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Pegasus Librarian Posts

WorldCat Even Slicker

Published by Iris on Thursday, February 1st, 2007

I just got an email from WorldCat saying that I could update my blog widget (see the bottom of my sidebar) so that it’s no longer a bright blue on my tan-ish/yellow-ish background. But the really cool part is what’s included in the rest of the email:

  • Automatic geographic location by IP address
    WorldCat.org library results for a particular item now determine the geographic location for a user based on IP address, even when the user has never before entered a postal code.


  • Users can expand faceted browse results
    The faceted browse feature of WorldCat.org search results now allows a user to expand the abbreviated results within each facet via a “Show More” link. Faceted browse allows a user to dynamically filter search results by categories, or facets, using the left-hand Refine Your Search panel, helping users narrow a large result set. Each facet in its initial state displays only the five most relevant results. The “Show More” link lets the user incrementally reveal 25 additional results at a time, up to 100 results within the facet.
  • More visibility for evaluative content and Web resource links
    Individual item records reached from WorldCat.org search results now include links to supplemental Web content at the record level. Previously displayed beneath the “Details” tab, these links can include publisher-provided item descriptions, author biographies and Web sites, tables of contents and content excerpts.

    Additional links may be provided with the heading “Web Resources,” which may give a user access to content related to the displayed item. If the displayed item is a digital object—such as an electronic book, or a digitally preserved photo, document or artifact—the link may provide direct viewing or retrieval of the object.

They’ve also added a Chinese language interface, and made it so that you can embed a keyword, subject, title, or author. That url will then lead to a result list as if you’d done a keyword search or a search on those common indices. A tutorial on that is here.

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Tax Refunds for All

Published by Iris on Wednesday, January 31st, 2007

I just learned that the IRS is offering a one-time refund for the long-distance telephone tax you may have paid over the last three years. All you need to know should be here.

And now back to your regularly scheduled library jabber.

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The Poor Rep Didn’t Know What He Was In For

Published by Iris on Sunday, January 28th, 2007

We had a rep from a major database vendor come and talk to us all afternoon on Friday. All I can say is, I feel like I’ve just been window shopping at Prada. I don’t know anything about our budget, but I’m pretty sure we saw enough wonderful databases and full text collections to blow our entire database budget several times over. Of course, it was all beyond wonderful… but wow… I think we all got database envy for at least two of the tools we saw.

Anyway, at one point the poor guy was showing us a free add-on to something we already have. Free. Got that? Well, we spent probably 20 minutes grilling him on how it works, why they made it, what it would do for us that another product we have doesn’t do, why they made it work the way they did rather than another way, and discussing our theory of student usage of databases… All for a free add-on. The poor guy.

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Yet Another Service Librarians Can Offer: Translation

Published by Iris on Sunday, January 28th, 2007

Run, don’t walk, to Dorothea Salo’s translation of the AAP/PSP statement regarding their PR campaign against Open Access publishing.

My favorite translation, exerpted from Dorothea’s post:

AAP/PSP: It’s unfortunate that reporters picked up on some early proposals that were not adopted and, regrettably, the Nature article has misrepresented what’s really going on.

Dorothea’s Translation: We really, really regret having been caught red-handed. We can’t possibly explain, because there isn’t actually an honest explanation that doesn’t make us look worse, and we can’t be dishonest because we haven’t yet found the leak we’ve obviously got, and so we’ll just get caught again.

Thank you Dorothea. Your service is greatly appreciated.

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