Report on a survey of "38 individuals at four prominent U.S. research universities," reflecting how researchers choose "adequate" rather than "optimal" information solutions and "use online tools and commercial
services related to their discipline rather than tools provided by their university." Concerns about long term data durability abound.
A review of four bibliographic utility studies on library catalogs points out that the library catalog is no longer the starting point for students and researchers and that it has been eclipsed by easier-to-use and more convenient tools such as Google Books, Google Scholar, and LibraryThing. The author suggests that catalog developers learn from these tools and draw on their metadata; include "social" enhancements such as tagging, comments, and reviews; develop systems that are user-focused rather than librarian-focused; forsake the local catalog for the union catalog to reduce duplication of effort
Excerpt: similarities and emerging differences between Generation Y and
older students in six broad areas:
* constraints on research;
* ways of searching for research information;
* research resources used;
* using library collections and services;
* using technology in research;
* training and support to research.
...
Dorothea Salo outlines a framework for understanding the complexities of research data and researchers' needs, with emphasis on digital libraries and institutional repositories and data standards and management characteristics and requirements.
Digitization of text corpora can impede the progress of scholarship if done without proper focus on reflecting the methodologies and intellectual practices of actual scholarship practices...
A report from the Council of Library and Information Resources. Featured chapters include "Can a library go all-digital?" and "the cost of keeping a book"
Excerpt; "In contrast to confirmatory analysis, which involves testing preconceived hypothesis, exploratory data analysis involves a broad investigation, a key component of which may be visual display. ... Today, there is tremendous potential for computational biologists, bioinformaticians, and related software developers to shape and direct scientific discovery by designing data visualization tools that facilitate exploratory analysis and fuel the cycle of ideas and experiments that gets refined into well-formed hypotheses, robust analyses, and confident results.""
"a novel PDF reader that semantically integrates visualization and data-analysis tools with published research articles." A pilot project with Biochemical Journal is described.
Abstract: The deluge of scientific research data has excited the general public, as well as the
scientific community, with the possibilities for better understanding of scientific
problems, from climate to culture. For data to be available, researchers must be willing
and able to share them. The policies of governments, funding agencies, journals, and
university tenure and promotion committees also influence how, when, and whether
research data are shared. Data are complex objects. Their purposes and the methods
by which they are produced vary widely across scientific fields, as do the criteria for
sharing them. To address these challenges, it is necessary to examine the arguments for
sharing data and how those arguments match the motivations and interests of the
scientific community and the public. Four arguments are examined: to make the results
of publicly funded data available to the public, to enable others to ask new questions of
extant data, to advance the state of science, and to reproduce research. Libraries need
to consider their role in the face of each of these arguments, and what expertise and
systems they require for data curation.
from the eco4r project, features a review of "enhanced publications" in repositories, data standards for supporting the use of these publications, best practices and examples from Bielefeld University Library repositories
Video of a lecture by Charles Vest (former MIT president and president of the National Academy of Engineering) on sharing educational resources over the web, with MIT's OpenCourseWare as a model.
A project proposed by Cameron Neylon to convene (funders, publishers and individuals) and developers to develop useful research metrics that encourage more open usage and re-usage of research data.