The Yin and the Yang of Research Tools

A big thanks to my colleagues e-Lizabeth and Gaye for their amazing contributions to the BRAIN_blog while I was off galavanting across the Philippines! Thanks, guys! For those fans of e-Lizabeth, have no fear, she�s still here�she will continue to contribute her witty and thought-provoking articles to the BRAIN_blog so watch this space! (As a teaser, tune in next issue when she uncovers the wild world of social bookmarking!) Holy cow� lots has been happening in LibraryLand while I was off savouring balut and other fine Asian delicacies �this week we feature: 1) very serious library research-type information and web tools and 2) web tools for fun, exhilaration and excitement (well, aren�t they all really, when you come down to it?) 1) Yes, Virginia, the Hamilton Spectator is still available online via the Library @ Mohawk! There has been a change in the method of accessing the Hamilton Spectator online at the Library @ Mohawk. Before, access was through the database �Virtual News Library� (VNL). As VNL no longer carries TorStar publications (including the Hamilton Spectator), the Library has purchased a new database of Hamilton Spectator articles. Look for the link �Hamilton Spectator (Proquest)� to access the full-text of the Spec (including today�s issue) back to 1991. In addition, access to Hamilton Spectator articles is available in the database �Canadian Reference Centre� with a one day lag time and an archive back to September, 2002. To access, follow these steps or view a quick 1.5 minute video tutorial to watch the process in action! 1. click �find articles from newspapers� from TheBRAIN home page just as you did before the change. 2. A list of the Library�s newspaper databases appears. Select �Hamilton Spectator (Proquest)� or, if you are at IAHS, select the link beneath that has the note �(IAHS only)�. 3. The database is launched and from the next screen you need only click �Continue.� 4. From here you can enter your search terms into the Search box. 5. There is also a Date Range drop-down box. Note that from here you can narrow your search to specific dates or search specific ranges (last 7 days, last 3 months, etc.) Your search results comprise a list of full-text articles. Note that, like the Virtual News Library database, the classified sections and advertisements are not included in the database. 2) There�s more to life than Google: SMEALSearch for business researchers In the "there's more to life than Google" department...from the Penn State SMEAL College of Business, SMEALSearch is a specialized search engine for the field of business. According to the web site, �the search engine crawls websites of universities, commercial organizations, research institutes and government departments to retrieve academic articles, working papers, white papers, consulting reports, magazine articles, and published statistics and facts.� In addition, SMEALSearch performs a citation analysis of the academic papers and lists the most cited papers first in result lists. Some other neat features of SMEALSearch are: suggestions of related articles, and links to easily send an article to a friend, rate an article or provide comments on it. Excitement galore for the business researcher! 3) Inside Scoop on Desktop Search Tools...Revealed! In previous issues of BRAIN_blog, we mentioned the new Google and Yahoo! desktop search tools. There is actually a whole gamut of these handy little critters and a research group from UW-Madison has released a comprehensive study that outlines the features and evaluates 12 of these new tools. The University of Wisconsin E-Business Consortium ranked the 12 tools and found Copernic 1.5 Beta with Coveo to be the best and easiest to use while Yahoo! Desktop Search 1.1 Beta came in second and Wizetech Archivarius 3000 3.14 third. The report contains lots of nifty charts and comparisons so check it out for the full scoop! 4) Help now available for indecisive readers Do you secretly have difficulties deciding what book to read next but are too shy to talk to your local Librarian? Private and confidential help is here in the form of an online book recommender system called Whichbook.net. Rather than choosing by author or genre (ho hum), WhichBook.net lets you choose by the type of experience you want to have (for example, predictable/unpredictable, happy/sad, etc.) You can also choose by type of character, plot (quest, conflict, etc.) or setting. The recommendations include a short excerpt from the book as well as suggestions of similar titles. Don�t be surprised when the �borrow� link presents you with a map of England �this tool has been developed for British libraries�.so you will need to take the extra step of searching your local library catalogue for the titles you find. For everything you wanted to know about your next read but were afraid to ask...look no further! 5) Tired of reading? Tired of reading your news online? Now you can watch it too. Yahoo News now provides access to Reuters video clips as well as new video from CBC and AP Television. You have the option of searching for feeds (top bar), choosing video by topic from a drop-down or selecting feeds by provider (AP, Reuters, NPR, Washingtonpost.com, and CBC.) Of course that value in this really depends on your Internet connection�.here at the college, it took about 5 minutes for a 2 minute CBC news story to load in my browser (and yes, there are commercials!) 6) And a little something special for all you podcasters� Podcastersout there will be interested in learning that podscope (the search engine for podcasts, of course!) now includes audio and video content in its search. The interesting thing here is that every word is searchable within a podcast, even though it is audio or video!