1. 1 Finding scientific information through the Internet and the WWW in 2007 Paul.Nieuwenhuysen@vub.ac.bePaul.Nieuwenhuysen@vub.ac.be Belgium Prepared for a presentation at University Eduardo Mondlane in Maputo, Mozambique 27 June 2007

2. 2 These slides should be available from the WWW site http://www.vub.ac.be/BIBLIO/nieuwenhuysen/presentations/ (note: BIBLIO and not biblio)

3. 3 Information literacy (in universities) Online information sources and services Libraries contents = summary = structure = overview of this presentation

4. 4 Information literacy

5. 5 Our world: future trends Future trends in our world Complexity  Dynamics and evolution  Speed and acceleration  Internationalization  Globalization  Economic products less based on natural resources and more on “knowledge” Answers / Requirements / Solutions / Reactions Knowledge and skills  Adaptability  Flexibility  Global co-operation  Mobility  Education, research, exploitation of knowledge is important

6. 6 Information, computer and media literacy overlap Media literacy Computer literacy Information literacy

7. 7 Information literacy: definition: the importance of information 1. To understand in general the nature, the value and the importance of information. The ability to recognize when information is needed, when information can help to make progress, to solve a problem, to make a decision…

8. 8 Information literacy: definition: finding information 2. The ability to search, find, locate relevant, needed information! (Identify concepts, select information sources, formulate queries….) The ability to cope with information overload.

9. 9 Information literacy: definition: evaluating information 3. The ability to evaluate the quality and suitability of retrieved information!

10. 10 Information literacy: definition: managing information 4. The ability to manage information! (Saving information, ordering information in folders on computer, finding information in your own collection… = “personal information management”)

11. 11 Information literacy: definition: sharing information 5. The ability to apply/use information effectively. The ability to keep up-to-date on the topics/subjects that are relevant for you. The ability to communicate with others, to share information with others! (Using citations, live presentations, electronic mail, your own WWW site, publishing…)

12. 12 Online access information sources and services Introduction

13. 13 Online information sources: summary The following gives a general overview of online accessible information sources. This overview is not limited to or focusing on a particular concrete subject domain/area.

14. 14 Internet based information sources: problems / difficulties (Part 0) Through the Internet, we can access information sources and information services. This has become increasingly important and interesting since 1990. The advantages are tremendous and well appreciated. However, the following are some of the remaining difficulties and bottlenecks.

15. 15 Internet based information sources: problems / difficulties (Part 1) Redundancy and overlap: On the one hand, there is too much information on some topics; in other words, the redundancy and overlap are high in many cases. Only few information sources: On the other hand, there are only few information sources on some topics.

16. 16 Internet based information sources: problems / difficulties (Part 2) No order is imposed on most sources. Quality checks / quality controls are not performed. Related to this: it is not required to register new information offered. Is the information that you find real, honest, authentic?

17. 17 Internet based information sources: problems / difficulties (Part 3) Change is the only constant: Information sources are constantly changing, growing, but sometimes disappearing.

18. 18 Internet based information sources: problems / difficulties (Part 4) Scattering: There is no single simple but powerful system to find relevant information through the Internet. In other words: integration / aggregation is still far from perfect.

19. 19 Internet based information sources: problems / difficulties (Part 5) Slow: The Internet is in many places and for many applications not yet fast enough.

20. 20 Online access information sources and services Types of online access information systems

21. 21 Primary versus secondary computer sources / systems / services Primary sources /systems /services directly useful Examples: - books, - collections of full-text articles on the Internet (such as Hinari and Agora) Secondary sources /systems /services ! »helping to access / use the primary services »“travel agencies”, “navigation services”...

22. 22 Online access information sources and services Dictionaries and encyclopaedias accessible through the WWW

23. 23 Dictionaries and encyclopedias through the WWW: introduction Dictionaries and encyclopedias are the first choice among many types of information sources, »when we do not need detailed information on a common topic »when we want to prepare a more detailed search on an unfamiliar topic, by searching for the right spelling, synonyms, context… Some dictionaries and encyclopedias are available through the WWW free of charge.

24. 24 Encyclopedias accessible through Internet and the WWW: examples Wikipedia A free-content encyclopedia that anyone can edit. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Example

25. 25 Online access information sources and services Internet directories and indexes

26. 26 Internet global subject directories: introduction They are virtual libraries with open shelves, for browsing. They are manually generated, man-made by many people. They can be browsed following a tree structure or a more complicated variation.

27. 27 Internet global subject directories: pros and cons They cover a small number of selected WWW sites, in comparison with the total number of sites that are accessible  + Browsing is possible (formulating a query is not needed). + The selected, included sites should be better than average. - They are NOT suitable for deep, detailed, specific searches with a high coverage.

28. 28 Internet global subject directories: Yahoo! A hypertext global subject directory can be found at http://dir.yahoo.com/http://dir.yahoo.com/ Entries are NOT rated. Accessible free of charge. Example

29. 29 Internet global subject directories: Yahoo!: screenshot of home page Example

30. 30 Internet global subject directories: Yahoo! links in pediatrics Health > Medicine > Pediatrics: International Pediatric Chat - for professionals to share information and education regarding children's health care.International Pediatric Chat National Med/Peds Residents' Association - organization for residents, practioners and medical students interested in combined internal medicine and pediatrics.National Med/Peds Residents' Association Neonatology Network - information and communication platform for neonatologists and pediatricians.Neonatology Network Pediatria OnLine - qui si parla di bambini, fra pediatri e con le famiglie.Pediatria OnLine Pediatric Critical Care Pediatric Database (PEDBASE) - containing descriptions of over 500 childhood illnesses.Pediatric Database (PEDBASE) Pediatric Endocrinology Conference - LWPES/ESPE joint meeting occuring July 6-10 2001.Pediatric Endocrinology Conference Pediatric Endoscopic Photos - illustrating intestinal problems in children.Pediatric Endoscopic Photos Example

31. 31 Internet global subject directories: dmoz Open Directory Project A hypertext global subject directory can be found at http://www.dmoz.org/ http://www.dmoz.org/ Accessible free of charge. It is allowed to use the contents also in other systems; this is indeed done in the Google Directory and Webbrain. Example

32. 32 Internet global subject directories: dmoz: screenshot of the starting page Example

33. 33 Internet global subject directories: Intute A collection of hypertext subject directories that focus on academic information sources can be found from 2006 at http://www.intute.ac.uk/ http://www.intute.ac.uk/ Accessible free of charge. Also tutorials are offered about how to find information in specific subject domains. Example

34. 34 Internet subject directories: non-global, more specific systems a directory limited to sources in/of a country or region a directory restricted to a specific subject domain (“portal”) a global subject directory the complete WWW can lead to

35. 35 Internet subject directories focusing on a specific subject domain: example Communication studies: »http://www.lib.washington.edu/subject/communications/lrcs/http://www.lib.washington.edu/subject/communications/lrcs/ Examples

36. 36 Internet subject directories focusing on a specific subject domain: example Marine science and oceanography: »http://oceanportal.org/ = http://ioc.unesco.org/oceanportal/http://oceanportal.org/http://ioc.unesco.org/oceanportal/ Examples

37. 37 Internet subject directories focusing on a specific subject domain: example Fishing: »http://www.onefish.org/http://www.onefish.org/ Examples

38. 38 Internet indexes: automated search tools Several systems allow to search for and to locate many items (addressable resources) in the Internet in a more systematic, direct way than by only browsing/navigating. These systems do NOT search the contents of computers through the real Internet in real time and completely when a user makes a query. Searching in that way would be much too slow due to limitations in the technology.

39. 39 Internet indexes: scheme of the mechanism User searching for Internet based information Internet client hardware and software user interface to a search engine Internet information source Internet index search engine Internet crawler and indexing system database of Internet files, including an index

40. 40 Internet indexes: Google (Part 1) http://www.google.com/ Available since 2001 with most of its features. The most popular system in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006…

41. 41 Internet indexes: Google (Part 2) Full-text searching is possible of many files that are available through the WWW. Not only HTML and plain text pages are covered, but also the first part is indexed of many files in other file formats, such as »Adobe PDF, »Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint »Rich Text Format…

42. 42 Internet indexes: Google Scholar Google Scholar allows us to search for more scholarly information sources, including journal articles. A beta (test) version has been available since November 2004. The system is accessible starting from the home page of Google as one of the additional services, or more directly from http://scholar.google.com/http://scholar.google.com/ The online manual explains the system, but provides no details on algorithms applied and on coverage.

43. 43 Internet indexes: the coverage of Google Scholar The information is harvested in a more or less automatic way from the public access WWW and from databases of some scholarly publishers that publish »full-text, primary electronic journals »bibliographic, secondary, abstract databases including —the Ingenta database of journal articles —the Pubmed database —some databases of the company CSA

44. 44 Internet indexes: MSN Web Search = Live Was available from: http://search.msn.com/http://search.msn.com/ Since 1998. Offered free of charge by Microsoft. You can search for WWW content. Since 2006 available from http://www.live.com/http://www.live.com/ Example

45. 45 Internet indexes: Scirus The search interface: http://www.scirus.com/http://www.scirus.com/ Since 2001. Offers not only access to files in html format, but also to files in PDF. Example

46. 46 Internet indexes: Scirus contents and coverage Allows you to search for more or less “manually” selected »scientific WWW pages, plus »the contents of some scientific, bibliographic databases. In the sense that Scirus is dedicated to scientific information, it is similar to Google Scholar. Example

47. 47 Internet indexes: Scirus contents details Is offered free of charge by the publisher of scientific journals, named Elsevier. Offers bibliographic descriptions of the articles that are published in close to 2000 peer-reviewed journals that are made available through the Internet/WWW site ScienceDirect by Elsevier ! However, the full-text can be downloaded only when a fee has been paid to the publisher. The similar and competing open access search system named Google Scholar does NOT include these important data. Example

48. 48 Internet indexes: Yahoo! Example An Internet search system is offered through http://www.yahoo.com/ http://www.yahoo.com/ This is offered BESIDES the well-established, classical Yahoo! subject directory.

49. 49 Internet indexes cover only a part of the Internet: metaphore The “visible” part of Internet The “deep, hidden, invisible” part of Internet and the WWW, (that is not searchable using a global index like Google, Yahoo!...)

50. 50 Internet indexes cover only a part of the Internet: introduction Why can Internet indexes find only a part of what is in fact available through the Internet? Quantitative technical limitations: »Each Internet search system has indexed only a part of the static WWW pages that are available for indexing. Qualitative technical limitations: »Besides the static WWW pages that Internet search engines try to cover, many other, quite different sources exist, that are also available through the Internet, but that are not incorporated in those search engines.

51. 51 Internet Internet indexes cover only a part of the Internet: scheme WWW Databases and file archives accessible through the Internet telnet ftp... telnet ftp... CGI, ASP,... Rapidly changing information, such as news, weblogs=blogs… Information accessible only when passwords are used Static texts in the WWW that can be indexed ( = on HTTP server computers) covered partly by Internet indexes Word files PDF files

52. 52 Databases accessible over the Internet: examples Medline/PubMed offers bibliographic descriptions of publications on medicine, free of charge. Example

53. 53 Databases accessible over the Internet: examples Example http://oaister.umdl.umich.edu/ “Our goal is to create a collection of freely available, previously difficult-to-access, academically-oriented digital resources that are easily searchable by anyone.”

54. 54 Online access information sources and services Public access book databases

55. 55 Public access book databases: introduction Even in this age of Internet-based information sources, a lot of information is still distributed in the form of printed books. The contents of most books is (still) not available on the Internet. Most general Internet search tools do NOT allow you to find out about the existence of books that may be interesting for you. So, specific search tools to find books can be useful.

56. 56 Public access book databases: an overview (Databases by publishers.) (Fee-based databases by commercial providers) (Databases of computer-based versions of books.) Catalogue databases by book distributors / bookshops! Online public access catalogue databases of libraries Databases of scanned book pages (really taking off since 2004)

57. 57 Book databases accessible free of charge: examples in U.S.A. Amazon.com (US): http://www.amazon.com/ http://www.amazon.com/ This company offers also different, more local versions that offer books in other languages, such as http://www.amazon.co.uk/ http://www.amazon.fr/ http://www.amazon.co.uk/ http://www.amazon.fr/ note: amazon, NOT amazone Subject description is poor. Take into account delivery costs: postage + tax Examples

58. 58 Free public access federated search systems for books: introduction Also available free of charge are searches through the independent catalogue databases of several bookshops, in one and the same action. Furthermore the results from the various shops are presented in such a way that the user can easily compare them (for instance: price, delivery costs…) We can call these “meta-catalogues”.

59. 59 Federated searching: scheme information sources portal for meta-searching = federated searching = cross-database searching portal for meta-searching = federated searching = cross-database searching End user End user End user End user

60. 60 Free public access federated search systems for books: examples http://www.addall.com/ [accessed 2007] Takes into account your location (country) and calculates the cost to ship/send a book to you.http://www.addall.com/

61. 61 Full-text databases of books: introduction Some organisations have scanned the contents of thousands of old as well as recent books, to make them searchable through the Internet.

62. 62 Full-text databases of books: Amazon http://www.amazon.com/ and choose BOOKShttp://www.amazon.com/ Since 2004

63. 63 Full-text databases of books: Google Book Search In November 2005 http://www.books.google http://www.books.google The contents of this database is obtained »directly from book publishers, and »by scanning the contents of books from a few big libraries

64. 64 Online Public Access Catalogues of libraries Mainly to find older books, the catalogues of libraries can be useful. Most are accessible online and free of charge.

65. 65 General conclusion concerning book databases The one and only, international, complete, ideal, bibliographic database does NOT exist, but the united forces of the different available book databases should be satisfying.

66. 66 Online access information sources and services Fee-based online public access information services

67. 67 Types of online access information systems: “free” versus “fee” Public access information sources free of charge Fee-based online information services (NOT free of charge)

68. 68 Types of online access information systems: “free” for members only Public access information sources free of charge Fee-based online information services (NOT free of charge) Fee-based online information services, made accessible “free of charge” by an institute to its members

69. 69 Online access information sources and services Online access databases about journal articles

70. 70 Online access databases about journal articles: overview Thousands of fee-based online access databases offer bibliographies or full-texts of journal articles in particular subject domains and published by many publishers. Many publishers offer searchable bibliographies, but only of their own publications. (for instance Elsevier, Emerald, Sage) Only few large databases offer access to bibliographies of articles published in journals from many publishers, free of charge.

71. 71 Online access databases about journal articles: Ingenta (1) Ingenta allows you to search a bibliographic database of millions of journal articles, including titles, authors, in many cases abstracts. The organisation claims to be “The most comprehensive collection of academic and professional publications” Available from: http://www.ingentaconnect.com/http://www.ingentaconnect.com/ Example

72. 72 Online access databases about journal articles: Infotrieve Available from: »http://www.infotrieve.com/http://www.infotrieve.com/ »http://www3.infotrieve.com/http://www3.infotrieve.com/ Infotrieve allows you to search free of charge in a bibliographic database of the articles of more than 20 000 journal titles and conference proceedings, NOT full-text.

73. 73 Online access databases about journal articles: Scirus The search interface: http://www.scirus.comhttp://www.scirus.com This is a specialised Internet index that allows you to search for selected scientific information (only) on the WWW. This includes the peer-reviewed articles in the journals that are published in ScienceDirect by Elsevier. Offered free of charge by Elsevier. An article can be downloaded in full-text format only when a fee has been paid to the publisher.

74. 74 Online access databases about journal articles: Google Scholar Google Scholar allows us to search for more scholarly information sources, including journal articles. A beta (test) version has been available since November 2004. The system is accessible starting from the home page of Google as one of the additional services besides the normal, classical WWW search. The online manual explains the system briefly and provides no details.

75. 75 Online access databases about journal articles: DOAJ The Directory of Open Access Journals started in 2003 as a directory/database of titles of electronic journals that can be accessed by anyone free of charge. http://www.doaj.org/ More recently, this system allows deeper searching (down to the level of the titles and even abstracts of journal articles) for an increasing number of the journals that are included in the directory.

76. 76 Online access databases about journal articles: DOAJ screenshot

77. 77 Online access information sources and services Finding multimedia files on the Internet

78. 78 Finding multimedia files on the Internet: introduction Several public access search systems are available free of charge, to search the Internet for multimedia files: »images / pictures (either artwork, either photos, or both) »sound / audio files (music, speeches...); video

79. 79 Finding images on the Internet: introduction Several public access search systems are available free of charge to search for images / pictures (either artwork, either photos, or both) on the Internet. When searching for images, the search results from such a system offer not only links to the image files on the Internet, but also directly small versions of the images (so-called “thumbnails”).

80. 80 Examples Finding images on the Internet: screen shot of a Google image search

81. 81 Online access information sources and services Evolution

82. 82 Online access information: evolution and future trends An increasing amount of information becomes available online. A growing amount of this online information becomes available free of charge. The quality and ease of use of software on server as well as client is growing. A consequence is: An increasing number of end-users searching for information online.

83. 83 Online access information: easy or complicated? In the case of simple information needs, the WWW and the search tools can work like “magic”. However, in the case of more complicated information needs, there is still is no “magic button” that brings you immediately to all the required information.

84. 84 Libraries

85. 85 The digital/electronic/virtual library: scheme Structures, practices, and methods of physical libraries and archives Computing power that is decreasing in price Communication capabilities of electronic networking Digital / electronic / virtual library

86. 86 “Collection development” in information centres: hard + digital User / Reader Collection development Information centre Electronic, digital resources Hard copy

87. 87 “Collection development” in information centres: hard + digital  Electronic, digital resources Hard copy User / Reader

88. 88 Organizing access to information in information centres: hybrid libraries User / Reader Searching + using Hard copy + electronic, digital resources in an integrated, hybrid library

89. 89 Organizing access to information in information centres: the problem Users should be guided in finding their way through the maze, through the labyrinth that is formed by all available information systems and services.

90. 90 Integrating access to all types of information in information centres (1) Users are in general more interested in the contents of the information carriers (documents) than in the type of information carrier, such as hard copy or computer-based. Therefore, an information centre should try to offer access in a way that offers all documents nicely integrated, irrespective of the type of document / information carrier. In this way the so called “hybrid libraries” are created.

91. 91 Integrating access to all types of information in information centres (2) Some tools can help to integrate access. For instance: A web site created, offered, and maintained by a library can point out how to access the hard copy documents and can offer hyperlinks to online accessible information (web sites, databases, documents…)

92. 92 Integrating access to all types of information in information centres (3) Web site created, offered, and maintained by a library 1 or several catalogues created, offered, and maintained by a library Web site created, offered, and maintained by a library 1 or several catalogues created, offered, and maintained by a library

93. 93 Web sites developed by information centres: example

94. 94 Web sites developed by information centres: integration The web site made by a library can (and ideally should) integrate several more traditional products like »links / pointers to information sources (including the traditional catalogue) »the guide to using the library »study material to become information literate »how to contact library staff members?

95. 95 Web sites developed by information centres: integration Scheme: bibliographic database searching bibliographic reference linking full text / complete version

96. 96 Organizing access to information: some conclusions Organizing access to digital information has become an additional role for libraries and information centers. Computer technology offers some new tools to integrate access to information in the hybrid library. Still in full evolution   No standard solutions. Change is the only constant.

97. 97 Questions? Suggestions? Topics for discussion?

98. 98 You are free to copy, distribute, display this work under the following conditions: »Attribution: You must mention the author. »Noncommercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. »No Derivative Works: You may not change, modify, alter, transform, or build upon this work. For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work.