Search results

The results of the DIALIB project are described. This three‐year experiment of on‐line bibliographic search in the public library had as major participants four public libraries in the San Francisco Bay area. Five other public libraries in other parts of the USA participated to a lesser extent. Evaluation results were obtained concerning the users of the system and their characteristics, the use of the data bases, and librarian reactions to the system. In addition, interesting data were gathered concerning the time and cost of on‐line search, both in a free and fee‐for‐service environment.

Reviews some of the good reasons for looking to real neural nets for guidance on ways of implementing effective parallel computation. Discusses existing artificial neural nets with particular attention to the extent to which they model real neural activity. Indicates some serious mismatches, but shows that there are also important correspondences. The successful applications are to image processing, pattern classification and automatic optimization, in various guises. Reviews important issues raised by extension to the symbolic problem solving of “intellectual” thought, the prime concern of classical AI. These illustrate the importance of recursion, and of a degree of continuity associated with any evolutionary process.

The paper reports experimental results concerning user interaction with document organization, user‐librarian negotiation and the librarian's search processes in public libraries. The focus of the investigations is on the cognitive aspects of information retrieval. After defining the formal framework of the information retrieval (IR) process a theoretical section discusses the cognitive viewpoint on which the research is based, followed by an outline of applicable findings and theories within the fields of cognitive science and cognitive psychology. The experimental design involving tape‐recording and analysis of verbal protocols is briefly described and considered. The main part of the paper concentrates on the results of investigations and considers certain implications. It is shown how the user's knowledge structures cope with the structures of the system. User needs seem often to be presented as a label which may create ambiguity problems. Functions of open and closed questions are investigated and certain behaviouristic factors discussed. Matching the knowledge structure of the user and the librarian is considered a kind of learning process. Librarians prefer search activity before consideration of the presented problem. Without a user present the librarian's IR process is determined by three search attitudes involving motives and expectations as to search routines and possibilities. Conceptual knowledge, previous search and working domain play important roles. The attitudes have consequences for the objectives concerning use of routines and for the use of search concepts.

This paper surveys theoretical and practical issues associated with a particular type of information retrieval problem, namely that where the information need is pictorial. The paper is contextualised by the notion of a visually stimulated society, in which the ease of record creation and transmission in the visual medium is contrasted with the difficulty of gaining effective subject access to the world's stores of such records. The technological developments which, in casting the visual image in electronic form, have contributed so significantly to its availability are reviewed briefly, as a prelude to the main thrust of the paper. Concentrating on still and moving pictorial forms of the visual image, the paper dwells on issues related to the subject indexing of pictorial material and discusses four models of pictorial information retrieval corresponding with permutations of the verbal and visual modes for the representation of picture content and of information need.

This article presents an introduction to the Delphi method and review of Delphi studies published in the literature of library and information science (LIS).

A review of Delphi studies published between the years of 1971 and 2019 is performed, using studies retrieved from the Library and Information Science Source database. A total of 122 articles were retrieved and evaluated based on the population studied, means of identifying experts, number of participants for each study round, type of Delphi, and type of findings.

General librarians (any type), academic librarians, and information science researchers are the most common populations in LIS Delphi studies. On average (middle 50 percent of studies), 14–36 experts are used in the first round of LIS Delphi studies (median n = 23). Employment in a specific role and publications in scholarly journals are the most common means of identifying experts. Variants of the e-Delphi (online survey/email) method are increasingly common, particularly in LIS Delphi studies that focus on general information science, rather than library, topics. Though LIS Delphi studies are relatively few in number, they have a consistent record of being published in some of the most prestigious LIS journals.

This paper provides an introduction to the Delphi method for LIS research and presents an overview of existing literature in LIS that utilizes the research method. No overview of this extent exists in the LIS literature, and, thus, this paper may serve as an important information source about the method for LIS researchers.

THE Reference Department of Paisley Central Library today occupies the room which was the original Public Library built in 1870 and opened to the public in April 1871. Since that date two extensions to the building have taken place. The first, in 1882, provided a separate room for both Reference and Lending libraries; the second, opened in 1938, provided a new Children's Department. Together with the original cost of the building, these extensions were entirely financed by Sir Peter Coats, James Coats of Auchendrane and Daniel Coats respectively. The people of Paisley indeed owe much to this one family, whose generosity was great. They not only provided the capital required but continued to donate many useful and often extremely valuable works of reference over the many years that followed. In 1975 Paisley Library was incorporated in the new Renfrew District library service.

On‐line update combines a bibliography of recent on‐line articles with a search example from a data base producer or an on‐line system vendor.