ENG 102

Finding Information

Martin J. CrabtreeMCCC Library

October 15, 2004

Agenda

• The College’s Card Catalog• Electronic Searching

– Keywords & Boolean Searching

• Electronic Databases at Mercer– What’s a database?– Accessing the databases– Databases available through Mercer Library

• Web Information– Searching– The Invisible Web– Evaluating what you find

Using The Card Catalog• The catalog is available

online. Used to find books, videos and other material both in the MCCC collection and the Mercer County Public (MCL) libraries.

• You can have materials from MCL brought to the college. Deliveries arrive Tuesday and Friday afternoons. (DVD’s not available from MCL)

• Link to the catalog is on the library’s web pages.

The link to the catalog is on the library’s web pages.

Searching Electronic Databases

And The Web Too

Starting An Electronic SearchKeywords

• Keywords are used when searching electronic databases and web search engines

• First step - Generate a list of words (keywords) that describes or is commonly used when discussing your topic. For example:– Ozone– Layer– Depletion– Atmosphere– Hole

Starting An Electronic Search

Boolean Searching/Logic

• Boolean searching - Connecting keywords with the terms– and– not– or

• For example– eagles NOT football– (car or automobile) and exhaust

• More Terms = Fewer “Hits”

Searching More Than Just Keywords

Phrases & Truncations• To search for a phrase, use quotation

marks– “survival of the fittest”

• Truncations allow for searching related words all at once– The * is usually used (! For Lexis-Nexis) .

For example:• “child*” would include: child, children,

childhood, childproof, etc.

Searching More Than Just Keywords

Field Limiters• Field limiters allow you to specify your

search within varied parameters for example:– Only full-text articles– Only peer reviewed publications– Limit your search to just the titles, abstracts,

the full-text, etc. of an article– Date (or date range)– A specific periodical title (or source)– Author

Electronic Databases at the Mercer Library

What are electronic databases?

• A collection of electronically searchable information (frequently, but not limited to, periodical articles) that is accessible via the internet

• Access to this information is by subscription only, paid by the library.

• It is accessible via the internet, but it is not truly web information.

Electronic DatabasesIn General

• Over 40 databases available• Not every article is available full text

though many are• Abstracts (summary) is often

available when full text is not

Electronic DatabasesIn General

• Accessible at any computer on the MCCC/JKC campus network

• Most are available off campus, need to request a password.

• Can print/e-mail/download articles

Some Useful Databases• EBSCOhost - Academic Search Premier

– Broadest of the databases covering everything from science to the humanities including many scholarly journals

– Not every article full text– Need Acrobat Reader for some articles

• Academic Universe (Lexis-Nexis) - News– Large collection of newspaper information from around

the US and the world mostly in full text

• Ethnic Newswatch– English and Spanish language focusing on many ethnic gropus

Subject Specific Databases• A number of subject specific

databases are available covering:– business– art– architecture– criminal justice– education– mortuary science– more

• Many contain full-text articles

Non-periodical Databases..• Literature Resource Center - Reviews, criticisms, and

biographical info on a number of authors and their works.

• AP Photo Archives - Photograph collection

• Biographies Plus - Biographical information of noted people in a wide range of fields.

• Oxford English Dictionary

• Encyclopedia Britannica

• College Source Online - College catalog info (Only avail. At W.W. Library)

Searching the World Wide Web and Evaluating What You Find

Brought to you by…

&

Searching the World Wide Web

How can I find what I want?

Some things to consider when searching the web

• Everything is NOT on the web and may never be

• No search engine covers the entire web

• The “invisible web” is huge!

• Though there has yet to be consensus, estimates put the size of the invisible web between 2 and 500 times bigger than the “visible” (or surface) web.

Searching the World Wide Web

Search Strategy• Searching the Web is much like database

searching:– Put together a list of keywords describing the

information you desire– Use Boolean logic (and, not, or) to better define

your search, use double quotes for phrases, etc.

• When searching the web, also:– Consider which search engines/sites may best suit

your search needs. Different search engines yield different results.

– Use the search engine’s “advanced search” to select limiting parameters (language, date, domain, etc.)

Searching the World Wide Web Search Engines & Meta Sites

• Search Engines:– There are many search engines out there. Yahoo! and

Google are two of the most popular.– You may others exist that you may want to try such as:

Alta Vista, Alltheweb, Infoseek, & Lycos

• Meta search sites (like Ask Jeeves, Dogpile):– Allow you to search more than one search engines at a

time.– Can generate more “stuff” to sift through– Limited to only basic searches, can’t use advanced search

features– Some results can be from “paid for listing” search engines

Sample Web Search• Topic - Censorship in the field of Radio, NOT Television

• Try search in:– Google (note Google’s “cached” feature)– AltaVista

The Invisible WebWhy is so much being missed?

• When using a search engine, you are searching a database that represents what is known to be on the web

• Spiders or crawlers roam the web from link to link generating this database

• Works extremely well for static all text pages in the HTML language

• The problem arises when pages are ever changing or not in HTML

So where is all of this stuff hiding?

• By far, a great amount is contained in databases (both paid and free)

• Other places include:– Non-text information such as photos or

audio– PDF formatted documents– Very new web pages– Password only access information

Finding the invisible stuff

• The key is knowing when you need “invisible” information and then where to find it.

• Not every web search requires looking in the invisible web.

• Search engines work best when looking for a narrow, focused topic.

Some helpful invisible websites

• www.lii.org - searchable annotated directory of Internet resources

• www.freepint.com/gary/direct.htm - Direct Search, large listing of free databases

• infomine.ucr.edu [NO www] - good for searching academic information

• completeplanet.com [No www] blend of database, directory, & search engine information.

• www.firstgov.gov - search federal government sites

Evaluating Web Sites

Is this stuff any

good?

Now Back to Our “Sponsors”

&

Evaluating Web Sites

• Quality varies greatly from site to site

•YOU are the sole evaluator of the quality of information a site provides

Five Evaluation Criteria1. Accuracy - is it reliable?2. Authority - is author qualified on

subject?3. Objectivity - is the information biased?4. Currency - is the information “new”

enough?5. Coverage - does the info completely

cover the topic?

Evaluating Web SitesThe Home Page

• Search engines may put you out of context, go the home page to help evaluate the site

• A good home page will include contact information such as phone numbers and street addresses (not just an e-mail address)

• Links to other web sites DOES NOT necessarily mean that the site is credible. Evaluate each site separately.

Evaluating Web SitesSite Extensions

The extension can help evaluate information• .gov - Governmental sites• .edu - Educational institution sites• .com - Commercial sites• .org - Not for profit organization sites• .mil - Military sites• Others are being creates that are less

clear cut, e.g.: .net or .co.uk

The Bottom Line…

Buyer Beware• The web contains a vast amount of information…but

not everything

• Anyone can put information on the web, hence the quality of web information varies greatly

• YOU will often be the only person to decide if the quality of the info you find on the web is good

Now let’s visit a site…