Sadly Unperpetual Access

I always feel bad when I have to tell students that no, they can't keep getting awesome access to all our subscription-based electronic journals and databases after they graduate.

I mean, unless they want to come into the library to use our computers, which alums may always do, but if they move across the country or something it's not going to be that helpful an option.

I feel their pain. I love having access to all these databases! I don't even use them that often, not for personal use anyway, but it's just nice to know they're there. It's comforting.

Like a healthy savings account! Of information!

I was prematurely nostalgic for the University of Alabama's databases as soon as I started library school. "I'm going to miss these so much after I graduate!" I said mournfully.

"You're going to be working in a library after you graduate," my spouse pointed out reasonably. "You'll have access to databases that way."

Oh yeah. Sweet!

And so I do. And believe me, it's awesome.

This whole post pretty much proves that I should never not be a librarian, doesn't it?

Mmm...EMBASE

Krafty Librarian alerts us to the fact that Ovid is offering EMBASE Classic as a free trial this month.

IN-teresting!

We occasionally have people ask about this database, which I've heard described as "the European MEDLINE,"where I work, but we don't have a subscription because it costs a lot.  I'm automatically interested in it because it relates to stuff I do, but I've never actually seen it.

I may have to check this out. If I can dig out of the catalog updates and bindery preparations.

.

Mmm, Data

I always like a new database! Especially a free one I can recommend to the students.

Along those lines, we have Data.gov, which will offer access to data sets from the federal government. It offers a "featured dataset" (today the Residential Energy Consumption Survey) and the option to access either raw data or tools for data mining.

It seems to basically collect data from various federal agencies that has probably been available on other sites, but is now conveniently in one place.

This could obviously be potentially useful for all sorts of research. There are several interesting categories to search, with information on education, nutrition, social statistics, law enforcement, and more.

You can search by keyword, category, agency, or data file type (XML, CVS/Text, etc.).

The site also invites suggestions for what sorts of data we'd like to see in future, so I'll be wracking my brain to think of helpful information I may someday like to access. Come on, brain! Tell me what you need!

There doesn't actually appear to be a whole lot there right now (47 results in "raw data," 27 in "tools"), but what's there could certainly be of help to someone--especially if you're interested in copper smelting, as who isn't--and I will keep an eye on the site.

iLibrarian saw this before I did.

Company in the Front Hall

There is a response from Caveat Lector to responses to yesterday's question.

The author promises a later report on ulterior motives (my favorite kind of motives!), and discusses a few of the responses that were received.

Now I wish I'd actually had a conclusion (as opposed to winding up with "yeah, I dunno if teaching databases is a good idea or not--ooh, look, a metaphor!").

I should have emailed in some sort of creative answer such as "because we like databases, and want to share the love! How will they ever learn to adore Boolean operators if we don't teach them?"

She does express sharp scorn for one argument that I touched on:

One response in particular… well. “They have to do lots of stuff in college they’ll never have to do again. Why not this too?” People. PEOPLE. That is not a reason. That is an excuse. I expect better from my tribe.

Ouch.

Although as far as I know Caveat Lector* does not read this blog and was not referring to me personally, I would nevertheless like to state in my defense (and that of anyone else to whom it applies) that I did not say this was a good reason to teach databases, only that it was not necessarily a good reason not to, if there was some demonstrable value gained.

I stand by this as a valid distinction.

I should also note that as a teacher of databases to graduate students, I today experienced a heartwarming bit of geek satisfaction when a student assignment included references to truncation!--and the aforementioned Boolean operators!

I can't really argue that this incident is a good reason in itself, though. My geek satisfaction is clearly very important to everyone, but I do recognize that it's not the primary consideration in every single decision.

Well, I'm certainly staying tuned for more on the ulterior motives.

5/4/09

*Edited to note that by this I of course mean the author of Caveat Lector. Caveat Lector itself, as the title of a blog, presumably does not read anything. I do this sort of metonymy in my head all the time, essentially naming the author after the blog, but it's not exactly an accurate description of reality.

I think it comes from a perhaps misplaced sense of blog-privacy, where it seems almost impolite to mention a person's name (after all, they publish under such-and-such heading--that must be what they want to be called!).

If the blog is anonymous, this is pretty much the only option (and maybe that's where I got into the habit), but in cases like Caveat Lector, or, indeed, this blog, where there's an actual person's name attached to it, it becomes a little more interesting.

Is it more polite to use a person's actual name, even though other readers online may then have no idea which blog you're talking about? To use both the name and the blog title? To do what I do, and conflate blog title and person?

Let's not even talk about blogs with multiple named authors, for to tread there brings madness.

It is possible that the etiquette has not yet been completely established. Someone should become the Miss Manners of blogs!

Not me, though.

Enjoy Our Lovely Front Hall!

Caveat Lector asks an interesting question:

Why should we go through so much effort and agony to teach undergraduate students to use library-provided subscription databases when the vast majority of them will never again have access to those databases once they graduate?

I don't work with undergraduates, so my opinion has limited bearing on the question, but thinking of myself at that time---oh, yes, was I ever ignorant of and uninterested in databases!

I can't even remember if we had databases. I do remember looking up articles in some sort of index (and then going down to journal storage to locate the full text), so there must have been some.

I seem to recall they all looked exactly alike, on these grim orange-on-black screens at terminals that were also used for the catalogue, and nothing else. So either branding was not big, or my library indexed articles in the catalogue.

Or my unreliable brain is feeding me erroneous messages about the past, which is also entirely possible.

The point being, I had pretty much no clue about database search skills. I did OK in college, so maybe that was fine. It seems that the limited level of clue I had (see keyboard, type in keywords, probably) was sufficient to my information needs at the time, since I did graduate.

And it's not as if the librarians weren't there if I'd ever thought to ask for advice.

I think a related question would be, what's the alternative to teaching students? Just pointing at the library home page and telling them to call if they need you?

Could work. I mean, we know most of them will never take full advantage of the advanced features that way, but they probably won't if you haul them through library orientation and tell them about it, either, because they're distracted and don't really care and it's not useful information until they actually need it.

At which point, if they think of it, they can call you.

"We rented a giant mansion full of awesome magical information rooms, but most people just bumble around in the front hallway. Oh well. If they want directions to more stuff, they can always ask, plus, there's a lot of decent stuff in the front hallway."

The second part of the question, the fact that most people will not have this kind of database access once they graduate, also caught my eye.

I'm not sure how serious it is. I mean, whether or not something is valuable long-term is often irrelevant to whether or not it's valuable now, so what does the fact that they'll probably never use these databases again have to do with it?

I spent a lot of time working on formatting references in MLA style as an undergraduate, which I've pretty much never been called upon to do since (and which we now have software to handle, mumble mumble kids these days don't know how good they have it etc. etc.).

Heck, I spent plenty of time and effort just learning my way around campus, figuring out class and dining schedules, remembering peoples' phone numbers--that's stuff I'll definitely never use again!

That doesn't mean it wasn't energy usefully expended at the time, on my part and on the part of all the people who printed up schedules, posted notices, made study guides available, and so forth.

So if trying to teach students search skills means some of them do a little better in their courses, than I don't really care whether or not they ever use a database again after they graduate. If it helps them while they're in school, that seems like help enough.

But as far as the question of whether or not teaching database search skills does actually mean some students do better, or whether even if some do, enough do to make it worth the effort, I don't know.

Certainly the database designers are working hard to put enough stuff in the front hallway of the mansion that people can get something useful without knowing how to get to the other rooms.

Maybe they've done a good enough job that we (meaning, again, people who work with undergraduates, since that was the question) can leave it to them. (Graduate students must obviously be thoroughly indoctrinated with database search instructions: it's just sound policy.)

Yeah, that was a lot of rambling to get to that inconclusive conclusion, I know. Sorry. I thought I was going somewhere, but it turned out I was sidetracked by my 'giant mansion full of magical information rooms' metaphor.

Also, the memory of those square orange catalogue letters on those black screens in the library in college. It will haunt me now.

Unexpected Ovid

Yow!

BIOSIS suddenly looks like our other Ovid databases, all pastel and such. It always used to be orange and blocky-looking, with a sort of retro look that some might find charming.

But, it seems, no more.

All those tips we taught people a couple of weeks ago about how to use the old Biological Abstracts search features are instantly meaningless.

Well, that's life.