Some years ago, bringing up peak oil--the concept that oil production will crest and then decline, leading to all sorts of trouble in society--might have made one seem like the kind of person who frequents Web sites that sell survival books and freeze-dried food. Today such discussion has pretty much hit the mainstream. Last month The Wall Street…

Interest in strengthening the impact and value of education research has been growing around the world. Here I outline a view of the nature of "impact" and point to instances where research has had a positive impact in education, but always within a larger social and political framework. A three element "model" of research impact is developed and…

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) software research and development project described explores information seeking behavior of end-user energy experts and develops software offering tutorials on front-end use of DOE/RECON databases and active help in performing online searches. Software development is described and results of prototype testing…

Prepared under contract with the International Council on Archives (ICA), this study is intended to assist archivists and information specialists in creating, developing, and evaluating modern archival systems and services, particularly with reference to the concept and the role of the user in such systems and services. It ranges over a wide field…

Reviews the research on the role, importance, and impact of the federal technical report literature, and summarizes some ambiguities and gaps in the research. Different approaches to conceptual and methodological issues are discussed, and a typology of technical reports is provided. (38 notes with references) (Author/CLB)

Reviews recent and current research and development projects in the United Kingdom dealing with online information systems. Main areas of research (systems design, impact on user behavior and organizational structure, ergonomics and bibliographic factors) and research techniques (features analysis, transaction log analysis, surveys and comparative…

Describes the design and operation of a prototype online catalog; reviews research which evaluated the system in terms of types of searches and success rates; and offers suggestions for enhancing subject access, including automatic stemming, synonym tables and cross-reference lists, and relevance feedback mechanisms. (CLB)