". "I'm very keen on the idea that every public library should be a Wi-Fi hotspot," he said. "Already 90 per cent have broadband, and my department is now working up that idea."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Jobs and Professions--United States--Lists & Rankings Annual Poll: Most Honest and Ethical Profession Source: The Gallup Organization "Nurses top Gallup's annual survey on the honesty and ethics of various professions, followed by other medical professionals like doctors, veterinarians, pharmacists, and dentists. Car salesmen, HMO managers, insurance salesmen, and advertising practitioners are rated as the least honest and ethical. Overall, there has been little change in the public's rating of the honesty and ethics of professions over the past year." Thanks to ResourceShelf's Shirl Kennedy for the link. Friday, December 05, 2003
Professional Reading Shelf (2 Items) Health Information Source: BMC Medicine 2003, 1:2 Full Text article, Where are systematic reviews published? From the abstract, Systematic reviews summarize all pertinent evidence on a defined health question. They help clinical scientists to direct their research and clinicians to keep updated. Our objective was to determine the extent to which systematic reviews are clustered in a large collection of clinical journals and whether review type (narrative or systematic) affects citation counts. -- Government Information--Preservation Source: An Andrew F. Mellon Funded Initiative of the California Digital Library Full Text Report, Recently Released, Web-Based Government Information: Evaluating Solutions for Capture, Curation, and Preservation "In large part, our research set out to determine how best to leverage memory organizations’ historic roles and current activities; to ask, in effect, what might encourage and enable their greater involvement in the capture and persistent management of web-based government information so that they may extend their historic roles as guarantors of our governments’ copious published record into a digital age." The sheer volume of web-based information is not only staggering. It is also extremely volatile, which makes preservation a critical challenge for "memory organizations" -- notably libraries. The study suggests that different parts of the preservation process be farmed out to those institutions best equipped to handle them, and encourages a "broker service" model that "will supply a range of tools and a deep technical infrastructure that will enable memory and other organizations to focus in areas where their expertise and their missions naturally permit." Extensive bibliography of projects and programs as well as information resources.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (2 Items) Health--Public Opinion--United States--Database Source: Kaiser Family Foundation Database: Health Poll Search Health Poll Search is a searchable archive of public opinion questions on health issues that allows users to know what Americans think about health issues, as well as what Americans have thought about health issues over time. Health Poll Search is the result of a partnership between the Kaiser Family Foundation and The Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at the University of Connecticut...The Health Poll Search archive covers 29 topics and more than 300 subtopics, and holds more than 60,000 questions on health issues from health care surveys that have included questions on health. These questions provide information on public perceptions of HIV/AIDS, reproductive health, health policy and health reform, Medicare and Medicaid, women's health, the uninsured, minority health, and children's health. Response percentages and source information are provided for all questions. -- Military Foreign Military Studies Office Source: U.S. Army "The Foreign Military Studies Office (FMSO) assesses regional military and security issues through open-source media and direct engagement with foreign military and security specialists to advise Army leadership on issues of policy and planning critical to the U.S. Army and the wider military community." Offers: ++ Publications (Browse by geographic region or topic.) ++ Book Reviews ++ Research Links Thursday, December 04, 2003
Resources of the Week (2 Items) Business Information 1) A New Fee-Based Publication from Free Pint: VIP As some of you know Free Pint (http://www.freepint.com) is a highly respected and FREE resource for information professionals based in the UK. If you've never visited the site I encourage you to plan a visit. Btw, ResourceShelf is hosted by Free Pint and is a proud member of the Free Pint family of resources and tools. ----- This week Free Pint launched a new, fee-based publication and online resource focusing on business information. I've asked Pam Foster, the editor of the new publication and online service to provide you with an introduction. Before Pam's intro let me once again remind those of you who use Free Pint that their FREE services (newsletter, Pub, etc.) are not going away. They remain free and most deserving of your attention. ------ An Intro to VIP (Fee-Based Service) http://www.vivavip.com/ -------- My name's Pam Foster and I edit 'VIP' and 'VIP Eye', two exciting new subscription services from FreePint. I've been involved in the business information industry for over 17 years as a commentator, writer and reviewer. I've also been involved in a wide range of projects for clients in the business information industry. During the whole of that period, I've been associated with Headland Business Information, most recently editing Headland's two newsletters 'Business Information Testdrive' and 'What's New in Business Information'. I'm a regular contributor to 'Information World Review' and I also edit 'Online Business Sourcebook', published by KG Saur. In November 2003, I joined the FreePint team to edit the new VIP services. The monthly 'VIP' publication is aimed at information professions, knowledge managers, IT professionals, Web content and intranet managers. We decided from the outset that the defining characteristic of 'VIP' would be its interactivity – we want the user to dictate content. Every month I'll be including comparative reviews of business information products and software, features, interviews, case studies and trends. 'VIP' content will be driven via the 'Lounge', a free discussion area where VIP members can post their views and ideas for content. I'm also editing a separate service, 'VIP Eye', which provides a twice-monthly e-news and analysis service on the business information industry, concentrating on new products, companies and upcoming developments. Also available is the 'Wire', a database of press releases posted by information companies, which is free to members and vendors alike. Register your interest at: http://www.vivavip.com/ or email me at: pam.foster@freepint.com +++++++ +++++++ +++++++ 2) Open Access Journals—Directories Scholarly Publishing Source: Lund University Libraries Directory of Open Access Journals The DOAJ is a searchable and browsable directory of almost 600 open access publications. Browse by subject or by title. Since the directory is growing all of the time a handy list of "new titles" is also available. Individual entries contain direct links to the publications along with publisher, language, ISSN, keywords, and start year. Exactly what's included in the directory? From the site, "The Directory aims to be comprehensive and cover all open access scientific and scholarly journals that use a quality control system to guarantee the content. All subject areas and languages will be covered." This page contains detailed definitions along with directory selection criteria. By May, 2004, the directory will launch a searchable article index of material found in each publication. The Directory of Open Access Journals was launched in May. See Also: What is Open Access? See Also: To learn more about open access and stay updated with the latest news from the movement, Peter Suber's Open Access News is essential reading.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (3 Items) Multilateral Conventions Source: Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy/Edward Ginn Library Fletcher-Ginn Multilaterals Project "The Multilaterals Project, begun in 1992, is an ongoing project...to make available the texts of international multilateral conventions and other instruments. Although the project was initiated to improve public access to environmental agreements, the collection today also includes treaties in the fields of human rights, commerce and trade, laws of war and arms control, and other areas. The vast majority of texts date from the second half of this century, but the collection also includes historical texts, from the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia to the Covenant of the League of Nations." Treaties are keyword searchable, with Boolean options. Offers links to other treaty research resources. -- Aviation--History Source: U.S. Census Fast Facts, First Flight Centennial The 100th anniversary of the first flight of the Wright brothers takes place on December 17th. This new "fast fact" report from the U.S. Census is loaded down with statistics about aviation in the U.S. -- District of Columbia--History Source: U.S. Census Fast Facts, Anniversary of Washington, D.C., as Nation’s Capital "On Dec. 12, 1800, Washington, D.C., officially became the nation’s capital." This "fast fact" report contains stats about the city.
Online Research Source: Detroit News Another Google Article For some types of research Google as well as other open web engines (remember, Google isn't the only one) work fine. However, this quote from a university professor makes me wonder if any potential library user considers using anything else. From the article, "It [Google] is amazing," says Oakland University English professor Jude Nixon. On Tuesday, Nixon -- a scholar of Victorian literature -- needed to refresh his memory regarding the myth of Osiris. Instead of burrowing into library carrels, he used Google to find the story of the son of the earth god Seb and sky-god Nut. The article makes no mention that the reach of most libraries (including the one at Oakland University) extends beyond the walls of the building. I wonder if the journalist who wrote this column has any idea of Google's limitations (in terms of content) and that other resources are available to her (without having to go to a library building) both for a fee or for free via her public or corporate library. Someone should let her know. Wednesday, December 03, 2003
Citation Analysis Scholarly Publishing Source: ISI + The most-cited 150 countries in ALL FIELDS + Civil Engineering: High-Impact U.S. Universities, 1998-2002 + Journals Ranked by Impact: Anthropology
Information Industry Notes (2 Items) Health Information--Database Trials Source: OVID This Month Only, Free Access to the Pascal Biomed Database (via OVID) Pascal Biomed, a subset of the renowned Pascal Database, holds the core of world literature on medicine and life sciences in over 6 million references. It is a unique multi-disciplinary and multi-lingual resource covering over 6500 major international journals, reports, periodical articles, doctoral dissertations and conference proceedings in all aspects of Medical Sciences. Pascal Biomed represents a perfect complement to MEDLINE giving special emphasis to European literature. Pascal Biomed incorporates tri-lingual indexing, meaning that keywords can be searched in English, French or Spanish. See Also: Learn More About Pascal Biomed See Also: More News, OVID Launches Pay-Per-View Service -- Salaries--Non-Profits--United States--Database Source: PNN New Database (Fee-Based): Salary Search From GuideStar From the article, GuideStar Salary Search offers wide-ranging, frequently updated data on employee compensation for more than 234,000 nonprofit organizations. This interactive, on-line nonprofit compensation research tool gives users greater flexibility in researching nonprofit compensation. Salary Search gathers data from the Forms 990 public charities file annually with the IRS. On the 990, nonprofit organizations must provide compensation figures for board members, key officers, and the top five additional employees whose total compensation exceeds $50,000. Salary Search’s benchmark job report presents this information in 14 job categories. See Also: Direct to Guidestar Salary Search Info and Demo
Professional Reading Shelf Reference Reviews Péter's Digital Reference Shelf, December, 2003 Is Now Online This month Péter Jacsó offers detailed reviews of Amazon's Search Inside the Book and ConsumerReviews.Com. ConsumerReviews was featured as a ResourceShelf Resource of the Week in October. Overall, Péter has positive comments about both resources. + "Search Inside the Book" Jacsó concludes, "In spite of some software glitches and limitations, the new Amazon enhanced by the SIB function offers impressive alternatives for digital ready-reference." + Consumer Search Jacsó concludes, While it does not have the breadth of coverage of Consumer Reports, Consumer Digest or Consumer Guide, ConsumerSearch offers an innovative solution, and saves consumers a lot of time and agony by synthesizing published reviews of products and services in a very appealing fashion free of charge. Users will be happy with this resource and reference librarians will be appreciated when they guide their patrons to it.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (5 Items) Internet Source: InfoWorld Full Text Report, Trouble on the Net (PDF; 5.63MB) "The founders of the Internet sought to minimize intelligence at its core and insure end-to-end connectivity. Today, a host of challengers, including commercial interests and security concerns threatens that vision. What can be done?" Some interesting tidbits from this article: -- The number of "average daily queries" to the Net's DNS services is "up fivefold since 2000." The number doubles every 18 months. -- "Internet traffic is growing at a faster rate than Moore's Law predicts...." -- IPv6, the so-called "next generation Internet," has gotten off to a slow start in the U.S. Says Symantec CTO Rob Clyde, "That whole product upgrade cycle is likely to be very complex. Everything has to be changed. It will probably take the government driving IPv6." -- VeriSign has invested more than $100 million in the DNS system and provided "100% availability for six years." Thanks to ResourceShelf Contributing Editor, Shirl Kennedy, for the annotation and link. -- Latin America--Webliography Source: C&RL News Full Text, Latin America on the Internet: A bibliography A new compilation by Rafael Tarragó, a librarian at the University of Minnesota. -- Arab Americans--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Released Today, The Arab Population: 2000 Summary ||| Direct to Full-Text -- NGO's Source: Department of the Parliamentary Library, Australia New, Issue Brief: Redefining NGOs: The Emerging Debate -- Cooking--Thesaurus The Cook's Thesaurus "The Cook's Thesaurus is a cooking encyclopedia that covers thousands of ingredients and kitchen tools. Entries include pictures, descriptions, synonyms, pronunciations, and suggested substitutions." Tuesday, December 02, 2003
Web Search--Google OCLC OCLC Open WorldCat in Google About a month ago ago ResourceShelf offered a few comments along with a link to Barbara Quint's excellent article about OCLC's relationship with Google. Quint's article broke the news that OCLC was supplying Google with about 1 million WorldCat bibliographic records for inclusion into the Google database. Earlier in the week THIS POST contained what I thought was news that the first record was in the Google database. I ran several tests using queries that I thought an average searcher would create. So, where are my findings? After posting the info I learned from an OCLC spokesperson that although my alert tools worked well to alert me to the record what I found was an early test and in no way reflects where a typical OCLC would appear on a results page. Actually, Google goofed (say it isn't so) by including the record in their public database. Where will a typical Open WorldCat record appear on a results page based on an average user query (2.4 words)?. The answer is nobody including OCLC knows, but ResourceShelf is keeping a close watch. --- And while we're on the Google beat... You can imagine that we are happy to see Danny Sullivan's article about how useful and necessary specialized search databases are. Those of you who have read ResourceShelf and are aware of my other work know that this is something I've been saying for many years, especially as it relates to librarians and other information professionals. From the article, "Many times, people would be far better off performing a search that taps into a specialized collection of material rather than trying a web search." In many ways this relates to OCLC and Google. Instead of adding records from WorldCat into Google and having little to no control where they appear on a results page, a direct tab or link to the user's public, academic, school or special library would be a much better idea. Libraries would also be ready to offer access to fee-based databases or even a federated search tool that they were remotely making available to their users. Sullivan also mentions the excellent work Ask Jeeves is doing with their Smart Answers technology. As I've mentioned on numerous occasions, Ask Jeeves is onto something good and potentially very useful for librarians. Jeeves and other companies would be wise to get the help of the library community about "ready reference" answers and assistance (links to specialized databases) to make available via Smart Answers. If you would like a link to all of the Smart Answer "shortcuts," a complete list is available on ResourceShelf. -- Search Engine Showdown, Google Starts AutoStemming Searches Greg writes, "Does this help relevance? Maybe for some searches and searchers, but for precision searching it can also be frustrating. Plus, the searcher is not given the choice of when to use it and when to turn it off." Google documentation here. So, once again a precise keyword search might not actually be a precise keyword search. UPDATE: To deactivate autostemming place a + sign in front of the term. There is no way to turn off this function. MSN offers this option on its advanced search page.
Archives--E-Mail Source: InfoWorld Making Large E-Mail Archives Easily Accessible From the article, Archiving e-mail properly is one of the most difficult chores for companies attempting to comply with new government regulations, largely because of the sheer volume of e-mail. "Customers are asking, How do I search through petabytes of data?" says Chris Van Wagoner, director of product marketing at CommVault Systems, a data management software developer. "Because they are retaining data longer, the aggregate amount of data is bigger than anything people have dealt with until today." And the amount of e-mail that companies must oversee is likely to grow. According to IDC predictions, the total number of e-mails sent daily worldwide will grow from 9.7 billion in 2000 to 35 billion in 2005. Thanks to PW for the news tip.
Professional Reading Shelf Information Age The December, 2003 of First Monday is Now Available Articles include: + Phantom authority, self–selective recruitment and retention of members in virtual communities: The case of Wikipedia + The Internet and the right to communicate See Also: You might also want to take a look at Peter Jacso's and Genie Tyburski's comments about Wikipedia -- Metadata Learn About: Simile (Semantic Interoperability of Metadata and Information in unLike Environments) From the about page, Libraries worldwide face significant challenges in coping with the increasing amounts of digital material that they must acquire from external sources, either digital publishers or material produced by their institution (e.g. by the faculty and researchers of an academic institutions). These materials require new methods for long-term stewardship and preservation in addition to those that have evolved for print and other analog material...SIMILE is a joint project conducted by the W3C, HP, MIT Libraries, and MIT's Lab for Computer Science. SIMILE seeks to enhance inter-operability among digital assets, schemas, metadata, and services. Five position papers were posted on the site in the past two weeks. Discovered via BUBL Link Updates
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (4 Items) Books--United States--Statistics Source: RR Bowker Charts: A Decade of American Book Production 1992-2002 Includes: + U.S. Book Production, 1992-2002 + U.S. Trade Book Production, 1992-2002 + University Press Production, 1992-2002 + Book Production Graphs -- Science and Engineering--United States--Statistics Source: NSF Just Released, Full Text Report: Characteristics of Recent Science and Engineering Graduates: 2001 -- Australia Source: Department of the Parliamentary Library, Australia New, Research Note: The New National Threat Assessment Centre -- Child Support--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census New Report, Custodial Mothers and Fathers and Their Child Support: 2001 Summary ||| Direct to Full-Text Monday, December 01, 2003
Text Mining Source: Intelligent Enterprise Full Text, "The Word on Text Mining" From the article, Text mining is poised to fill the void, structuring the information inherent in volumes of free text in ways that enable decidedly more intelligent search. There will still be a role for the thoughtful, manual classification and filtering that made Yahoo a winner [LII, IPL, RDN, and library OPACS too!] from its earliest incarnation, and there will still be advantages to intentional, semantic-Web type efforts to categorize content for identification by automated agents. But just as data mining lets you discover hidden relationships in structured data and apply predictive algorithms, text mining will help identify value that you and the manual classifiers and Resource Description Framework wizards didn't know existed.
Web Search Source: PSU Live New Study: "No 'ifs,' 'ands' or 'buts': simple queries work best" A news release about a recently published study by Bernard J. Jansen, at Penn State University. From the release, Searching experts who tout the benefits of using advanced query markers have it wrong: Web searches with "and," "or," "must appear" and "phrase" fare no better than simple, dressed-down submissions, according to a Penn State researcher. I haven't had a chance to read the complete article but allow me to make a few comments about the summary. * This study was conducted over 2 years ago using Excite. Search engines have grown in size since then. Btw, the Excite database/technology of 2001 is no more. This engine now is a meta-search tool. Of course, discussion on this topic should also consider the query length (the average query remains at about 2.4 terms) and search term selection (does the patron want info about Golden Retriever Rescue in Toronto but starts his or her search with "dogs"?). * Using "AND" in your search query is redundant. All engines use an implied "AND" between terms. * Operators like "must appear" that are typically used to reduce the number of results sometimes increased them. This search term weighting option never made sense to me, either you want it or don't want it. * True, common phrases are often "understood" by some web engines but for uncommon names/phrases/sentence I still find searching with quotation marks to be useful. Also, using quotes can be useful when searching stopwords. Compare "to be or not to be" Shakespeare with Shakespeare to be or not to be * AllTheWeb automatically rewrites common phrases by automatically adding quotation marks. This is the default behavior. * This summary makes no mention of additional limiting syntax like site: , filetype:, and AltaVista's NEAR (10 words in either direction) operator. IMHO, these remain valuable limiting options for the advanced searcher and information professional. * As Greg Notess documents, Google's OR operator and other syntax continues to behave erratically. * The article summary concludes with comments about web pages designers needing to include relevancy keywords. Again, without seeing the complete article I'm a bit up in the air about what this means. If it means using the terms the average people uses to describe a service, item, topic on your web page then this is good advice. However, if it means using keywords in the meta-tag section of the page, this is a waste of time. No major web engines pay attention to the meta-keyword tag anymore. * Of course another way to increase precision is to find a specialized or niche database devoted to a topic. Dr. Lee Giles, also at Penn State, is doing impressive work in developing "niche" databases using open web content. --- --- See Also: While on the web search beat, Google, is full of many odd results these days. Here are a few examples I've noticed recently. --- --- Search 1: Christmas Result #8 is for librarian, Ex Libris editor, and ResourceShelf friend Marylaine Block. She is a cheerful and merry person but how her page got to this position has stumped a couple of web search experts. The cache version will show that the term is not on the page. NOTE: Since alerting Marylaine to this story she has added the term Christmas to her page. Here is a screen capture of the web page from 12/3/03 illustrating what I first found. +++ Search 2: apple tree Result #1 is for the National Physical Lab in the UK. No mention of either term on the web page. +++ Search 3: television history united kingdom Result #1 is a page that doesn't contain any of the search terms. Yes, it's for a tv company but it still falls far short.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents (3 Items) AIDS * New Report and Initiative, "Treating 3 Million by 2005" (UNAIDS, World Health Organization) Full Text report, 61 pages * Full Text Report, AIDS epidemic update 2003 (UNAIDS, World Health Organization) * Various Fact Sheets, Epidemiological graphics in PPT Format (UNAIDS) * United States...Various AIDS Fact Sheets (Statistics) ||| Other Reference Materials * Canada...Released Today, Full Text, Canada's Report on HIV/AIDS 2003 - Looking Forward: Focussing the Response (Health Canada) -- Automobiles--Australia Source: Department of the Parliamentary Library, Australia Research Note: The 5 Per Cent Tariff on Four-Wheel-Drive Vehicles This report also contains a chart with statistics and market share info. -- Agriculture--Public Records--United States--Database U.S. Department of Agriculture New Searchable Database, Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act (PACA) License Holders From the site, Under the PACA, anyone buying or selling commercial quantities of fruit and vegetables must be licensed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Records for about 15,000 businesses that currently hold PACA licenses along with businesses that have held PACA licenses in the last 12 months are included in the database. See Also: Learn More About PACA
Info Industry News (5 Items) Research Tools Proquest Announces New "Newsletters" (Free) for Info Pros "...five new bimonthly e-newsletters for librarians and database users. The free subject-specific e-zines will hold case studies, research tips and tactics, content updates and more, designed to help librarians and researchers...Each e-newsletter will focus on a single research arena: Business, History, Social Sciences and Humanities, Science, Technology and Medicine, and General Reference...The forthcoming titles are scheduled to launch over the next two months, beginning with “Best Practices - Business” on December 3. History and SSH titles will follow in January 2004, with STM and Genera Reference e-newsletters scheduled to debut in February 2004. Subscription info and more info at: www.il.proquest.com/proquest/mailinglist/. -- INSPEC Completes Retrospective Coverage Project back to 1898 (via Information Today NewsBreaks) -- Dialog Announces New API (Application Programming Interface) Service -- The netLibrary Collection Continues to Grow: Over 62,500 Full Text Titles Now Available -- WilsonWeb Databases Now Include Direct Link to Google and "Other" Popular Web Engines Notes: 1) The announcement does not indicate what the other popular web engines are. 2) The announcement also uses the example of a search for info about a painting, "The Progress of Love". Other than a direct link to the museum where the painting is on display the remaining nine links on the results page have nothing to do with the piece of art. x |
