these schedules are now confirmed and posted to the Reference Desk LibGuide.
Year: 2015
Database Decommissioned: In the First Person
Alexander Street Press has decided to decommission its In the First Person database. The links to it on LibGuides have been removed today.
Gale Interface Changes Coming on April 2
Gale is making a number of interface changes launching on April 2 that will:
- make their interfaces more unified in appearance
- be more accessible to searchers using assistive technology
- offer a responsive design that works on all screen sizes
You can preview the changes ways:
- on a special set of pages on the Gale site detailing the changes with screenshots
- live in a preview mode in selected Gale resources (look for the “TRY NEW EXPERIENCE” icon in the top left corner)
This interface update will only affect a third of the databases we get from Gale:
- Academic OneFile
- Gale Virtual Reference Library
- General One File
- General Science Collection
- Health Reference Center Academic
- Infotrac Newsstand
- New York State Newspapers
- Opposing Viewpoints in Context
Books24x7 Now Works in OneSearch
The CUNY Office of Library Service and Ex Libris have found a solution to the problem we were seeing with full text links into Books24x7 from OneSearch. You should now be able to click through to titles from OneSearch search results (as well as regular catalog searches, something that’s been working for a long time now).
Database Trial: Medcom
Database description
Nursing educators can provide nursing students, allied health students, and nurses with the most current content with almost 200 educational nursing videos. Videos can be viewed in a classroom setting or remotely. Practicing nurses can also obtain CEU credits quickly and easily. Test results are immediate with instant test processing. Testing scores are maintained in a centralized location making it easy to monitor progress.
Features:
- 24/7 access to almost 200 nursing videos
- User-friendly LMS backed by complimentary technical support and customer service
- Quick and easy access distance learning
- Supports tablets and mobile devices
- View entire programs or desired sections
- Closed captioning available
- Works with Mac and PC
Trial ends
2 April 2015
Access
On and off campus via the link on the Trials tab of the databases page. On the EBSCO page that opens, click the link for “Medcom Nursing Video Collection Trial” and then on the Medcom page, click the link to “Create a New Account.”
Feedback
Please share with any faculty who might be interested and recommend they use the trial feedback form (also linked to on the Trials tab on the databases page)
Biography in Context unavailable
UPDATE 4 June 2015: This database is now available again.
Biography in Context is currently unavailable due to procurement issues.
Facts on File Is Now Called World News Digest
Recently, the company that owns Facts on File had rebranded that product as “World News Digest.” We’ve updated the listing for that database to “World News Digest (Facts on File)” and moved it to the W-Z page of the alphabetical databases list. We’ve also added a “see reference” on the E-F page that says “Facts on File is now called World News Digest” and offers a link over to the W-Z page. This pointer will remain in place until the end of the summer.
How to Use S&P Capital IQ
Detailed instructions can now be found in the Databases Overview page in the Library Services wiki.
Database Trial: Artstor
Database description
From the vendor: “The Artstor Digital Library is a nonprofit resource that provides over 1.8 million digital images in the arts, architecture, humanities, and sciences with an accessible suite of software tools for teaching and research.”
Trial ends
31 March 2015
Access
On and off campus access via the link on the Trials tab of the databases page
Feedback
Please share with any faculty who might be interested and recommend they use the trial feedback form (also linked to on the Trials tab on the databases page)
Search Page Alerts in OneSearch
With the help of the CUNY Office of Library Services, Baruch is now the first CUNY school to set up a useful customization that addresses the problem of users searching for things in OneSearch that can’t be found there or that are more easily found elsewhere. For example, one of the things that got searched for a lot last year in Bearcat Search and now in OneSearch is “factiva.” In the past, running a search like that would yield a search results page with a long list of articles about Factiva and no links to the database itself. Now, if you search for “Factiva” in OneSearch, you’ll get an alert message at the top of the search results pointing you to the specific page on the A-Z list of databases where you can find the link to Factiva.
By looking a search query logs in Summon (our old discovery service), OneSearch (our current one), and the site search on the library web site, I was able to put together a list of things to add to this alert system:
- every database we link to on our A-Z databases page and common misspellings for the most popular ones (etc., Lexus Nexus, JSTORE)
- commonly sought after periodicals with both the complete name (e.g., Harvard Business Review, Wall Street Journal) and common abbreviations found in prior search queries (e/g., HBR, WSJ, NYT)
- library services and policies that are frequently searched for (e.g., fines/fees/overdue items, graphing calculators)
As much as possible, the choice of things to set up alerts for has been driven by actual evidence of need. Still, we’ll likely continue to discover things users are frequently searching for in OneSearch that can’t really be found there, and additional alerts will be added as needed. It’s worth noting that usability tests planned for OneSearch this spring will look at how effective these alerts are and consider additional design work to improve them.