This study evaluates the "Education Resources Information Center" (ERIC), "Library and Information Science Abstracts" (LISA), and "Library Literature" (LL) databases, determining how long the databases take to enter records (indexing delay), how much duplication of effort exists among the three databases (indexing…

Rules and guidelines are provided for the preparation of abstracts and annotations for documents and journal articles entering the ERIC database. Various types of abstracts are defined, including the Informative, Indicative, and mixed Informative-Indicative. Advice is given on how to select the abstract type appropriate for the particular…

Rules and guidelines are provided for the preparation of abstracts and annotations for documents and journal articles entering the ERIC database. Various types of abstracts are defined, including the Informative, Indicative, and mixed Informative-Indicative. Advice is given on how to select the abstract type appropriate for the particular…

Suggests a nationwide Canadian online bibliographic system for improved access to research publications, especially scholarly journals and papers produced by university departments and research institutes, similar to the ERIC system. Also discussed is funding of this abstracting and indexing service, possibly through the Canadian government. (SW)

In order to compare effects of input processing on information retrieval in three databases, 25 articles from a specific journal were examined. Tables and Venn diagrams show retrieval results from different manual and computer searches. The relation between document surrogates and subject matter of the documents is discussed. (SW)

Presents various levels of criteria for judging the quality of abstracts and abstracting. Requirements for abstracts to be read by humans are compared with requirements for those to be searched by computer. Concludes that the wide availability of complete text in electronic form does not reduce the value of abstracts for information retrieval.…

This paper presents a detailed analysis of the content and format of seven machine-readable bibliographic data bases: Chemical Abstracts Service Condensates, Chemical and Biological Activities, and Polymer Science and Technology, Biosciences Information Service's BA Previews including Biological Abstracts and BioResearch Index, Institute for…

Designed to provide students of information science with an introduction to British librarian Samuel Clement Bradford's 1934 findings about the scattering of information, this reader on Bradford's Law begins by discussing its use in calculating search procedures in printed bibliographies as well as in databases. The following additional materials…

The Association of Information Dissemination Centers (ASIDIC) formed the Cooperative Data Management Committee to address the problems of information center operators and data base suppliers. The number of operating centers in the U.S. is limited and their future expansion in numbers and in type of services, will depend on the education of users.…

Presented are the results of a study which examined the scope of the ERIC data base. Recommendations include a more explicitly stated policy for selective indexing of data base and indexing procedures, and also a consideration of indexing, but not abstracting, relevant dissertations. (AP)

Compares "Library Literature" with "Library and Information Science Abstracts" (LISA) and outlines searching LISA on the SilverPlatter CD-ROM. Use of indexes and abstracts to aid information retrieval is explained; abstracting services are described; and five steps in writing an abstract are listed. Abstracts and annotations…

This chapter describes how ERIC addresses the problems resulting from four conditions that make it unique in the indexing field: (1) its subject area includes a wide range of subspecialists; (2) its clientele is extremely diverse; (3) it has a dual retrieval purpose--for both manual and computer access; and (4) its retrieval is challenged by the…