National Game @ Your Library Day

Okay, I have no idea who invented this (or why) but in honor of National Game @ Your Library Day, I have decided to put the fun in library (that doesn't really make sense, does it?)

Anyway. Who knew that we have a ton of video games in the library? We have some in the Multimedia library and some in the music library (Did you know we have a professor here who writes music for video games?).

I hereby pledge that when I finish playing Morrowind, I will donate it to the library. Of course it could take many months. ;)

Also, in honor of this day, I would like to share with you this very fun (remember that I am a librarian) game about the Library of Congress classification system. I scored 4400. If you can prove to me that you beat me, maybe I will give you a prize. :)

They say it's the same, but it's not the same

By now, you will have noticed that while you were away enjoying your summer vacations, basking in the sun on the beaches of Oahu, the Web elves took away your old comfortable UCR Library Home Page and replaced it with something...else.

Don't Panic. It will be okay.

For the most part, all of the changes were to the very top page. The menus on the left were changed slightly, mostly so that they would collapse and uncollapse based on the beta brainwaves (and mouse clicks) of the user. Honestly, wasn't it looking a little crowded over there.

The main part of the page has a lot more words on it. We are going to track how many times each of those words catches the attention of unsuspecting users and if they do not...well it might mean they get the axe. It's a dog eat dog world in the Web real estate game.

Honestly. I want to know what you think. You can let me know here, or you could do something actually useful and fill out our teeny, weeny survey.

I missed you all and I am glad you are back.

Springer eBooks

We have been working with Springer (a notable publisher in Science, Engineering and Medicine) to selectively acquire some of their books in electronic format.

In order to evaluate their products and our interest in them we will be able access their entire collections until December 31st. Give it a try and let me know what you think.

We like Springer because they are not charging a premium for electronic access, and they are fully downloadable (PDF). I hear they even work on the Kindle.

YAML (Yet another Mailing List)

Hello. How are you all doing today. I hope you are well.

I have a great idea. What if you don't use RSS and you don't want to miss out on my informative and mightily amusing missives.

Thusly, I have decided to start a mailing list for engineering graduate students (I know, I know, all of you undergrads are saying, "but what about us?" Wait your turn.)

In a brilliant flash of irony, I have decided to announce it here, which, unless you have bookmarked my blog or are an active RSS user, will do you no good.

I have to come up with a better plan.

If no news is good news, than what is this...

Bad news. We have no money. In a cosmic way. Zip, zero, zilch. I have not been able to purchase, more or less, a single book since January. Please tell me if there is anything important we are missing. I can't even stand to look at all of the lovely, informative, fascinating and unattainable expensive books I am not able to buy. If you have written something, edited something or read something wonderful from 2008 that we really should have...let me know.

I will be able to order direct requests until further notice.

Please bear with me. We still have ILL.

EndNoteable

How many of you have ever heard of EndNote? (show of hands).

Those of you who are already using it, happily and trouble free, can move on to the next post.

The rest of you...

I don't work for EndNote, I don't get any money from EndNote, I have no relatives who rely on EndNote's parent company ISI in any way.

However, it is probably one of the most useful pieces of software you could own as a graduate student, outside of Microsoft Office (or Open Office or Abio), and maybe IE/Firefox/Opera, and whatever specialized engineering software you use for your specific field of Engineering.

EndNote exists solely to help researchers like you keep track of all of the papers you have ever read and easily put them into whatever papers you write. It even works with LaTeX, if you push it hard enough. (since when has x been alloud to sound like "k").

To find out more about EndNote, visit the EndNote Shrine on our Library Home page.

If you ever need help with EndNote, I am here for you.

Google Scholarly

I think it is time that we had a little talk. I have heard that some people (I am not naming names) think that Google Scholar can do everything that our library databases can do, only easier and more...free.

While I truly love Google Scholar, and indeed anything free, I think you all should know a few things about Google Scholar.

A few things about Google Scholar

IP trouble

Many of you may know by now of the trouble we have been having with the new Engineering Building IP's. One by one our vendors are adding the new IP ranges to our authentication profiles, but it is not going as quickly as we hoped.

In the meantime, I would like to let you know that if you find a resource that does not recognize you as coming from UCR, you might want to try the campus wireless connection or the campus Client VPN. Plus we always love you see you in the library :)

Please feel free to contact me if you need any help.

A New Home for Inspec?

Amongst the UC Librarians, we are beginning to discuss the best possible home for the Inspec Database. Right now it is living off by itself on the Ovid Platform. However, many of you are likely more familiar with the EI Village Interface (which we use for Compendex) and the ISI Interface which we use for Web of Science.

When we put two databases onto a single platform, it becomes possible (usually) for us to "cross-search" them, or search them both at a single time. That is the case with Inspec. If we put it in ISI, we will be able to cross-search with Web of Science. If we put it on EI village, we will be able to cross-search with Compendex. Both have their advantages.

So tell me...

Would you rather have Inspec with Compendex or ISI? Or would you rather leave it on Ovid?

New Books

Do you ever wonder what new books are coming in to the UCR Libraries in your topics? There are several ways to find out. One way is to set up a Melvyl profile and create an alert for your subject area.

Or, you can visit our New Books Page:


New books for this week include:

Call Number	Title	Author	Imprint
TA418.9.S62 R58 2007	Smart materials in architecture, interior architecture and design / Axel Ritter.	Ritter, Axel.	Basel Boston : Birkhäuser, c2007.
TD645 .R44 1995	Natural systems for waste management and treatment / Sherwood C. Reed, Ronald W. Crites, E. Joe Midd	Reed, Sherwood C.	New York : McGraw-Hill, c1995.
TD730 .B45 2007	The culture of flushing : a social and legal history of sewage / Jamie Benidickson foreword by Grae	Benidickson, Jamie.	Vancouver : UBC Press, c2007.
TK5102.2 .R69 2006	Spirit of the web : the age of information from telegraph to Internet / Wade Rowland.	Rowland, Wade.	Toronto : Thomas Allen Publishers, c2006.
TP159.C3 N37 2007	Nanotechnology in catalysis / edited by Bing Zhou, Scott Han, Robert Raja, Gabor A. Somorjai.		New York : Springer, c2007.
TP577 .O37 2006	Fermenting revolution : how to drink beer and save the world / Christopher Mark O'Brien.	O'Brien, Christopher Mark.	Gabriola Island, BC : New Society Publishers, c2006.
TP936 .V3713 2006	Colors : what they mean and how to make them / Anne Varichon translated from the French by Toula B	Varichon, Anne.	New York : Abrams, c2006.

Dissertations and Theses

Have you ever needed a dissertation or thesis for your research and weren't sure where to get it. You may be lucky enough to find a copy on the author's Web site or institutional repository by searching Google, If not here are some suggestions:

UCR Theses and dissertations:

Search Scotty, the UCR Catalog to find UCR dissertations.
Look for dissertations by the author or title, or browse by UCR department. To directly access dissertations by a specific department, you can simply do a subject search:

Examples:
Chemical and Environmental Engineering Dissertations
Computer Science Dissertations
Electrical Engineering Dissertations

A circulating copy is shelved either in the Science or Rivera Library, depending on the subject matter. Dissertations and theses can be found under different call number locations in the Rivera Library (according to topic) whereas in the Science Library, they are shelved under the call number, Q180 A494 (M.S. & M.A. degrees) and Q180 A495 (Ph.D. degree) Browse by year and then by the author's last name.

Other Dissertations:

UC dissertations (Including UCR dissertations) can be found in the ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT) database. UC Dissertations are online free and full-text from 1998. Other dissertations can be ordered from Interlibrary Loans

SPIE, SPIE, SPIE

Welcome to the SPIE Digital Library!! The UCR Libraries have shelled out big money so that we can access SPIE! http://spiedl.aip.org/

The SPIE Digital Library is the most extensive resource available on optics and photonics, providing unprecedented access to more than 230,000 technical papers from SPIE Journals and Conference Proceedings from 1990 to the present. More than 17,000 new research papers are added annually.

I have regularly gotten emails form you all with subjects like "Why don't we have SPIE?" And the new answer will be. But wait, we do! :)

Included in the SPIE digital Library are:
The Proceedings of SPIE: Starting at Vol 1200 (1990)*
Optical Engineering: Starting at Vol 29 (1990)
Journal of Electronic Imaging: Starting at Vol 1 (1992)
Journal of Biomedical Optics: Starting at Vol 1 (1996)
Journal of Micro/Nanolithography, MEMS, and MOEMS: Starting at Vol 1 (2002)
Journal of Applied Remote Sensing: Starting at Vol 1 (2007)
Journal of Nanophotonics: Starting at Vol 1 (2007)

You all have access either on campus or through our remote access services.

I just cant stop grinning about this.

Welcome Back!

Hello! I hope you have all had a good summer. A lot has changed in the Libraries in the past few months. For one thing, We finally have the Proceedings of SPIE! I may devote an entire Blog entry to that on a later day, and you all might also get an email on the subject.

Also, while you were away, we changed the food policy in the libraries. You are now able to bring drinks and light snacks into the library. I think that by light we are not implying low-calorie, but merely not pizza or burgers. :)

Plus, we have color printing in the library ($.75 per page).

But wait there's more.

Some of the computers in the library are being loaded, as we speak, with high-end software such as Matlab, Mathematica, Creative Suite 3 and some other cool 4th thing.

Good times, good times....

Happy 2007 School year!

Ch...ch...ch..changes

It appears that the world keeps moving, and even the cutting edge information in my Blog becomes obsolete. I have edited the posts for Proxy (now gone) and CDIGIX (also now gone) to reflect the transition to various new services.

The Proxy is being retired June 15th, and has been replaced with a more secure connection known as WebVPN. There are many advantages to the occasional user. However WebVPN does not work with the O'Reilly Tech Books.

Because many of you are technologically saavy, it will likely not be difficult for you to transition instead to the Client VPN. The client VPN works perfectly well with the O'Reilly books as well as many other things that we can talk about at another time.

For more information click on the "Connect from home" link in the upper right hand corner of the UCR Libraries Web Site

CDIGIX has been replaced by a new service called Ruckus. I will reserve judgement. For more information visit the UCR Legal2Share page.

Bookmarklets

I have fallen in love with bookmarklets. I have in fact become obsessed with bookmarklets. These handy javascripts, masquerading as bookmarks can allow you one to do an amazing array of things, including efficiently searching the world of literature. I have created (or tweaked) the following bookmarklets:


Internet Explorer: (Right click on the link below, "add to favorites", put them in the links folder)



ISBN lookup for Melvyl (on a page with an isbn, this will automatically search for the ISBN in Melvyl)

ISBN Lookup for Scotty (ditto for Scotty)

Scotty Keyword Lookup (highlight a word on the page and click on this link, or just click on this link to do a quick Scotty search)

Amazon.com ISBN Look-up (look up an ISBN in Amazon.com)

Amazon.com Keyword Look-up (highlight a word and click on this link to look it up in Amazon.com)

Wikipedia Lookup (highlight a word and click on this link to look it up in Wikipedia)

Google Scholar





Firefox (and Netscape and Mozilla) - Drag the links onto your toolbar



ISBN lookup for Melvyl (on a page with an isbn, this will automatically search for the ISBN in Melvyl)

ISBN Lookup for Scotty (ditto for Scotty)

Scotty Keyword Lookup (click on this link to do a quick Scotty search)

Books Seeking Readers

Dear Readers,

Every once in a while (actually annually), I like to go through a list of the books that I have bought in the past year and see how much usage the books are getting. It is a fun analytical exercise and helps me choose what to buy in the future. Sometimes I run into unused books and think, "why on earth has no one yet checked out this book?" So I decided to feature a few (in CS this time), and give them a chance to make a pitch for themselves.

Book seeking reader

Reader wanted for book on cryptography and information theory. I am very readable and would probably be most interesting to people without a strong background in either topic. I would especially like to be read by an undergraduate who is interested in seeing connections between computers and everyday life. My name is Decoding the Universe: How the New Science of Information is Explaining Everything in the Cosmos, from our Brains to Black Holes.

Bachelor (or bachelorette) number two is a somewhat drier sounding book named Researching Information Systems and Computing. This book is perfect for a beginning masters or PhD student in CS who would like to get a broad picture of the types of research (methodology not subject) done in CS.

Our third contestant is a very interesting collection of essays which is available either as a printed book or an e-book. The Handbook of Bioinspired Algorithms and Applications is probably most interesting to advanced researchers in neural networks and automata. The book has several articles on what we can learn about processes from bees and ants. This book is thoughtful and insightful, but has no real sense of humor.


I would also like to call your attention to:Guide to RISC Processors: For Programmers and Engineers (readable and educational)

I have no doubt that these books will eventually develop a rich social life, but I thought I would try to help them out a little. All of the books can be found in our Scotty catalog.

As usual, I welcome your comments.

Nature Nanotechnology and Photonics

The UCs now have access to the new Nature journals, which you're now free use and abuse. You should see the records appear in Scotty shortly.


http://www.nature.com/nnano/index.html
http://www.nature.com/nphoton/index.html

Full Backfile from O'Reilly!

I have some great news for you all. We now have ALL of the O'Reilly books. nearly 900 of them. You will no longer have to check if the publication date is 2003- or 2004- or whatever...we have them ALL!

http://library.ucr.edu/go/oreilly

Or find the link on the library Web site.

There is a huge backlog of ebooks that have not made it into Scotty yet, so the books may not show up there for a while.

Happy reading!

Chat Reference

This weekend, we officially launched chat (Internet) reference for UC people. You may not get me, you may not even get a UCR Librarian, but during the following hours, the ask a librarian icon on the Libraries' Web site will become LIVE and you can chat with a real live UC Librarian. Try it out.

Hours:

Sunday		Monday - Thursday		Friday
5 - 9 p.m.		11 a.m. - 9 p.m.		11 a.m. - 5 p.m.

Conference Proceedings

I am going to lay this on the line.

I have no idea what to do about conference proceedings. We have full coverage of ACM conferences and IEEE conferences and ACM/IEEE conferences through our digital library subscriptions, but I get dozens of notification slips for conferences in any given week and I really can't buy them all and I really can't buy just one or two individual years in a whole series, so really I just pretty much say no. For example, this week I have a notification for:

1. Advanced Materials for Energy Conversion (III)
2. World Environmental and Water Resources Congress (2006)
3. Waste Management and the Environment (III)
4. Management of Intentional and Accidental Water Pollution (2005)
5. Advanced Materials Forum (III)

I think you probably get the point.

So the upshot is, if you do see a paper in a volume of proceedings in Compendex or in the references of another paper, unless it is IEEE or ACM, the chances are we don't have it. However, if you request the paper from ILL (email to illsci@ucr.edu with the information about the paper and your name, department, status and email address), you will likely get it emailed to you in a matter of days. This is actually much more convenient than coming to the Science Library and copying it yourself. In the end, I think you will thank me for not buying the proceedings volume in which your paper can be found.

On the other hand, if you know of a great conference, in which all (or most) of the papers are high quality and pertinent to UCR research or teaching, do let me know, because I can put those conferences on a standing order. However you would then have to come here to copy the papers you want.

P.S. A note on SPIE. Once upon a time we had full online access to the proceedings of SPIE. Then it stopped, presumably because we weren't actually paying for them. Please let me know if you are a big fan of SPIE. I might be able to start the process of actually buying them, and I would know for sure if anyone is reading this blog.

P.P.S. I forgot to mention that we also have all of the proceedings done by the S.A.E. (Note: Because of overly restrictive Digital Rights Management policies by S.A.E. we are, hopefully temporarily, without S.A.E. access)

P.P.P.S. I am also working on getting full access to M.R.S. Proceedings, but do feel free to help me advocate.

P.P.P.P.S. Which also brings up the point that if you know of any organizations that publish all of their proceedings online, let me know. I may not know about it, and they may be useful.