DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
LIS1510
Library and Archives Automation Issues
Introduction to
the Internet
Andy Dawson
Department of Information Studies, UCL
(University of Malta 2010)
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
What we will be covering today
• What is the Internet?
• How does it work?
• What can we do with it?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
What we will be covering today
• Developing trends on the net
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Extensible markup
Trends in epublishing
Social software
Web 2.0
• What problems do we have with finding
information on the Internet?
• Why do these problems occur?
• What can we do about it?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
What is the Internet?
• Origins
• US Government, Department of Defense
need for a distributed communication
system
• Expanded to incorporate research and
academia
• Benefits lead to expansion
• Now a generic term
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
What is the Internet?
Nature
• Common set of protocols
• Communications medium
• Network of networks
• Enormous number of individual computing
sites
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
What is the Internet?
Developments
• Common tools
• Explosive growth
• Congestion
• Commercialisation
• Change in complexity?
• Overload?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
What is the Internet?
Ramifications
• Communication is easy
• Access can be difficult
• Inconsistency & duplication
• Missing Links
• Difficulties when searching
• Value of serendipity
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
How does the Internet work?
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Activities
Email
Remote login
File Transfer
The Client/Server concept
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
How does the Internet work?
Tools
• Text-based tools
– Email, Lists and Newsgroups
• Remote login tools
– Telnet & FTP, modern clients
• World Wide Web
– Which often now also provides a common
interface to the other tools, and web 2.0
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
LIS uses of the Internet
Actual
• Online searching
• Catalogue access (OPAC)
• Interlibrary loan (Arttel)
• Document delivery (Uncover)
• Record downloading (OCLC)
• Bulletin boards
• Local information services
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
LIS uses of the Internet
Actual/Potential
• Electronic publishing
• Current awareness services
• Distance education
• Videoconferencing
• Resource sharing & distribution
of almost any kind
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
LIS uses of the Internet
• Unrealistic:
• “Universal” access?
• The “Virtual Library”?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
In summary
• The Internet has a number of inherent
strengths and weaknesses
• It has much potential in LIS if its limitations
are understood and accepted
• It requires investment to make good returns
• It cannot be relied upon as a reference tool
• Commercialisation & growth of the Internet
has changed/is changing its nature
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Developing trends
• Markup languages –
The rise of extensible markup
• Growth and conflicts in epublishing
• Social software and interactivity
• Web 2.0 (and beyond!)
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Markup languages
• The concept of markup
– The role of tags
• How a webpage works
– The web – a client-server technology
– HTML and browser interpretation
– Rules are made – to be broken?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
The rise of extensible markup
• HTML, SGML, XML and XHTML
• Benefits of extensible systems
– Separate content from presentation
– Allow accurate document description
– Allow easier reprocessing/repurposing
– Simple textual base promotes futureproofing
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Growth and conflicts in epublishing
• Epublishing vs traditional publishing
– Quality Control and the publication process
– Personal publishing via the web
– The epublishing “revolution”
• Ejournals and beyond
• New paradigms for electronic publication
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Social Software and interactivity
• What is social software?
• Examples of social software
– Wikis
– Blogs
– RSS
• Value for information work?
• Ramifications of the social phenomenon
– Yet more dross, yet more overload?
– Archiving problems – volatility and the electronic
record
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Web 2.0
• What is Web 2.0?
– A good question!
– “It’s the web, Jim, but not as we know it…”
• Has it already happened?
– A vision rather than existing technology?
• Will it happen?
– Increasing interaction…
– …but not quite seamlessly? Web 3.0? 
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
To get back to a core issue…
• Information retrieval on the internet!
– Is it easy?
– Is it effective?
– Do we have problems with it?
– Can we do anything about it?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Why do we have problems
retrieving Internet information?
• I’d suggest two main areas:
– Connection
– Identification
• And three main causes
– Congestion
– Technology
– Transcience
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Connection
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Q: When is a link not a link?
A: When it doesn’t work!
The unidirectional nature of a link
The problem of access
– rights
– Knowledge
• The problem of congestion
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Interpreting error messages
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Erroneous error messages
“Permission denied”
“Server may be down or unreachable”
“404 not found”
“Does not have a DNS entry”
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Identification
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How do you find what you want?
By reference
By serendipitous link-following
By using search tools
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Types of search engine
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Machine-indexed
Human-indexed
Metasearch engines
Other approaches
– “Intelligent” systems
– Citation-ranked systems
• Also gateways – but more on that later…
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Search Engines and their
shortcomings
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The problem of the idiot user
Machines vs humans
Recall & Precision
Ranking mechanisms
Who makes the effort
Volumes and rate of change
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Internet Transcience
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Audience participation time!
How many Internet sites?
How many items per site?
Lifespan of an item?
Rate of change:
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Why does it change so fast?
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Ease of publication
Lack of planning
The popularity stakes
Keeping up with the Joneses (Borgs )
again!
• Reinvention of the...
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
So what can we poor users do?
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Become an alcoholic!
Recognise - accept - overcome
Don’t trust error messages
Wise up on search engines
Use and check bookmarks
But is there a better answer?
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
Gateways
• The way of the past?
• The way of the future?
• Reasons for “localisation”
– Cost, effort, overload, congestion…
• The way of the present...
– OMNI, EEVL, SOSIG etc...
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
The reality...
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The Internet will always be anarchic
Web 2.0 (and beyond) double-edged?
Serious users can be frustrated
Specialist gateways increasingly valuable?
Local gateways become the norm?
Job opportunities for all types of information
professionals!
Andy Dawson
DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION STUDIES
That’s it for today!
• Any questions?:
• After the break:
– Search tools practical
– (Optional email/mail lists practical)
• Next week:
– Introduction to HTML
– Building your first webpage!
Andy Dawson