Even as librarians have spent the past twenty years documenting the rich world of scholarly communication beyond the catalog, repositories and catalogs too often remain completely siloed from each other. Current practices and tools to unite the two focus entirely on matching names, an imprecise method requiring substantial time spent on review.…

Sometimes users need to be asked if they need help. This is difficult with online users, because in-person cues cannot be used to engage when the users need assistance. Proactive chat widgets help to solve this problem as the chat box slides out onto the screen and prompts the user for help. The need for the proactive chat widget was also seen as…

Sharing longitudinal student record data and merging data from different sources is critical to addressing important questions being asked of higher education. The Multiple-Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIELD) is a multi-institution, longitudinal, student record level dataset that is used to answer…

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Library, where the author serves as the digital services librarian, is increasingly challenged to make it easier for users to find information from many heterogeneous information sources. Information is scattered throughout different software applications (i.e., library catalog, federated search engine, link…

The recent introduction of Google Scholar has renewed hope that someday a powerful research tool will bring continuing education literature more quickly, freely, and completely to one's computer. The authors suggest that using Google Scholar with other traditional search methods will narrow the research gap between what is discoverable and…

School library websites enhance and explain the services provided by the library. Most schools have a library website. Jurkowski (2004) reviewed thirty-four school library websites and ranked the most common features: website links, databases, policies, Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC), and websites by subject. These features give patrons a…

Describes a project at the Princeton University libraries that converted the pre-1981 public card catalog, using digital imaging and optical character recognition technology, to fully tagged and indexed records of text in MARC format that are available on an online database and will be added to the online catalog. (LRW)

This article recounts a project at the Middle Tennessee State University library to include records for electronic databases in the online catalog. Although electronic databases are accessible via the library's Databases A-Z list and related subject guides, cataloging these resources also provides access via the online catalog, allowing more of…

Considers some of the major technical and organizational issues involved in virtual-catalog production, contrasting them with the traditional union catalog approach exemplified by COPAC, an online public-access catalog composed of academic libraries in the United Kingdom. Suggest a method of integrating these two models of the union catalog.…

As news outlets create headlines such as "A Cloud & A Prayer," "The Cloud Is the Computer," and "Leveraging Clouds to Make You More Efficient," many readers have been left with cloud confusion. Many definitions exist for cloud computing, and a uniform definition is hard to find. In its most basic form, cloud…

Describes the Library of Congress online catalog, which is now available on the World Wide Web. Highlights include the LOCIS (Library of Congress Information System) database; Telnet access; the Web gateway to book and name authority files; an experimental catalog with a user-friendly interface; and examples of computer screens. (LRW)

Summarizes how the Library of Congress' digital library collections can be accessed globally via the Internet and World Wide Web. Outlines the resources found in each of the various access points: gopher, online catalog, library and legislative Web sites, legal and copyright databases, and FTP (file transfer protocol) sites. (LAM)

Discusses some problems in accessing the microform collection of the Research Libraries of the New York Public Library using the library's printed and online catalogs. Creation of an in-house automated microforms database is described, including software, selection and downloading of records, updating, and searching the database. (MES)

Describes a statistical study of three databases, conducted at Iowa State University, on holding links between citation databases and the online catalog. Provides insights into the construction and quality control of citation databases and online catalogs, and identifies a new issue of continued maintenance of ISBNs and ISSNs for catalogers.…

Discussion of aggregator databases focuses on a project at the Hong Kong Baptist University library to integrate full-text electronic journal titles from three unstable aggregator databases into its online public access catalog (OPAC). Explains the development of the electronic journal computer program (EJCOP) to generate MARC records for…