- New book alerts
- Contents page alerts from your favourite journals
- Database search alerts (journal articles and other documents)
- Citation alerts
- RSS feeds
- Discussion lists
- Scholarly societies
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Keeping Your Research Current
Keeping up with new research and publishing in your field is a critical task that can also be quite time consuming. You need to know about new books and articles being published, about conferences, about the activities of organisations, about informal communication taking place within your discipline community and and even about what is being said in the media. You can use some of these methods to keep up with flow of knowledge and information
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Scholarly societies
Most academic disciplines have national and international organisations to oversee their interests. Scholarly or learned societies do things like organise conferences, publish journals, establish and uphold academic and technical standards, provide continuing education, accredit university courses, mentor and support researchers and act as advocates for their disciplines with government, industry and the public.
It is a very good idea to identify the main professional societies in your disciplines and monitor their websites and other channels of communication.
The Scholarly Societies Project sponsored by the University of Waterloo Library is an excellent place to find organisations of this sort.
It is a very good idea to identify the main professional societies in your disciplines and monitor their websites and other channels of communication.
The Scholarly Societies Project sponsored by the University of Waterloo Library is an excellent place to find organisations of this sort.
Discussion lists
Academic discussion lists, often known as listservs, are email-based communities that are used to exchange news, information and ideas. If you find one that is well-moderated and closely related to your research interests it can be a very useful means of keeping in touch with your international community and finding out about conferences, grants and jobs as well as keeping up with the latest thinking in your field.
Catalist is a very extensive catalogue of discussion lists and is worth searching to see if there are any in your area. Be warned that many of the lists you find may be quite small or localised.
JISCmail is a UK-based collection of academic mailing lists, many of which are international in scope.
In the humanities and social sciences H-Net is a US-based collection of several hundred lists.
Many learned societies also operate discussion lists which can be an excellent source of news and views. You should check the websites of the scholarly societies in your discipline.
Catalist is a very extensive catalogue of discussion lists and is worth searching to see if there are any in your area. Be warned that many of the lists you find may be quite small or localised.
JISCmail is a UK-based collection of academic mailing lists, many of which are international in scope.
In the humanities and social sciences H-Net is a US-based collection of several hundred lists.
Many learned societies also operate discussion lists which can be an excellent source of news and views. You should check the websites of the scholarly societies in your discipline.
RSS feeds
RSS feeds are a convenient way of keeping yourself updated with new information from websites and other online resources where the content regularly changes. They are typically used for keeping up with newspaper headlines or blog postings but they also allow you to receive journal contents pages or updates of new content from your database searches. The advantage of receiving your alerts as rss feeds rather than email is that it brings all of them together in one place where you can check for new any new content of interest at a convenient time.
Any of these distinctive orange icons indicates that a feed is available. By clicking on the icon you will be invited to subscribe to the feed.
Both the Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox browsers have in-built rss functionality through Favorites (IE7) or Live Bookmarks.
Using IE7 simply click on Subscribe to this feed
Simply save the feed in the Feeds folder
Using Mozilla Firefox you can use Live Bookmarks to subscribe to feeds.
Any of these distinctive orange icons indicates that a feed is available. By clicking on the icon you will be invited to subscribe to the feed.
Both the Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox browsers have in-built rss functionality through Favorites (IE7) or Live Bookmarks.
Using IE7 simply click on Subscribe to this feed
Simply save the feed in the Feeds folder
Using Mozilla Firefox you can use Live Bookmarks to subscribe to feeds.
An alternative method is to use a "feed reader" like Google Reader or Netvibes. You will need to create an account but a reader of this sort will allow you to handle a large number of feeds and also to access them from any computer. Most regular users of rss do so through a reader rather than simply using browser functionality.
For assistance consult your liaison librarian.
Citation Alerts
A citation alert lets you know when an article in a database has been cited by another article in the database and is particularly useful if you are keeping track of citations of your own work for research assessment purposes.
Any of the Web of Knowledge databases (Web of Science, CAB, ISI Proceedings), searched individually or as a group, are able to provide alerts when an article is cited in Web of Science - to create a citation alert you need to register yourself and sign in. Once you have done this you simply open the record by clicking on the blue title link.
Now click on the Create Citation Alert button
An email alert is automatically created
Whilst you could create an RSS feed as well this is probably less useful - citation alerts often produce few or no results.
As well as the Web of Knowledge database, ScienceDirect and Cambridge Journals Online also provide citation alerts.
Any of the Web of Knowledge databases (Web of Science, CAB, ISI Proceedings), searched individually or as a group, are able to provide alerts when an article is cited in Web of Science - to create a citation alert you need to register yourself and sign in. Once you have done this you simply open the record by clicking on the blue title link.
Now click on the Create Citation Alert button
An email alert is automatically created
Whilst you could create an RSS feed as well this is probably less useful - citation alerts often produce few or no results.
As well as the Web of Knowledge database, ScienceDirect and Cambridge Journals Online also provide citation alerts.
Database search alerts
As well as journal contents pages you can set up alerts based on database searches - your database search will be run automatically at regular intervals and any records found will be emailed to you or sent through as rss feeds. This is a very powerful way of keeping up to date with your subject as you are able to scan thousands of journals for the latest articles relevant to your research. Providing that your original search was well constructed and not too narrow you should be able to receive regular updates of highly relevant material. You can consult your liaison librarian to fine-tune your search before you save it as an alert. Postgraduate students and academic researchers should have an alert set up for each major research area.
Setting up Alerts by Database Groups
Scopus A large multidisciplinary database with exceptionally good alerting functions
Web of Knowledge (Web of Science, CAB Abstracts, Biological Abstracts)
EBSCOhost (Academic Search Elite, Business Source Premier, CINAHL, EconLit, ERIC, Historical Abstracts, RILM Abstracts of Music Literature, SPORTDiscus)
OVID (Biological Abstracts, ERIC, Food Science and Technology Abstracts, Medline, Philosopher's Index, PsycInfo)
CSA (ARTbibliographies Modern, Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals, Bibliography of the History of Art , DAAI: Design and Applied Arts Index, Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts, Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts, Sociological Abstracts)
Setting up Alerts by Database Groups
Scopus A large multidisciplinary database with exceptionally good alerting functions
Web of Knowledge (Web of Science, CAB Abstracts, Biological Abstracts)
EBSCOhost (Academic Search Elite, Business Source Premier, CINAHL, EconLit, ERIC, Historical Abstracts, RILM Abstracts of Music Literature, SPORTDiscus)
OVID (Biological Abstracts, ERIC, Food Science and Technology Abstracts, Medline, Philosopher's Index, PsycInfo)
CSA (ARTbibliographies Modern, Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals, Bibliography of the History of Art , DAAI: Design and Applied Arts Index, Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts, Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts, Sociological Abstracts)
Contents Page Alerts
You can keep up with the articles published in your favourite journals by receiving contents alerts, either in the form of emails or rss feeds. Each time a new issue of a journal is published you will receive the contents page, with links to the articles themselves. You can set up alerts through publishers' journal packages or by going to the web page for a specific journal.
Publisher's websites
If you know the publisher of the journal for which you wish to receive contents pages you may be able to receive email alerts or rss feeds directly from their websites - this usually provides a direct link to your Massey subscription rights. Ulrich's Periodicals Directory is a good place to find who publishes a specific title. The Journal Publishing and Ranking Page contains an extensive list of links. Some of the more important publisher-based alerting services are
American Chemical Society
Annual Reviews (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Cambridge University Press (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Elsevier ScienceDirect (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Emerald Journals (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Highwire Press (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
IEEE (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Nature Publishing (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Oxford University Press (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
Palgrave Macmillan Journals (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
Sage Journals (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
SciQuest Journals (Register for email alerts)
Springer Journals (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Taylor & Francis (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Wiley InterScience (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
IngentaConnect
IngentaConnect is a freely available database of over 30,000 journals to which you can set up email alerts or rss feeds. To find a journal search for it by title with the Journal or book title option selected.
If you register yourself you can select up to five titles for email alerts under Massey's license. There is no limit on the number of rss feeds you can create - if you cannot see an rss icon click on the Alerting options link at the right of the page.
Warning - often the alert you receive from IngentaConnect will link you to a page offering to sell you a copy of the article rather than to one where your Massey subscription rights are recognised. For this reason it may be preferable to use one of the major databases or the publishers' own websites for your email alerts or rss feeds.
Publisher's websites
If you know the publisher of the journal for which you wish to receive contents pages you may be able to receive email alerts or rss feeds directly from their websites - this usually provides a direct link to your Massey subscription rights. Ulrich's Periodicals Directory is a good place to find who publishes a specific title. The Journal Publishing and Ranking Page contains an extensive list of links. Some of the more important publisher-based alerting services are
American Chemical Society
Annual Reviews (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Cambridge University Press (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Elsevier ScienceDirect (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Emerald Journals (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Highwire Press (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
IEEE (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Nature Publishing (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Oxford University Press (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
Palgrave Macmillan Journals (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
Sage Journals (Select an individual title for email alerts and rss feeds)
SciQuest Journals (Register for email alerts)
Springer Journals (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Taylor & Francis (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
Wiley InterScience (Register for email alerts or select an individual title for rss feeds)
IngentaConnect
IngentaConnect is a freely available database of over 30,000 journals to which you can set up email alerts or rss feeds. To find a journal search for it by title with the Journal or book title option selected.
If you register yourself you can select up to five titles for email alerts under Massey's license. There is no limit on the number of rss feeds you can create - if you cannot see an rss icon click on the Alerting options link at the right of the page.
Warning - often the alert you receive from IngentaConnect will link you to a page offering to sell you a copy of the article rather than to one where your Massey subscription rights are recognised. For this reason it may be preferable to use one of the major databases or the publishers' own websites for your email alerts or rss feeds.
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