Last week (Monday Feb 22nd 2016) we had a visit from expert searcher Phil Bradley, who spoke to us about search, where we are, and where we’re going. This report was written by MA LIS student Cathy Goodin:

Phil Bradley talking about search at UCL

Phil Bradley has a mission: to make everyone, especially librarians, see that using Google alone is like trying to answer every question by opening up Encyclopaedia Britannica.

You may know Phil from Cilip Update, where his sunny by-line photo appears beside the “Internet Q&A” column every month. Phil spoke to us in Foster Court on Monday 22nd February and turned out to be a lot less sunny when he got on to the subject of Google.

Because Google is taking advantage of us.

Google knows we all turn to it automatically, so over the years it has gradually reduced its search functionality (what happened to Advanced Search?) knowing that a poorer list of results will make us more likely to click on a piece of advertising instead.

Which makes money for Google.

And making money is the no.1 aim of all search engines. I thought they were in it to help us find information on the internet, but I was wrong.

Phil’s advice? Don’t slavishly use Google for everything. There are a hundred different search engines out there – in fact there are 400,000 of them depending on how you define “search engine” – so get under the hood of a few and learn what they are capable of.

Use Duckduckgo when you want to preserve your privacy. Use Yandex for Boolean, proximity and synonym search functionality. Try Newslookup.com or NewsNow for news, and Zanran for data and statistics. Try a multi search engine such as Trovando for comprehensive results, and SimilarSites to take one good website and find others like it.

You can find a whole collection of search engines on Phil’s website.

Phil also talked about the future of up-to-date information: social media. YouTube, twitter, Facebook, reddit and the like generate so much content every minute that big search engines can’t keep up. Use something like Social Searcher or SocialMention to find out what has happened in the last few minutes. Or follow what your network are talking about with a collation service like Flipboard or News.me.

We are in a transition time. Internet search is changing. People don’t want to look at a website to see what a company or organisation is saying – they want to hear from individuals who are experts in a particular field.

Phil encourages us to find our own experts, and then to become experts – to post as knowledgeable people using whatever the social media platform of the moment might be, until we ourselves are the go-to sources of information for others.

Author: Cathy Goodin, 29 Feb 2016

Phil Bradley’s slides can be downloaded here

Congratulations to Sarah Hume on being awarded an Early Career Conference Award by the Special Libraries Association Europe.

Sarah is completing her MA LIS part-time while working as a Library Assistant at the Geological Society of London and the London Library, and is active in student life, at UCL, where she is helping to organise our upcoming employers fora, nationally, as Chair of Cilip’s Student Committee, and internationally, as a contributor to Hack Library School.

ECCA are highly sought-after, providing accommodation, travel and registration for the SLA annual conference. UCL’s last ECCA holder was Marie Cannon, who now works for a leading international law firm and is a well-respected conference speaker. Sarah’s award is the first to be co-sponsored by the Competitive Intelligence Division – an area of library practice that is of particular interest to Sarah – and she is looking forward to finding out more about it, and meeting practitioners from Europe and beyond.

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Image: @sarahfhume

Following in the tradition of independent visits to libraries, a group of UCL LIS students organised a visit to some departmental libraries of the British Museum on the afternoon of Wednesday 19th November 2014. The libraries which we were able to see were the Anthropology Library and Research Centre (in the Department of Africa, Oceania and the Americas), the Library of the Coins and Medals Department, and the Library of the Middle East Department. It was really interesting to be able to compare these libraries, which were very different (with the exception of the typical library issue of a lack of space for the collections!) despite being within the same broader institutional setting.

Andretta, S. (2011). Evaluating information literacy educators’ practices before and after the course facilitating information literacy education: from tutor to learner-centred Health Information & Libraries Journal, 28 (3), 171-178 DOI: 10.1111/j.1471-1842.2011.00946.x

Indexing and abstracting databases are key to producing good, robust research but they can be daunting and  confusing and it is tempting to stick with the familiarity of Google and Google Scholar.  To get some advice on  searches for your assignments, come along to a search skills surgery, where you can pick up some tips and develop your confidence in using A&I databases.

The surgery, run by Tara your subject librarian, will take place on:

Tuesday 9th December 11:00-12:00 Room G31

This is a drop in session so come along at any time within the hour, armed with any troublesome searches and questions you have.

We’ll primarily be looking at the following databases as they’re key to DIS:

• LISA  – Index of journal articles in librarianship and information science, including archives and records management, publishing and some material relating to Digital Humanities. Includes abstracts from over 440 periodicals from more than 68 countries and in more than 20 different languages.
• Library and Information Science Source – Content includes full text for more than 460 publications and indexing for hundreds of high-quality journals, as well as books, research reports and proceedings. Subject coverage encompasses librarianship, classification, cataloging, bibliometrics, online information retrieval, information management and more.
• INSPEC – a bibliographic information database covering the fields of physics, electronics, computing, control engineering and information technology with more than 7.7 million records taken from 3,500 technical and scientific journals and 1,500 conference proceedings.
• SCOPUS – multi-disciplinary database containing references to journal articles, conference proceedings, trade publications, book series and web resources.

If you can’t make this session please feel free to drop me an email with your queries.

Please note these sessions are only open to students in the UCL Department of Information Studies

Following Simone’s post about our class visit to St Bride’s Printing Library, I thought I would share our experience learning about different print techniques using materials from the UCL Art Museum. 

The practical session on the methods of printing led by Curatorial Assistant and print artist J. Yuen Ling Chiu (@yuenlingchiu) was an hour’s worth of hands on experience with printed pictures. Have you ever looked at a print and wondered how it was made? Well wonder no further with this module session.

We started by each choosing a printers tool which was used to make one or more of the printed images displayed around the room. After a few minutes of studying the images, we were asked to guess which tools were used to make each of the prints. Firstly we looked at some woodcut prints, made with a ‘u’ tool, which is used by scraping lines in the wood. This imprints very defined straight lines which are tapered at the ends where the tool enters and leaves the wood. The ink is then rolled onto the remaining sections of wood to create the print. This is known as relief printing. We also looked at copper engraving and etching (in which acid is used to cut into the metal).

One of the forms of etching I found most interesting was the aquatint, where a cloud of blue dust is thrown into the air and left to settle onto a piece of copper sheet. Wax is then placed on certain sections, before the sheet is dipped into acid which burns through the dust to leave white flecks on the print. The print is then built up with layers of wax and acid to for the picture.

Another interesting technique is mezatint, where the surface starts very black, and layers of white are created on top using a tool which had grooves running along the edge, ending in little teeth. These teeth were used to ‘smoosh’ (technical word!) the dots together by rocking the tool from side to side.

After this quick induction we were set loose on a new set of prints, discussing which method of printing was used to create each print. On the whole I like to think we got more than half of them right between us.

If this doesn’t convince you that Historical Bibliography is a good optional module to choose, then the seminars on collation and quasi-facsimiles will top the balance! I am looking forward to the remaining seminars that this module has to offer.

Editorial Note: UCL Art Museum is closed for refurbishment until April 2015, but its programme of teaching and public engagement is continuing off-site. We are very grateful to J. Yuen Ling Chiu and Dr Andrea Fredericksen (UCL Art Museum Curator) for delivering this regular session for INSTG012 in the Haldane Room this year. You can find details of the Museum’s ongoing programme of events on its website. Staff also contribute to @UCLMuseums on twitter, UCL Museums and Collections facebook page, and the Museums & Collections playlist on UCLTV on YouTube. — Anne Welsh, INSTG012 Historical Bibliography Module Coordinator.

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Nikki Gregory (@NikkiG434) is a full-time student on the MA Library and Information Studies.

Image: Anne Welsh.

Note: the appearance of the byline on this post is auto-generated, indicating that it was posted by Anne Welsh. Apart from the editorial note, Nikki Gregory is the sole author of this piece.

Indexing and abstracting databases are key to producing good, robust research but they can be daunting and  confusing and it is tempting to stick with the familiarity of Google and Google Scholar.  To get some advice on  searches for your assignments, come along to a search skills surgery, where you can pick up some tips and develop your confidence in using A&I databases.

The surgeries will be run by Tara, your subject librarian and will take place on:

Tuesday 2nd December 14:00-15:00 Room G31

Tuesday 9th December 14:00-15:00 Room G31

The surgery will run as a drop in session so come along at any time within the hour, armed with any troublesome searches and questions you have.

We’ll primarily be looking at the following databases as they’re key to DIS:

• LISA  – Index of journal articles in librarianship and information science, including archives and records management, publishing and some material relating to Digital Humanities. Includes abstracts from over 440 periodicals from more than 68 countries and in more than 20 different languages.
• Library and Information Science Source – Content includes full text for more than 460 publications and indexing for hundreds of high-quality journals, as well as books, research reports and proceedings. Subject coverage encompasses librarianship, classification, cataloging, bibliometrics, online information retrieval, information management and more.
• INSPEC – a bibliographic information database covering the fields of physics, electronics, computing, control engineering and information technology with more than 7.7 million records taken from 3,500 technical and scientific journals and 1,500 conference proceedings.
• SCOPUS – multi-disciplinary database containing references to journal articles, conference proceedings, trade publications, book series and web resources.

Looking forward to seeing you there!   If you can’t make either of these surgeries, please feel free to drop me an email with your queries.

Please note these sessions are only open to students in the UCL Department of Information Studies

The one-year spent in the full time Masters course passes by very quickly. You start and, all of a sudden, it is January and Term 1 has gone. Then you find yourself putting together that case study and after a minute you are writing up your dissertation. In all this, visiting libraries is a (very) good idea.

The idea came about spontaneously to my classmates and me. As comprehensive as it can possibly be, a LIS course could never cover all the possible aspects of libraries in all their fields. Academic libraries are the first and most common example for library students, but we wanted to explore a bit more what there was out there. Departments would organise visits as part of their curricula, but self-organised students visits respond more to the students’ natural curiosity. And it was fun!

How? We pulled together the resources we had and we used our contacts. Those who had spent a year in a Graduate Traineeship relied on the relations in the previous workplace: simply, they asked their previous supervisor whether they where willing to host a visit by eager library students. Others used personal contacts and their network to arrange a visit. We have never tried to directly contact a library we were interested in, presenting ourselves as “UCL LIS students”, but I am confident that very few libraries would have turned us down: sharing and teaching are at the core of the profession!

What? Our visits were approximately two hours long: enough time to look around and have a relaxed chat with the staff. The more questions, the more engaging the experience was – and it also helps a lot to think critically about ideas and experiences one might have. We managed only 3: the more the better, but studying full time and in some cases having part-time jobs made it difficult to do any more. For the same reasons, each time the group was not too large: trying to fit a visit into everybody’s schedules was of course impossible – doodle helps a lot. We have been to the library of Lincoln’s Inn, one of the four Inns of Court in London and to the Idea Store in Whitechapel, a new concept of public library that aims at serving at its best their community. We also treated ourselves with a one-day trip to Cambridge to visit the library of Trinity College. Here and there, a couple of pubs.

Why? It has been a great way to think about libraries out of the “write-that-assignment” frame of mind and to build stronger relations among ourselves beyond the university walls. It has been useful in terms of inspiration and a good exercise in planning and organising. Meeting professionals in a more informal situation also allowed us to ask more questions and free up your own curiosity. I believe we gained an awareness of the diversity and the options that exist in libraries.

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Ivan Donadello (@ibancelafa) was one of the MA LIS class of 2012-13, and is now Senior Library Assistant at UCL Institute of Ophthalmology.

Image: Trinity College by Laura Newman (@librarylandL), used with permission. Pictured, from left to right: Ivan Donadello (@ibancelafa), Natalie Kent (@natalielkent), Richard Hobart, Fiona Watson, Ella Taylor and Alexandra Kohn.

Note: the appearance of the byline on this post is auto-generated, indicating that it was posted by Anne Welsh. Ivan Donadello is the sole author of this piece, and Laura Newman holds the copyright for the image.

I recently attended the School Library Association’s Reading for Excellence one day conference.

Wendy Cooling MBE, founder of Bookstart, opened the day with an inspirational talk on her own journey of reading and libraries. Reading for her meant two words: power and passion. Reading, she believes, gives young people power and without it they have very few choices. Passion, as librarians, is what we all have for reading and we have a responsibility to ignite this in our young people.

Dr Clare Wood then presented a number of studies conducted from the Reading Research and Insights into Achievement centre at the University of Coventry. A recent study by PHD student Emily Harrison investigated the link between children’s ability to hear speech rhythm and their progress in reading. Her research is not yet in the public domain but previous research by Corriveau et al on auditory processing skills and language and literacy achievement is available.

Clare also spoke about a study by Smith et al on reading enjoyment and how despite a steady improvement in children’s reading ability between the ages 8 – 12, their enjoyment and self-efficacy declines. As a school librarian working with children in this age group, this is of particular interest to me. One finding of the research suggested that 80% of pupils enjoyed books that they selected for themselves. This highlights the importance of reading for pleasure and the need for us as adults, librarians, teachers and parents to reconsider what we view as legitimate reading and the importance of validating pupils’ own reading selection choices.

Karen Goulding, Learning Hub Director at the University of Reading, challenged us to consider our library space and ask ourselves: “Are we making a substantial impact on all children? How do we decide what to include? Do we realise that means we make choices about exclusion too?” This was a powerful insight into thinking about school libraries. Karen advised us spend time simply observing how pupils move around the space, what sections they are drawn to and which areas they overlook. She also emphasised the need to engage with our users and develop a clear strategy for moving our libraries forward.

There was also the chance to participate in a workshop. I selected Thinking Skills and Reading because I want to develop a deeper understanding of the role of reading across the whole curriculum. Sue Dixon, founder of the Thinking Child, stimulated us with a range of practical activities which we could take back and explore with our pupils. Sue highlighted the importance of pupils as social and political critical thinkers in our information rich society. The activities were designed to promote curiosity, imagination and questioning.

The day concluded with a talk from Marilyn Mottram, Her Majesty’s Ofsted Inspector, Deputy National Lead for English and Literacy. The audience welcomed the recognition of the importance for reading for pleasure in the new curriculum. Marilyn identified that 10.2% of pupils aged between 8 – 16 do not enjoy reading at all. This is a challenge for schools to overcome and it is through partnership that it can be achieved. Everyone in education has a role to play. It begins with being a reader yourself and as a librarian being ready to share your subject knowledge and passion with teachers, parents, and of course, pupils.

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Becky Scott (@the_bookette), School Librarian, St Aubyn’s School, is completing her MA LIS part-time.

Image: St Aubyn’s School Library by Becky Scott, used with permission.

Note: the appearance of the byline on this post is auto-generated, indicating that it was posted by Anne Welsh. Becky Scott is the sole author of this piece, and also holds the copyright for the image.

As a MSc in Information Science student at the department I applied for the student systems developer position to help create an Open, Linked and Interactive Educational Resource for Bibliographic Data and was appointed in late September.

I could not summarize in a blog post everything I have learned so far but here are some highlights.

Semantic Web, Linked Data and RDF

Search engines have made the job of finding our way around the Web much easier. But we still have to go through the results of a search and take a few more steps until we get exactly what we want. That is because Web content is in a ‘human readable’ format and computers have a limited understanding of it. This understanding can be improved and there are several approaches to do so. One of them is the Semantic Web.

Honestly, I could not possibly explain better than the people from How Stuff Works what the Semantic Web is. Have a look, their Star Wars examples are insuperable.

Similarly, who could explain better Linked Data than Sir Tim Berners-Lee on his TED talk? He says Linked Data is about using identifiers for resources, those identifiers contain data in a standard format and, this is very important, relationships.

The standard format Berners-Lee talks about is Resource Description Framework (RDF). If you are interested in it, read the RDF primer or chapter 3 of Semantic Web Primer. Copies are available at UCL’s Science Library.

RDF allows to make statements, also called triples, composed of a subject (a resource), a predicate (a relationship) and an object (a value or another resource). Using the How Stuff Works example:

<AnakinSkywalker><isFatherOf><LukeSkywalker>

We are telling the computer that Anakin has a relationship ‘isFatherOf’ with Luke but we need to give the computer a bit more information. We know things that the computer does not know about this statement like:

• Anakin and Luke are both people and they are both male.
• Only males are called ‘father’ and in this context it describes the relationship with another person.
• Anakin is Luke’s father which means that Luke is Anakin’s son.

In RDF terms:

• Anakin and Luke belong to the subclass ‘Male’ of the class ‘Person’.
• Only resources belonging to the class ‘Male’ can have the property ‘isFatherOf’ (domain restriction) and only other resources that belong to the class ‘Person’ can be the objects of this property (range restriction).
• There should be another property named ‘isSonOf’ to explain the second relationship. Again it will have the domain ‘Male’ (a son can only be a male) and the range ‘Person’ (either a female or a male).

Classes, properties, domain restrictions and ranges can be defined in a RDF Schema (RDFS). RDF does not make any assumptions so the user can create any classes or properties.

SPARQL, which is the query language for RDF, is something else I have briefly had a look at. I will soon be learning about the practical side of publishing Linked Data as well.

BIBFRAME

The Bibliographic Framework (BIBFRAME or BF) is the standard replacing Machine Readable Cataloguing (MARC). Since the late 1960s, MARC provided bibliographic records with a structure that allowed computers to interpret and exchange the data they contained.

The new standard is now focusing on the Web environment and its objectives, as pointed out on the primer document, are “to differentiate clearly between conceptual content and its physical manifestation, focus on unambiguously identifying information entities and leverage and expose relationships between and among entities”.

With BIBFRAME we will be representing the valuable metadata libraries held until now in databases as Linked Open Data. Hopefully, this will lead to users being able to find information easily, search engines to direct people to library resources and to allow innovative uses of the metadata sets, increasing their value.

BIBFRAME is what the project I am helping with focuses on. I have read much of the content available on the official site, tried the editor, the comparison service and the transformation service. I have gone through examples and tried to create my own BF records which has helped me to learn about the use of the vocabulary elements. I have also joined the BIBFRAME list serv and keep an eye on what people are saying about it on social media.

If you are interested in learning more about BIBFRAME I would strongly recommend to start by reading the primer document as well as the FAQ section, then check out the vocabulary description and have a look at the vocabulary category view. This video of Eric Miller’s keynote at the DCMI 2014 sums up quite nicely what BIBFRAME may mean for the library community in the future. It lasts 80 minutes but it is worth it.

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Natalia Garea Garcia (@ngarea) is studying for her MSc IS and is the Student Systems Developer for the Linked Open Bibliographic Data project, for which staff in the Department of Information Studies (Antonis Bikakis (Project Lead), Anne Welsh (Project Coordinator), Simon Mahony and Charlie Inskip) hold an E-Learning Development Grant. Further blog posts and reports will be published periodically. A key output of the project is collaborative co-learning between staff and students, and this blog post supports teaching today in INSTG004 Cataloguing in which Natalia, Antonis and Anne are sharing knowledge and practical experience with students on the MA LIS.

Image: Overview of the BIBFRAME Model, Library of Congress

Note: the appearance of the byline on this post is auto-generated, indicating that it was posted by Anne Welsh. Natalia Garea Garcia is the sole author of this piece.