Due to the fact that I was off work for a few weeks in February, this is a combined issue for March/April.

Internet Resources Newsletter by email and RSS

Over 40,000 people subscribe to the free email version of this Newsletter. Very many thanks go to FUMSI http://www.fumsi.com/ who sponsor this newsletter. FUMSI publishes articles, tools, and a monthly magazine, to give you practical help with information skills.

To subscribe to the Internet Resources Newsletter, at no cost, go to http://www.hw.ac.uk/libwww/irn/

The Internet Resources Newsletter has an RSS feed: http://www.hw.ac.uk/libwww/irn/irn.rss
To add this feed to any feedreader, go to: http://tinyurl.com/39sg5j

A pdf of a foldable A4 leaflet about this newsletter is available. This may be useful for libraries or others who want to spread the word about the newsletter. If you do - many thanks!

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News items of interest.

Acknowledgement of funders in journal articles
http://www.rin.ac.uk/funders-acknowledgement
The RIN has issued some concise guidance and easily-understandable guidance

The Struggle for scholarly search
http://www.iwr.co.uk/information-world-review/features/2211186/struggle-scholarly-search
"...the part-time information worker, the home user doing a bit of academic sleuthing and the student on an assignment will all find Google Scholar great value for money."
From: IWR

STM/PSP/ALPSP Statement on journal publishing agreements and copyright agreement 'addenda'
http://www.stm-assoc.org/home/stmpspalpsp-statement-on-journal-publishing-agreements-and-c.html
In order to provide clarity to the debate on the rights that authors have (or indeed it is claimed inaccurately, do not have) over their published works, STM, PSP, and ALPSP have released an evidence-based "Statement on Journal Publishing Agreements and Copyright 'Addenda'."

A-Z NEW & NOTABLE WEB SITES

118FM

http://www.118fm.co.uk

Tools and services for anyone working within the Facilities Management Industry.

1807 Commemorated

http://www.history.ac.uk/1807commemorated/index.html

1807 Commemorated is a ongoing project based at the University of York examining the museums and commemorative practices regarding the bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade. It features discussion forums, interviews, analysis into museum representation and an assessment of audience responses towards exhibitions regarding enslavement and abolition. Using this data the project explores issues of identity, memory, commemoration and the negotiation of a traumatic past.

50+ Killer Online Resources for Computer Science Students

http://www.virtualhosting.com/blog/2008/50-killer-online-resources-for-computer-science-students/

From the Virtual Hosting.com blog.

A Database

http://www.adatabase.org/

A Database is a pioneering open-source research engine and digital archive for contemporary visual culture.

ADSET

http://www.adset.org.uk/

ADSET is a membership organisation which seeks to improve the quality, management, use and usefulness of information about learning opportunities, occupations and careers, student and client records, job vacancies, the labour market, and qualifications.

Afrigator

http://afrigator.com/

Afrigator is a social media aggregator and directory built especially for African digital citizens who publish and consume content on the Web.

Alternate Reality Games for Orientation, Socialisation and Induction: ARGOSI

http://www.playthinklearn.net/argosi.htm

The ARGOSI project aims to provide an innovative alternative to traditional student induction. It will combine an engaging narrative with a series of challenges (group and individual, online and set in the real world) and a social networking platform to create an alternative reality game. It is hoped that this will provide an authentic context in which students can meet and work with others, navigate their city and learn information literacy skills.

Architecture Media

http://www.archmedia.com.au/

Architecture Media titles include: Architecture Australia; Houses; Houses Style; Architectural Product News; Artichoke; Landscape Architecture Australia; and Selector.com

Much of the content is freely available online.

Ask a Philosopher

http://www.philosophypathways.com/questions/

This service is offered courtesy of Pathways to Philosophy, the independent distance learning project run by the International Society for Philosophers.

Awareness Watch Newsletter March 2008 V6N3

http://zillman.blogspot.com/2008/02/awareness-watch-newsletter-v6n3-march.html

The Awareness Watch Featured Report in February featured Business Intelligence Resources.

Big News

http://news.ask.com/news

A news service from Ask.com

Bus tracker

http://www.mybustracker.co.uk/

Access to real time bus information in and around Edinburgh.

Check your bus times at home, at work or on the move.

Calculatoredge

http://www.calculatoredge.com/

Online free Engineering Calculators for Engineers and Students.

Capital Collections

http://www.capitalcollections.org.uk/

A choice of images from the collections of Edinburgh City Libraries and Information Services.

Careerjet

http://www.careerjet.com/

Careerjet is an employment search engine for the United States. It allows you to search a growing selection of jobs listed on company sites as well as jobsites in one go saving you the trouble of having to go to each site individually.

Cites & Insights

http://citesandinsights.info/civ8i3.pdf

March 2008 issue.

CiteSeerx

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/

CiteSeerx is a scientific literature digital library and search engine that focuses primarily on the literature in computer and information science. This is a new version of the service which has been available since 1997.

Cititec IT Recruitment

http://www.cititec.com/

Cititec IT Recruitment specialise in IT recruitment for Investment Banks, offering IT jobs in the worlds leading financial institutions.

CNKI databases

http://china.eastview.com/kns50/

Access to several large bibliographic databases from China, including the China Academic Journals Full-text Database (CAJ is the most comprehensive, full-text database of Chinese journals in the world. It contains more than 7,200 journals starting from 1915. As of September 2007, the full-text article count reached 23.5 million)

Copyright Clearance Center

http://www.copyright.com/

Millions of people in corporations, universities, law firms and government agencies rely on Copyright Clearance Center to use and share published content with ease and confidence.

CoreIndex.com

http://www.coreindex.com/

A business to business directory of trade services, manufacturers and suppliers.

Council of Science Editors

http://www.councilscienceeditors.org/

CSE's mission is to promote excellence in the communication of scientific information.

Create Change Canada

http://www.createchangecanada.ca/

"In the age of the Internet, the ways you share and use academic research results are changing — rapidly, fundamentally, irreversibly. There’s great potential in change. After all, faster and wider sharing of journal articles, research data, simulations, syntheses, analyses, and other findings fuels the advance of knowledge. It’s a two-way street — sharing research benefits you and others. But will the promise of digital scholarship be fully realized? How will yesterday’s norms adapt to tomorrow’s possibilities?

This website will help you understand the changing landscape and how it affects you and your research. It also offers practical ways to look out for your own interests as a researcher."

Create online training

http://www.create-online-training.com/

How to create online training and e-learning using training software.

D4Science

http://www.d4science.org/

D4Science aims to continue the path that the GÉANT, EGEE, and DILIGENT projects have initiated towards establishing networking, grid-based, and data-centric e-Infrastructures that accelerate multidisciplinary research by overcoming several crucial barriers that stand in the way, primarily those related to heterogeneity, sustainability and scalability.

DRIVER Studies

http://www.driver-support.eu/en/studies.html

Here you can access information and support relating to Open Access and digital repositories.

Within the DRIVER project, three strategic studies on digital repositories and related topics have been carried out. The production of the studies was coordinated by SURF, the collaborative organisation for higher education and research aimed at breakthrough innovations in ICT in the Netherlands, in close association with Amsterdam University Press and the following DRIVER partners: CNRS (FR ), the University of Gent (BE), ICM (PL), the University of Goettingen, the University of Bielefeld (GER), UKOLN and the University of Nottingham (UK).

Education Podcast Network: EPN

http://www.epnweb.org/index.php

The Education Podcast Network is an effort to bring together into one place, the wide range of podcast programming that may be helpful to teachers looking for content to teach with and about, and to explore issues of teaching and learning in the 21st century.

ELI Discovery Tool: Net Generation Workshop Guide

http://www.educause.edu/NetGenTool

The ELI Discovery Tool: Net Generation Workshop Guide is designed as an action-oriented, modifiable resource for faculty development and other instructional uses. We have focused on the Net Generation because serves as a starting point for many other discussions about active learning, emerging technologies, information fluency, learning space design, and assessment.

e-Math for Africa

http://math.golonka.se/

The aim of this site is to coordinate the efforts to make an African consortium for e-journals and databases.

E-print Network Search

http://eprints.osti.gov/

Search thousands of e-prints in scientific and technical disciplines.

E-prints are scholarly and professional works electronically produced and shared by researchers with the intent of communicating research findings to colleagues. They may include preprints, reprints, technical reports, conference publications or other means of electronic communication.

Etsy

http://www.etsy.com/

Etsy is an online marketplace for buying & selling all things handmade.

eufeeds

http://www.eufeeds.eu/

300 newspaper feeds, updated regularly.

Eurocode 6: Design of Masonry Structures

http://www.eurocode6.org/

Resources to support masonry design and construction with respect to Eurocode 6, or to use the more formal title, BS EN 1996

European Journalism Centre

http://www.ejc.nl/

The European Journalism Centre (EJC) is an independent, international, non-profit institute dedicated to the highest standards in journalism, primarily through the further training of journalists and media professionals.

Europeana

http://www.europeana.eu/

This website, branded Europeana, will break new ground by bring together millions of digitised resources from Europe's archives, museums, libraries and audio visual collections through a single portal.

FEAlliance

http://www.fealliance.co.uk/

The FEAlliance exists to bring together Further Education colleagues providing networking opportunities that will inform the FE sector about the community's collective views.

Federation of Environmental Trade Associations: FETA

http://www.feta.co.uk/

The Federation of Environmental Trade Associations (FETA) is the recognised UK body which represents the interests of manufacturers, suppliers, installers and contractors within the heating, ventilating, refrigeration & air conditioning industry.

Free Library of Computer Science Knowledge

http://www.springer.com/computer/reading+room+welcome?SGWID=0-149902-0-0-0

The Springer Computer Science Reading Room offers you free access to books and journals in your area of interest.

FreePint 245

http://www.freepint.com/issues/240108.htm

Issue 245 is available. FreePint is a global network of people who find, use, manage and share work-related information.

Google Investor News

http://www.googleinvestornews.com

Google Investor News is an always-updating investment news portal focusing solely on Google Inc. financial and GOOG stock news.

Grazr

http://grazr.com/

Grazr is a great tool for anyone who needs to monitor online sources and share the results.

Handbook for Information Literacy Teaching

http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/insrv/educationandtraining/infolit/hilt/index.html

This Handbook was written by a group of subject librarians at Cardiff University to support their colleagues in Information Services as they developed their information literacy teaching.

Hyder Consulting

http://www.hyderconsulting.com/

Hyder Consulting is an international advisory and design consultancy with particular specialisation in infrastructure, property and environmental solutions.

IGLOO

http://www.igloo.org/library

Built by the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), the IGLOO Library is an Open Access online repository comprised of thousands of electronic resources gathered from hundreds of partnering organizations from around the world. All documents are available for free full-text download from anywhere at anytime.

This repository covers subjects such as: Economics, Energy, Environment, Health, Humanitarian Issues, International Institutions, International Law, Peace and Security, Science & Technology, Social & Political Development.

India Together

http://www.indiatogether.org/

India Together is a public interest reader-financed online magazine published by Civil Society Information Exchange Private Ltd, Bangalore.

Found via Marcus P. Zillman.

Industrial Leaders

http://www.industrialleaders.com/

Explore Who's Who In The Global Industrial Marketplace.

Information Professionals Adding Value

http://www.aukml.org.uk/conf2008.htm

AUKML Conference, 18-20 April 2008, Palace Hotel, Manchester

”The theme concerns how librarians and information professionals add value to their employers’ businesses. Our programme will provide an update on information work skills, give delegates sound techniques to assist users and to demonstrate their expertise to their managers. It will also provide an insight into how journalists and television companies work. As we expect it to be of interest to colleagues in many areas of the information profession, not just the media, you don’t have to be a member of the Association of UK Media Librarians to come to the conference.”

Intellectual Property Rights and copyright> Introduction

http://www.slainte.org.uk/copyright/copyrightindex.htm

From the Slainte website. This gives a basic overview of IPR and copyright, focusing on the information professionals' perspective.

International Journal of Communication Networks and Distributed Systems

http://www.inderscience.com/ijcnds

The first issue of International Journal of Communication Networks and Distributed Systems has just been published.

International Journal of Innovation and Regional Development

http://www.inderscience.com/ijird

The first issue of International Journal of Innovation and Regional Development has just been published.

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business

http://www.emeraldinsight.com/info/journals/ijmpb/ijmpb.jsp

A new journal.

The International Journal of Managing Projects in Business aims to address the increasing demand for articles on project management within business - the journal is independent from any association and is the first to focus on the management of projects rather than specifically project management.

Intute Repository Search

http://www.intute.ac.uk/irs/index.php

Search across 89 UK academic eprints repositories.

JobJourney Scotland

http://scotland.jobjourney.co.uk/

JobJourney Scotland is one of the UK’s leading employment websites for jobs from all industries in the Scotland.

Journal of Communication Studies

http://www.marquettejournals.org/accessthejournals/jourofcommstudies.html

Open Access journal.

Karnataka

http://karunadu.gov.in/

Karnataka government official web portal.

Keotag

http://www.keotag.com/

A search engine which lets you search for tags across 14 different sites such as Delicious, Newsvine, etc.

kwout

http://kwout.com/

"kwout" is a way you quote a part of a web page as an image with an image map.

Library jargon explained

http://www.swan.ac.uk/lis/HelpAndGuides/LibraryJargon/

A glossary of library, information and computing terms.

Listing of educational widgets

http://learning-activities.org/widgets/

A gallery of widgets, web services, and web applications of interest to educators.

Low Carbon Buildings Programme

http://www.lowcarbonbuildings.org.uk/home/

The programme provides grants for the installation of microgeneration technologies in a range of buildings to include households, community organisations, public, private and the non-profit sectors.

Making the Most of Moodle: 2 – Onwards

http://www.newcurioshop.com/moodle/mmm2.htm

“Continues the work from MMM1, but this time focuses on how to bring in your Word, Powerpoint and other resources. As in MMM1, we provide a full Moodle course space in which to work, and it can be tackled at your own pace, in your own time, and is fully supported by a real live tutor”

MasterKey

http://masterkey.indexdata.com/

MasterKey is a hosted service developed and maintained by Index Data. It uses Ajax to improve the speed and functionality of simultaneous multi-target search and retrieval..

The MasterKey hosted metasearch service is now, and will continue to be, freely usable for searching selected open content online resources and library catalogs. Commercial resources and additional catalogs can be added to the service using the fee-based version of MasterKey.

micropoll

http://www.micropoll.com/

Free web polls.

National Foundation for Educational Research: NFER

http://www.nfer.ac.uk/index.cfm

“Our aim is to improve education and training, nationally and internationally, by undertaking research, development and dissemination activities and by providing information services.”

Nature India

http://www.nature.com/nindia/index.html

A new website highlighting the best scientific research from researchers based in India.

Open Information Systems Journal

http://bentham.org/open/toisj/

The Open Information Systems Journal is an Open Access online journal which publishes research articles, reviews, and letters in all areas on the development, use, application and influence of information systems. The journal covers both fields of information science and computer information systems.

Open Science Directory

http://www.opensciencedirectory.org/

As a result of different projects a large collection of e-journals is now available for researchers in developing countries. The Open Science Directory IOC/IODE, with the support of EBSCO and Hasselt University Library, is creating a unique access point to all the journals contained in the different programs.

PaperofRecord.com

http://paperofrecord.com/search.asp

“With 21 million images in our collection so far, PaperofRecord.com is looking to a multi-billion-newspaper page universe to create a resource that will be used by scholars, students and individuals of all walks of life, for generations to come.”

Requires registration.

Pathways school of philosophy

http://www.philosophypathways.com/

The Pathways school of philosophy was founded in 1995 by Dr Geoffrey Klempner. In 1997, the six Pathways to Philosophy programs were launched on the world wide web as an independent project hosted on the University of Sheffield web site.

In 1999, the Pathways Ask a Philosopher service was introduced. In 2001, the first issue of the Philosophy Pathways e-journal was published.

Since 2002, Pathways has been run under the supervision of the International Society for Philosophers.

Peer Review in Scholarly Journals - perspective of the scholarly community: an international study

http://www.publishingresearch.net/PeerReview.htm

The main objective of this research is to measure the attitudes and behaviour of the academic community with regard to peer review.

Philosophy Pathways electronic journal

http://www.philosophypathways.com/newsletter/

The Pathways e-mail newsletter, Philosophy Pathways was launched in January 2001. Back issues are archived here.

Planet eBook

http://www.planetebook.com/

The home of free classic literature. All their novels and books are entirely free for you to download and share with your friends, classmates, students, etc.

Pluck

http://www.pluck.com/

Pluck provides Social Media solutions for publishers, retailers and major brands.

POS Software Systems for Retail Stores

http://www.softwareadvice.com/retail/

POS = Point of Sale.

”There are at least 100 systems designed for POS and other retail functions. Sorting through the options is dizzying and retailers often make the wrong choice. We're here to help... We can help you find the best system for your business. We don’t sell software. We don’t implement software. We are a free web resource where you can research your software purchase.”

Projity

http://openproj.org/

Projity is the world's leading provider of Software as a Service (SaaS) and open source project management software. Here you can find OpenProj a free, open source desktop alternative to Microsoft Project.

R&D Chemical

http://www.rdchemicals.com/

A database of rare chemicals searchable for free using a chemist-friendly search engine.

Research Excellence Framework

http://www.rin.ac.uk/ref-consultation

At the end of November 2007, the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), in parallel with the HE Funding Bodies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, issued for consultation a set of proposals regarding the future framework for the assessment and funding of research. This new Research Excellence Framework (REF) will replace the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) post-2008.

The Research Information Network's response to the consultation is available from this page.

Research funders' open access policies

http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/juliet/

SHERPA - JULIET now includes information on requirements for the open access archiving of data as part of funding agreements.

Research Trends

http://www.info.scopus.com/researchtrends/index.htm

A newsletter from Scopus that looks at scientific trends based on bibliometric analysis.

Revolutionjobs.co.uk

http://www.revolutionjobs.co.uk/

Covers new media career opportunities for digital marketing managers, e-commerce business development directors, SEO specialists, PPC, web design and web development, etc.

Scholarly Research Exchange

http://www.syrexe.com/

Scholarly Research Exchange is a peer-reviewed, open access journal that publishes original research articles in all areas of science, technology, and medicine.

Science and Technology Facilities Council

http://www.scitech.ac.uk/

Formed by Royal Charter in 2007, the Science and Technology Facilities Council is one of Europe's largest multidisciplinary research organisations supporting scientists and engineers world-wide. The Council operates world-class, large scale research facilities and provides strategic advice to the UK government on their development. It also manages international research projects in support of a broad cross-section of the UK research community. The Council also directs, coordinates and funds research, education and training.

ScienceWatch.com

http://www.sciencewatch.com/

From Thomson Scientific, part of Thomson Corporation. A free, open web resource for science metrics and analysis.

SciLink

http://www.scilink.com/

SciLink is an online community with the goal of helping you to discover scientists, authors, and relationships.

Searching for Science!

http://searchingforscience.pbwiki.com/

Interesting wiki from Wouter Gerritsma.

Sharing eLearning Content: a synthesis and commentary

http://ie-repository.jisc.ac.uk/46/

A report by Charlesworth, A and Ferguson, N and Schmoller, S and Smith, N and Tice, R.

Sheriff Ratings

http://www.sheriffratings.com/

“In 2005 the 'Sheriff Ratings System' was born with the simplest of ideologies, "the best business, product, service, or person could be defined by placing top the one with the highest amount of positive ratings and not the one that paid the most to be there or artificially manipulated public opinion". This could then act as a filter to put good where previously bad and unproductive entities had been.”

Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence

http://www.singinst.org/

“In the coming decades, humanity will likely create a powerful artificial intelligence. The Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI) exists to confront this urgent challenge, both the opportunity and the risk.”

Society for New Communications Research

http://sncr.org/

The Society for New Communications Research is a global nonprofit 501(c)(3) think tank dedicated to the advanced study of new communications tools, technologies and emerging modes of communication, and their effect on traditional media, professional communications, business, culture and society.

SPARC Open Access Newsletter

http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/03-02-08.htm

The March issue of the SPARC Open Access Newsletter.

Spir@l

http://spiral.imperial.ac.uk/

Spir@l is the Digital Repository for research output of Imperial College.

STFC ePublication Archive

http://epubs.cclrc.ac.uk/

The STFC ePublication archive (ePubs) records the scientific output of the Chilbolton, Daresbury, and Rutherford Appleton Laboratories in the form of Journal Articles, Conference Papers, Technical Reports, ePrints, Theses and Books.

Sustainable Innovation 08 - Future Products, Technologies and Industries

http://www.cfsd.org.uk/events/tspd13/index.html

Part of the Towards Sustainable Product Design series of conferences.

13th International Conference, 27th - 28th October 2008, Malmö University, Malmö, Sweden.

The Bazaar

http://www.bazaar.org/

The Bazaar is a community portal for people who want to use, exchange and share Open Source Software and resources to support learning.

The Primary Review

http://www.primaryreview.org.uk/

The Primary Review is a wide-ranging and independent enquiry into the condition and future of primary education in England.

Theoi Project

http://www.theoi.com/

A site exploring Greek mythology and the gods in classical literature and art.

University Business

http://www.universitybusiness.com/

University Business is a publication for presidents and other senior officers at two- and four-year colleges and universities throughout the United States.

UNU OpenCourseWare

http://ocw.unu.edu/

This site is involved in making course materials available through an open content license. It showcases the training and educational programmes implemented by the United Nations University in a wide range of areas relevant to the work of the United Nations.

VetcoGray

http://www.vetcogray.com/

With more than a century of experience, VetcoGray is one of the leading suppliers of innovative and cost effective products and services to the global upstream oil and gas industry. VetcoGray provides reliable and field-proven products, systems and solutions for drilling and production, onshore and offshore.

Virus Encyclopedia

http://www.viruslist.com/en/viruses/encyclopedia

All about Internet security.

Visuwords™

http://www.visuwords.com/

Online graphical dictionary. Look up words to find their meanings and associations with other words and concepts. Produce diagrams reminiscent of a neural net. Learn how words associate.

WaterAid

http://www.wateraid.org/uk/

WaterAid is an international charity. Our mission is to overcome poverty by enabling the world's poorest people to gain access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene education.

WebCite

http://www.webcitation.org/

WebCite®, a member of the International Internet Preservation Consortium, is an on-demand archiving system for webreferences (cited webpages and websites, or other kinds of Internet-accessible digital objects), which can be used by authors, editors, and publishers of scholarly papers and books, to ensure that cited webmaterial will remain available to readers in the future. A WebCite®-enhanced reference is a reference which contains - in addition to the original live URL (which can and probably will disappear in the future, or its content may change) - a link to an archived copy of the material, exactly as the citing author saw it when he accessed the cited material.

Webjam

http://www.webjam.com/webjam/home

“We make it easy for our users to aggregate and share content with the communities they create and join, giving them the tools to share what they discover, helping them to organise information and relationships.”

Widwisawn

http://widwisawn.cdlr.strath.ac.uk/

The Confederation of Scottish Mini-Cooperatives (COSMIC) has launched Vol.5 No.4 of Widwisawn, a 'webzine' covering various developments in the Scottish library, museums and archives communities.

WikiPatents

http://www.wikipatents.com/

The WikiPatents Community contributes to the US patent system by reviewing issued patents and pending patent applications. WikiPatents features a wiki-like interface to review, rate, and discuss patents -- plus free patent PDF downloads, file histories, and advanced patent searching.

Wise Guide

http://www.loc.gov/wiseguide/

From the Library of Congress.

“This Wise Guide portal was designed to introduce you to the many fascinating, educational and useful resources available from the nation's library and one of the most popular Web sites of the federal government.”

WIT Press

http://www.witpress.com/

With over 20 years experience in publishing, WIT Press books enable graduate students, researchers, engineers, scientists and managers within industry to remain up-to-date with the latest developments in their fields.

WiWi-Online

http://www.wiwi-online.co.uk/

WiWi-Online is an online research tool for students, academic staff and professionals of economics, accountancy and business.

Woodhead Publishing

http://www.woodheadpublishing.com/en/

Woodhead Publishing Limited is an independent international publishing company publishing in the areas of Food Science, Technology & Nutrition, Materials Engineering, Welding and Metallurgy, Textile Technology, Environmental Management and Finance, Commodities and Investment.

writewith

http://writewith.com/

"We make writing online work for groups. In just a few seconds, get your own account where you can upload documents, share with other people, chat, assign tasks, and track everybody's actions with a comprehensive history."

[Contents] - [ IRN Home Page ] - [HWU Library Home Page] 

NICE WEB SITE

In the course of finding sites of interest for this Newsletter, we sometimes come across Web sites which we feel deserve slightly more than a passing mention. Each month we will pick out one or more such sites, and give them a short review. The sites will often be UK based, may be small or large, and be of interest or potential interest to academics. After lengthy discussions we have decided, with incredible creativity :-), to call these: Nice Web Sites. Details of previous Nice Web Sites are available in the Nice Web Site Archive.

MasterKey Power Search
http://masterkey.indexdata.com/

RM

[Contents] - [ IRN Home Page ] - [HWU Library Home Page] 

BLOGORAMA

Selected interesting blogs, RSS feeds and news items

You already know what blogs are, but for more information about RSS see the Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(protocol) or Webopedia http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/R/RSS.html

The Internet Resources Newsletter has an RSS feed (essentially the Table of Contents for each issue): http://www.hw.ac.uk/libwww/irn/irn.rss
To add this RSS feed to any feedreader, go to: http://tinyurl.com/39sg5j

Easy RSS Mixer
http://www.extralabs.net/easy-rss-mixer.htm
Combine several RSS feeds into one

10 Tools to Combine, Mix, Blend Multiple RSS Feeds
http://www.tothepc.com/archives/10-tools-to-combine-mix-blend-multiple-rss-feeds

8 cool ways to use RSS feeds
http://webtrends.about.com/b/2008/02/12/8-cool-ways-to-use-rss-feeds.htm

Feedage
http://www.feedage.com/
Feedage is a free fully categorized and searchable RSS directory.

Alertle
http://www.alertle.com/
A new RSS feed reader

Our Favourite Social Science Blogs
http://www.intute.ac.uk/socialsciences/blog/
Intute: Social Sciences Blog are featuring a week long exploration of the social science blogosphere.

The world's 50 most powerful blogs
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/09/blogs

James Brown
http://www.jb-jb.co.uk/blog/
He works as a project manager for a design agency in Shoreditch, London.

Bigmouth Strikes Again
http://www.bigmouthstrikesagain.com/
Gary Marshall, on technology, the net, etc

play think learn
http://www.playthinklearn.net/
Thoughts on computer games for learning

Techno life
http://www.tothepc.com/
Latest - TechWorld - Tools - Tips - Downloads

Research Blogging
http://www.researchblogging.org/

Open Students
http://www.openstudents.org/
We’re changing the way that research is disseminated. We are Open Students.

WoW! Wouter on the Web
http://wowter.net/
The blog WoW!ter is written and maintained by Wouter Gerritsma, subject librarian at Wageningen UR Library.

Newspond.com - Technology, Gaming and Science News http://www.newspond.com/rss/main.xml

American Meteorological Society feeds
http://www.ametsoc.org/rss.html

Swiss Army Librarian
http://www.swissarmylibrarian.net/
or, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Fear and Loathing at a Public Library Reference Desk

Chipwrapper UK Newspaper Headlines
http://feeds.feedburner.com/chipwrapper

Latest Happenings in Library & Information Science
http://lislatest.blogspot.com/
News from India

Wildy & Sons Ltd
http://www.wildy.com/book_headings
Forthcoming book titles

Repositories Support Project News
htttp://www.rsp.ac.uk/news/rss1.php

SUNCAT Blog
http://www.suncatblog.blogspot.com/
SUNCAT is the Serials Union CATalogue for the UK research community.

Powder Metallurgy Forum
http://powdermetallurgyforum.blogspot.com/

Scopus search results: Scopus Topcited
http://info.scopus.com/topcited/rss.asp?search=PUBYEAR%20AFT%202003%20AND%20DOCTYPE(ar)

JISC Information Environment Team
http://infteam.jiscinvolve.org/

Packrat Librarian
http://packratlibrarian.wordpress.com/

Scientific American RSS feeds
http://www.sciam.com/page.cfm?section=rss&sc=rss_banners

matthewll's blog
http://matthewll.blogspot.com/
STM society publishing and web advances as i see them...

Computers, creativity and learning
http://judyrobertson.typepad.com/
Judy Robertson's blog

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RSS FEEDS FOR NEW BOOK ANNOUNCEMENTS IN ENGINEERING

Here are a few RSS feeds for new book announcements in the subject area of engineering. I'm interested in any other new book announcement feeds, produced by publishers, within the same subject area of engineering.

Please send me details, to r.a.macleod@hw.ac.uk

Wildy & Sons Ltd: Environmental Law http://www.wildy.com/subjects/environmental-law

Wiley: All New Engineering Titles http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/feed/RSS_WILEY2_ENGINEERING.xml

Springer Engineering Titles http://www.springer.com/uk/engineering/rssfeed?SGWID=3-175-820-0-0

Harvard University Press - TECHNOLOGY http://www.hup.harvard.edu/rss/feeds_subjects/TEC.xml

O'Reilly Media, Inc. New Books http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/feed/29?format=rss2

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NEW BOOK REVIEW

Providing effective library services for research
by Jo Webb, Pat Gannon-Leary and Moira Bent
Facet, 2007
ISBN: 978-1-85604-589-6
£39.95

This easy to read book discusses the evolving relationship between researchers and libraries. It covers key reports and gives insights from researchers, which make for useful background on how researchers and research support change over time. Reading this book in conjunction with the recently published Ciber report ‘Information behaviour of the researcher of the future’ [1] will give good coverage of evolving research behaviours.

The book is targetted at the quite specific readership of research support or liaison librarians. Research in the context of this book is clearly defined as academic research. Although, the book has a UK base, many of the ideas discussed will have relevance across georgaphical boundaries.

The book is structured in three broad sections covering researchers, research support and the role of libraries and challenges they face. Across each section there is a nice mix of background information, comment and case studies from researchers, which give a clear insight into what it means to be a researcher. In doing so, the authors sucessfully create a base from which discussion on research support is built.

While the book declares it is not a manual, chapters on finding resources and creating services offer some practical advice where useful resource links are given and specific services are discussed. Useful resources are listed by format, despite acknowledging later in the book that digital natives (the researchers of the future) are likely to be ‘format agnostic’.

The chapters on research support services encourage a proactive rather than reactive approach, suggesting that librarians should become active members of the research community. Of paramount importance to offering services such as research space, special collections/archives, subject support, document delivery, and access, is the need for these services to be marketed to researchers.

A range of library training sessions for researchers is discussed with tips on how to identify need, create content and decide on format. Useful advice on how to approach training adults who are experts in their field is also given.

There are many challenges to research support both current (open access, google scholar, copyright and plagiarism, freedom of information and e-science) and future (the changing research environment, competition and collaboartion and trends in scholarly communication). All are covered in this book. Collection management and the challenge of creating relevant collections within budget limitations is also touched on as is the role of collaborative schemes for improved access.

The final chapter consolidates the discussion and sets out ten key principles for the provision of effective research support:- know your users; understand the research environment; access is key; develop expertise; monitor and evaluate; treat the service provided holistically; support information literacy; embrace change; advocate scholarly communication; and finally become a researcher!

The authors note that the library’s role in supporting research is “self-evident and cannot be questioned”. However, the authors of both this book and the Ciber report [1] agree that, in an increasingly complex information landscape with more choice, the library’s role may be forgotten or ignored. Indeed, much of what is said on information behaviours in this book is confirmed in the Ciber report. Librarians should not be passive or complacent but proactive in promoting library resources and services. As the book’s authors note, libraries are no longer the sole gateways to academic knowledge, nor are they, in many cases, the intermediaries between the researcher and the information. The message from both is that we (librarians) need to know our users, adapt and compete. Only then are we likely to survive.

[1] Ciber/JISC/BL. Information behaviour of the researcher of the future. January 2008.

MK

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GET A LIFE! - LEISURE TIME

Geni
http://www.geni.com/
Geni lets you create a family tree.

Streets of Edinburgh  -  Edinburgh Street Photos
http://www.streetsofedinburgh.co.uk/

Touropia
http://www.touropia.com/
Travel highlights around the world using interactive maps

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