Electronic Resources
Bharat Kumar
Electronic Resources?
►A
resource available over the Internet can be
called ‘Electronic Resource’ or ‘e-resource’
Gail McMillan defines, “any serial produced,
published and distributed via e-networks such
as Internet, e-journals may be defined very
broadly as any journals, magazines, e-zine,
newsletter or type of e-serial publications,
which is available over the Internet.”
History of E-Journals
Earliest Journals
Earliest Journals
1st scientific journal-like publication
Jan 1665
Le Journal des Scavans
Founded by M. de Sallo
20 pages long
Contained 10 articles and some letters
2nd journal-like publication
Late in 1665
Royal Society of London
Called Philosophical Transactions
Monthly journal of articles that
recorded experiments of their member
16 pages of 9 articles
The 1980’s – The Turning Point
Technological changes
►Technology began to be developed to allow for e-journals
 Word processing
 Publishing software
 Introduction of the internet through LAN
 PC’s and workstations
►Telecommunication technologies improved
 Satellites
 Fiber optics
 General networking capabilities
 Other factors
►Journal prices doubled while library budgets declined
►Libraries worries about lack of library space
 Technological improvements made it easier to store
more information in a smaller space and to access that
The 1990’s – The Internet
Changes Everything
Journal prices continued to increase annually while library budgets
declined or had only modest increases
Libraries began to cut journals- publishers responded by offering
electronic formats
World Wide Web emerges and brought together all the elements
-made e-journals approachable, accessible & affordable
E-journals exploded onto the scene
September 1990 – Post Modern Culture – appeared (considered
the first true electronic journal)
July 1991 – “Directory of Electronic Journals and Newsletters” listed
30 electronic journals titles
60 newsletters
15 “other” titles
1995 – estimated 100 refereed e-journals
Need for E-Resources
► Can
be accessed remotely
► Can be accessed by more than one person at a
time
► Can be searched and saved digitally
► There is no chance for mutilation / disfiguring
/ tearing of pages
► Do not requires physical acquisition / receiving
► Reduce staff work for shelving / binding
► Do not require physical space to store
► No missing issue(s)
Categories for E-Resources
► E-journals
► E-books
► Full
Text (aggregated) Databases
► Indexing
/ Abstracting databases
► Statistical
databases
Advantages
► Early
publication
► Easily
searchable
► Accessibility
► Links
► Remote
► provide
Access
more and more back issues that are fully
searchable
Disadvantages
► Difficulty
► Archiving
in reading on computer screen
Accessing E-resources
► IP
authenticated access
► Log-In
ID / Password
► Virtual
Private Network (VPN)
E-Resources

Encyclopedia Britannica Quest

Britannica Image

PebbleGo

Teen Health & Wellnes
http://www.teenhealthandwellness.com/

EbscoHost

ProQuest

Cengage Learning - INFOTRAC
http://www.pebblego.com/
Future of Electronic Journals
From a
1999 study
by the ARL
Directory of
Scholarly
Electronic
Journals
and
Academic
Lists
Selection of E-Resources
► Identification of
E-resources
► Evaluation of Electronic Journals
- Content
- Currency
- User Interface
- Training Support
- Response, Reliability and Availability
- Statistical Reporting
- Method of Access
- Terms and Conditions of License Agreement
► Purpose
Of Subscription
Impact on Staff and Other Costs
► Infrastructure
► Space
► Administration/Management
► Staffing
► Technical
Services
Effective
Searching
of
E-Resources
Searching for Information
may be as tough as this
Searching: Common Practice
 Phrase
searching
Example- History of Science in India
 We
should know that
 Search
is case insensitive many times, need not
to bother about capitalization
 Connectives/
auxiliary words ( ‘of’, ‘in’ in the
above example) need not be mentioned
Search Process

While searching we should:
 Start with clarifying the subject, its connotation and
its ramifications
 Be clear about the scope of the topic, context,
perspective
 Express the question in terms
 Standardize in terms of the search engine
Boolean Operators

Also known as Logical Operators

Named after British born Irish Mathematician
George Boole

Wrote about system of Logic

From his writings Boolean operators were
derived
AND
OR
NOT
Boolean Operator : AND…
AND
- must have both the terms
- all-or-nothing operator
- this operator is binary one
- it has same concept as INTERSECTION in
set theory
solar
energy
solar + energy
Boolean Operator : AND
When One Should Use:
to connect two or more different concepts
together to find relationship between them
-
- to narrow down the search, telling the
database that ALL search terms must be present
in the resulting documents.
Boolean Operator : OR
When One Should Use
- To connect two or more similar concepts
(synonyms)
to broaden the search, telling the database that
ANY of the search terms can be present in the
resulting documents.
-
Boolean Operator : NOT…
NOT
- retrieves only first keyword not the second
- limits the search
Boolean Operator : NOT
When One Should Use
i) To exclude keyword(s) from the search
ii) to narrow the search, telling the database to
ignore the concepts that may be implied by
the search terms.
Truncation and Wildcard
►
Trancation and wildcards to retrieve variations of search
terms
►
truncation symbol (*) serves as a substitute for any string of
zero or more characters
for example the search golf* retrieves articles containing the
words golf, golfing and golfer(s), as well as golfball(s).

The wildcard symbol (?) serves as a substitute for one
character or none
for example – organi?sation will search ‘organisation’ as
well as ‘organization’
Boolean Logic Redux
 Different
search engines handle Boolean
operators differently
 Some require the operators to be typed in
CAPITAL LETTERS while others do not
 Some search engines use drop-down menu
options
Implied Boolean Operators
 Implied
Boolean operators use the plus (+) and
minus (-) symbols inspite of Boolean Operators
 (+)
or (-) sign in front of a word will force the
inclusion or exclusion of that word in the
search statement
Google Scholar: A Scholarly Search Service
Google Scholar…
Google Scholar…
Google Scholar…
Google Scholar…
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Google Scholar: Making Complex Search
Formulation of Search Statement…
be specific
 think about the words that one can expect to
find in the body of the page and use them as
keywords
 whenever possible, use nouns and objects as
keywords
 put most important keyword(s) first
 combine keywords whenever possible into
phrases
 avoid common words

Formulation of Search Statement
Write down the search statement and
revise it before typing it into the query
box to get the relevant information
WASTED SEARCH
Information retrieval
systems are powerful
tools
but
their
usefulness is limited
by the ability of the
searcher.
AVOIDING WASTED SEARCH
A good searcher should possess a variety of
skills related to searching.

Self Confidence

Patience and Perseverance

Logical and flexible approach to problem
solving

Spelling, grammar and typing skill
Thanks!