Jay Bhatt and Dana Denick – Hagerty Library, Drexel University
Smita Chandra – Indian Institute of Geomagnetism
Presentation for:
International Conference of Asian Special Libraries
Shaping the future of special libraries: beyond boundaries
November 27 th , 2008

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New research initiatives being developed in institutions, universities and organizations
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Drexel and IIG are no exception
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Multidisciplinary Fields: Nanotechnology, Plasma
Medicine, Engineering Cities, etc…
More research being done
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New and innovative ways of reaching out to researchers need further exploration
Need for increased information awareness of new resources and tools

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Web 2.0 tools are effective ways to share, generate and distribute knowledge among researchers – shared communication
Stephen Abrams thinks that Web 2.0 is “about a much higher level of interactivity and deeper user experiences…”
Potential for more academic and research based collaborations

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Blogs
RSS Feeds
Feed Readers
Bookmarks and Tagging
Aggregators
Social Networks

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Consists of dated entries in reverse chronological order
Frequently updated
Library blog can include news items, announcements, instructional tips, new electronic resources, etc.
Searchable by subject area

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Library Log
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News from the Drexel University Libraries
Careers Collections Blog
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Announcing new career-related resources, events and advice for job hunters in the Drexel community.
Drexel Physics
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News, events and resources from the Drexel University Libraries relating to physics. ischoolResearch
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News and tips from the Drexel University Libraries relating to the iSchool.
Drexel Emerging Technologies
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What’s new and interesting for Drexel University Libraries Staff
Print is Dead – E-Resources blog
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Primarily for Drexel University Libraries staff, designed to keep readers abreast of developments in electronic resources

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Engineering Information Blogs
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 http://www.library.drexel.edu/blogs/englibrary/ http://www.library.drexel.edu/blogs/engineeringlibraryinstruction/
Announcement of new resources, instructional tips for using a particular database or a resource, new and important web resources and more.
Archive of information added over a period of time
Emphasis on resources for CoE and Biomedical
Engineering – mainly subscription based

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Engineering Design Resources
Biomedical Engineering
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Finding Books, Electronic Books and
Journals
Biomedical Properties
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Patents and Intellectual Property
Ethical Issues

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RSS - Real Simple Syndication
Brings contents to you
Content available as new feeds
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XML based (eXtensible Markup Language)
For content distribution called feeds
Aggregators – contains compilation of feeds
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Collect feeds and display them in easy to read format
More later during the talk
See also: Using RSS to increase user awareness
 of e-resources in academic libraries http://www.higheredblogcon.com/index.php/using-rss-to-increaseuser-awareness-of-e-resources-in-academic-libraries/

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Feed readers (RSS feed readers)
Collect various feeds and consolidate the information
Downloadable Feed Readers:
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Google Reader, http://www.google.com/reader
Bloglines, http://www.bloglines.com
RSS Compendium: http://allrss.com/rssreaders.html
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Many blogs have built in RSS feeds.
RSS feeds are identified by ‘XML’ or ‘RSS’ icons
Just add the URL associated with the icons to your feed reader

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Integrating feeds from journals and journal articles
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Nature, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Materials
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Institute of Physics
Science Online
IEEE Computer Society
Royal Society of Chemistry
University of Chicago Press Journals
Many more to come including ScienceDirect

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Identify faculty and students working on blogs
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Drexel CoAS E-Learning Blog
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Drexel Smart House Blog
Department of Civil, Architectural and
Environmental Engineering Blog
One more opportunity to work together!

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Social Bookmarking services allow users to tag, save, manage and share web pages from a centralized source.
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Del.icio.us
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Diigo
Information rich resources can be shared among engineering faculty and students.
Users can categorize resources using their own tagging system.

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Collect various feeds from blogs, bookmarking systems and other forms of posted material in one location
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Friendfeed
Twitter

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Students in academic environments use social networks to connect with their friends and colleagues.
A Librarian’s presence on a students’ social tool will increase the visibility of library resources:
Information Awareness
Social Networks:
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Facebook
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Myspace
Orkut

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More and more electronic journals will develop RSS feeds
Increased use of applications such as
Facebook with imported Feeds
More collaboration among students, researchers, faculty members and librarians
More outreach necessary

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Thank you very much and have fun using
Web 2.0 Applications.
Please send us your feedback.
Interested in creating and developing a collaboration?
Contact us anytime at:
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Jay Bhatt, bhattjj@drexel.edu
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Smita Chandra, smtcd79@gmail.com
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Dana Denick, dld58@drexel.edu