BiblioTech Connections
Newsletter of the Tisch Library
Tufts University
Spring, 1998, No. 22
Contents:
- Full-Text Newspapers Online
- Grants Awarded
- Changes in Staff
- Recalls Improved
- Remote Access to Expand
- Databases Moving to Web
- Finding Fiction
- National Library Week
With the addition of LexisNexis to the
library's roster of Web products, it is now
easier than ever to stay up-to-date on current
events. LexisNexis offers online access to the
full-text of major English-language
newspapers, including the New York Times,
Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Boston
Globe, Chicago Tribune, and the London
Times. These newspapers are updated daily
and the backfiles go back several years. The
most sought after paper, the New York Times,
goes back to 1980.
Newspapers are just a part of the
LexisNexis universe. Other important files
include federal and state case law, transcripts
from major news sources (such as CNN and
NPR), the Bloomberg Daily Market Summary, brokerage house and industry analyst
reports, and full-text articles from major
American magazines. These include Fortune,
Economist, Business Week, Atlantic Monthly,
Harvard Business Review, and JAMA. The
magazines also go back several years, some as
far as the mid-'80's. The LexisNexis database
is "user friendly" and contains many online
help screens. Search results can be read
online, downloaded to a disc, e-mailed, or
printed. Best of all, LexisNexis is accessible
from dorms, offices, labs, and home. All that
is required is Internet access through the
campus network and a browser such as
Netscape. LexisNexis can be reached from
the Tisch Library homepage on several of the
Research Tools pages, including General and
Interdisciplinary, General Social Science and
General Science. It is also available at
http://www.LexisNexis.com/universe.
If you would like to arrange a
workshop on LexisNexis for a class or a
department, please contact Laurie Sabol,
Coordinator of Library Instruction, at x5167.
The two winning teams of the first
annual Berger Family Technology Awards,
announced in February, are now underway
with their projects. The library is also a
beneficiary of an AUDIT award.
The library and faculty team of
Gregory Crane (Classics), Kevin Dunn
(English), and Laura Walters (Tisch Library)
requested Berger grant funding for a five-
week hands-on seminar enabling a number of
library staff to gain expertise in the
technologies involved in creating a website on
a Shakespearean play, Richard III, with
contributing work to follow. Regina Raboin
(Tisch Library) and Sara Lewis (Biology)
proposed expanding an introductory biology
website to support numerous intermediate-
level biology courses. The Bio 14 site
developed by a library-faculty team in
1996/1997 forms the model. These winning
proposals are being funded for a total of
$42,500 from the endowment established by
Dr. Louis Berger and the Berger family to
foster, as stated in the founding agreement,
"the capability of librarians and faculty to
expand their understanding of and ability to
use digital information, to serve as guides for
their colleagues, and to apply their technology skills to real issues in the university."
Working together, Laurie Sabol from
Tisch Library and representatives from the
Experimental College recently obtained a
$7,000 AUDIT Grant from a university-wide
program that "fosters innovation in the use or
development of information technology at
Tufts." Funds from the grant will be used to
develop an interactive website accessible to
anyone needing help to learn the basics of
conducting research at the Tisch Library.
Initially, the site will be tested by Ex College
students, but it is hoped that the resource will
be relevant and useful to any member of the
Tufts community. The website will be
functional by Fall 1998.
More information about the Berger
Family Technology Transfer Endowment and
the two projects recently funded can be found
within the "What's New" section of the Tisch
Library homepage, or more directly at http://www.library.tufts.edu/tisch/Berger/bergerhome.html.
More information about the AUDIT
program is available at http://www.tufts.edu/tccs/tlr/audit.html.
Newcomer to the Circulation
Department, Pamela Miller joined the library
assistant team in February. Pamela brings a
wealth of customer service experience to her
position. After obtaining an education degree,
Pamela chose to explore retail settings,
working in this field for the past ten
years.
Thomas Stratton recently assumed
new responsibilities in a move from the
Circulation Department to Cataloging
Services. Thomas is putting his technical and
supervisory abilities to good use as a
Cataloging Library Assistant.
The staff bade good-bye to Acquisitions Library Assistant Anne Rawding,
who retired in February after thirteen years of
dedicated service. During her tenure in the
library, Anne specialized in serials and
acquisition work.
Another staff member sure to be
missed is Jim Walsh, who will begin work in
May as field representative for New York and
Pennsylvania for Congressional Information
Services (CIS). Jim's accomplishments as
Head of Reference these past four years are
too numerous to list in this space.
Faculty and staff are definitely
cooperating with the new policy to charge
fines if recalled books are not returned within
two weeks. Recall problems have been
reduced over 50% since the new policy went
into effect in January 1997!
By mid-summer, members of the Tufts
community will have off-campus access,
through textual and graphical Web browsers
(such as Netscape and Internet Explorer), to
databases within the library system previously
restricted to users connecting through a Tufts
IP address. An off-campus user who attempts
to call up a restricted resource will be
prompted for the user's Tufts ID. If the ID is
valid, the searcher will be connected to the
database of interest. Thus, most of the
electronic resources the library subscribes to
will now be available to all Tufts faculty, staff,
and students from off campus as well as on, via
the World Wide Web. In order to use this
service, there will be a one-time browser
configuration setting the user will have to
make. Watch for instructions for this step
online and in the next newsletter.
Some of Tisch Library's most popular electronic databases are moving to the
Web, thus facilitating access from homes, dorms, labs, and offices. The Web versions
of these databases are generally easier to search than their non-Web counterparts;
viewing and printing of graphical data is simpler as well. By fall all of the
Ovid databases will be available on the Web. These include Biological
Abstracts, Medline, PsycInfo, CINAHL, and several Current Contents
indexes. Other heavily used databases, such as ERIC and MLA,
will also be migrating to the Web in the fall term. Present there since January
is FirstSearch, a collection of databases that encompasses more
than forty indexes, including EconLit, ArtAbstracts, WorldCat, and
Book Review Digest.
Look for these titles on the Research
Tools pages of the Tisch Library Web. If you
know the title you are looking for, just go to
the alphabetical (A-Z) list at the top of the
Research Tools page. If a resource is already
available in its Web version, you will be able
to click on the title to have it appear. Until
then, you will find directions for reaching it.
Remember, help is always available at the
Reference Desk.
As reported in the Fall 1996 issue of
this newsletter, the library has taken a special
initiative to augment its English-language
fiction collection, both current and
retrospective, along with its holdings in
French, German, and Spanish literature.
Consequently, our collection of novels and
short stories now offers a wide range of
choice, both contemporary and classic,
published here and abroad. Members of the
Tufts community remaining nearby this
summer are invited to sample our fiction
collection for recreational reading. While
browsing is not as simple as it is in small
public libraries, where novels are often
placed alphabetically by author in one
shelving area, charting a course to our
holdings in fiction is definitely worth the
effort.
For readers interested in perusing only
the most contemporary English and American
novels, a handy technique is to browse
backward from the end of the PR and PS
classifications. Although mixed in with works
of criticism, drama, poetry, etc., the fiction
titles will often be easy to distinguish from the
rest. The principle to bear in mind is that
within national literatures (French, English,
American, etc.), division is by broad
chronological grouping without any
separation by genre. Consequently, a more
generally applicable method is to think of any
literary author of the nationality and time
frame that interests you, look up the call
number location for that writer's works and
browse nearby. Of course, there are always
reference bibliographies and guides to help,
and since searching the catalog for novels and
stories by known authors is less hit and miss
than browsing, that tactic offers a sensible
alternate route to finding fiction you'll enjoy.
Please join us for a celebration of National
Library Week (April 19 - 25) by attending a
Reading Festival. The Tisch Library will be
hosting a program of readings on
nonviolence.
When: Thursday, April 23
12-2 p.m.
Where: Tisch Library Plaza
(In case of rain: Tisch Reading Room)
The theme of this year's National Library Week, "Global Reach/ Local Touch,"
connects well with Tisch Library's theme of nonviolence and ways of working
for a more peaceful world. In this choice of focus, the library is working
cooperatively with others on campus. Please join us for readings chosen by
students, faculty, and staff to reflect on concerns of nonviolence and peace.
During the week there will also be, in the library lobby, a display of
books on nonviolence by Tufts authors, along with reference books on the
subject.
BiblioTech Connections is published three times a year: in the fall, winter, and spring. It is also available at bibliotech.htm
- Contributors to this issue:
- Laura Walters
- Laurie Sabol
- Bonnie Postlethwaite
- Stephanie St. Laurence
- Editor: Margaret Gooch
Feedback & Questions
Tisch Library, Faculty of Arts, Sciences, & Engineering, Tufts University, Medford,
MA 02155
© 2/98 Trustees of Tufts College. All rights reserved.