The Online World

e the information in other applications. Regular clipping of news is highly recommended. It is often quicker and easier to search your own databases than to do it online. Since your data is a subs

gathering, it often satisfies most information needs related to any task or project. Besides, i

ou may feel like Don Quixote, as he was looking "for a needle in a bottle of hay." The large number of online offerings is bewildering. To be successful, you must have a sound search strategy. Your first task is to locate useful SOURCES of information. The next, to decide

irst inclination is to visit forums and clubs concerned with products delivere

so many hits that you almost drown. To find anything of inte

. Usually, they just publish one or two stories on IBM per week. Don't exp

content with industry insiders' expert views, as provided by

source. The amount of "noise" (the level of irrelevancy) also varies. In most public forums, expect to wad

ces that provide re

s at a satisfactory level of details, and that the vo

ervice's search com

nd then

fastest way to interesting sources. If looking for information about agriculture and fisheries, visit conferences about relate

where to start your

usually the quickest

check out GEnie's Home

t of online searcher

rum, which has a sec

and the section for

alism

e a very specialize

log's DialMail. Their

I

also publish monthly magazines full of search tips, information about new sources, user experiences, and more. Dialog distributes the monthly newsletter Chronolog. NewsNet customers periodically receive a printed listing of available newsletters by subject area, and a presentation

se from Information Intelligence, Inc., (P.O. Box 31098, Phoenix, AZ 85046, U.S.A. Tel.: +1-602-996-2283). You can read the text on NewsNet about one week before it appears in print. These two newsletters can also be read and searched on Dialog and Data-Star, as part of the Information Access PTS Newsletter Database. Information Access is a full-text database with many specialized newsletters for business and industry. On CompuServe, you can get to Information Access through the IQuest gateway to NewsNet. Subscribing to THE ONLINE NEWSLETTER costs US$50.00 per year (10 issues) for companies, and US$35.00 for personal use (1991). For both newsle

*NEW & FORTHCOMING DATABASES

ND JOURNAL OF MEDICINE ON CD-ROM (CD-ROM) 18) ALUMINUM STANDARDS DATABASE [AAASD] (STN 19) PLASNEWS (STN INTERNATIONAL) 20) EPIC ANNOUNCES NEW DATABASES 21) DISCLIT: AMERICAN AUTHORS (CD-ROM - OCLC) 22) CROSS-CULTURAL: CRIME AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS (CD-ROM) 23) INTERNATIONAL PHARMACEUTICAL A

s in 70 countries, and has 535 pages. Topics: online host services, videotex/teletext information services, PC oriented services, data collection and analysis services, abstracting and indexing services, computerized searching services, software producers, magnetic tape/diskette providers, micrographic applications and services, library and information networks, lib

s available through ECHO in Luxembourg by telnet to echo.lu . At the question "PLEASE ENTER YOUR CODE," enter ECHO and press Return. You can search I'M-GUIDE for information sources, send email inquiries to

rary Catalogs and Databases" report is available by email from LISTSE

BRARY

Europe) Ltd., Woodside, Hinskey Hill, Oxford OX1 5AU, England, if you live outside North America. Tel.: +44 865 730 275. Price: US$25.00 for six issues/year (1993). An online version is available through ZiffNet's Business Database Plus on CompuServe. Two monthly magazines, Information World Review (price: GBP 30/year) and FULLTEXT SOURCES ONLINE from BiblioData Inc. in the United States, is also available through Learned Information. (BiblioData, P.O. Box 61, Needham Heights, MA 02194, U.S.A.) FULLTEXT SOURCES ONLINE publishes their listing of full-text databases twice per year. The price is GBP 50 GBP per booklet or G

IRECTRY GET EJ

t is the best approach on one service, may be useless on others. Most services offer full online documentation of their search commands

of messages. For example, on CompuServe you can limit your search to given sections. You

ccess from

S Access from Japan" in their subject t

next step is to enter search words (or text strings), an

le search terms ar

wild-card character referring to any ending of the word.

e word SONY and t

e present in

ve a

Both words must be

not be farth

(Proximit

ither one word

ime and money, if there are too many hits. For example: if IBM OR APPLE gives 1,000 hits,

le li

---

find files are simi

es. Often, you can

ame, or file extensio

description of the c

key

rogram RBBS-PC. You want a program that can show GIF graphic

-15-91 GIF*/TIFF/PCX

size in bytes, date available,

the term "s gif all". This will probably give you a list of files. Some will have

perator. It gets rid of any record in a database that contains the word that you've "notted" out. For example, searching for "IBM NOT APPLE" drops records containing the sentence, "IBM and Apple are computer giants." The record will be dropped, even if this is the only mention of Apple in an article, and though it is solely about IBM. Use NOT to drop sets of hits that you have already seen. Use NOT to exclude records with multiple meanings, like "CHIPS Not POTATO" (if you are looking for chips rather than snack foods). Often, it pays to star

nline services. Dialog, Dun & Bradstreet, NewsNet, and Individual Inc. have signed up for the program. You can request a search by direct email to say Dialog. The search results will be returned to

------------------ To get a directory of Internet/BI

SERV@VM1

(keep t

e

T G

ver two thousand lines of text. Each mailing list is described with one line. All the

ID Full addre

- -----

B Applied Expert Syst

L@UGA Agricult

NEWS@EB0UB011

Japanese animedia an

RONVM Banyan Netwo

UVM1 Bridge Commu

UOGUELPH Chemi

CS Electronic Jour

GE Marital/family & re

DYCMS USSR electroni

ir BITNET email addresses. "List title" is a short textual description of each conference. Keep t

r message sections on bulletin boards, but technically they are different. (Read about KIDLINK in Chapter 2 for background information.) All BITNET mailing lists are cont

ms" (i.e., electronic

s) are distributed

utomatically stored

e log files, and yo

s electr

d in the lists' asso

on to subscrib

ive to the host running the LISTSERV. If this host is your nearest BITNET LISTSERV, the

am

ministered by LISTSE

email to LISTSER

d subscribe to the nearby system rather than to the remote. Thi

am

The nearest LISTSE

@UMCVMB, send to LIS

embers of the mailing list. Chances are that nothing will happen, and everybody will see how sloppy you are. So, you subscribe by sending a command to a LISTSERV. The method is similar to what we did w

ERV@NDSUV

write anything her

SOVNET-L J

your mailbox. (Send "SIGNOFF SOVNET-L" to this address, when you have had enough.) Some lists will forward each message to you upon receipt. O

L@INDYC

ple. Most BITNET lists wi

st -------------------- CHINA-NN is l

SUACAD China News D

ubscribe to CHINA-N

T . North American use

RV@NDSUVM

n Hansen, write the fo

f the

-NN Winst

CHINA-NN, send a cancel

ERV@NDSUV

: (noth

FF CH

h LISTSERV@FINHUTC, sending the SIGNOFF command to LISTSERV@NDSUVM1 will get you nowhere. Send to LISTS

eviews of significant and thought-provoking exchanges within our new electronic nation. This electronic publication is free. If you're interes

ull-Name AT UserId@Your

am

s is opresno@extern.

, use the fol

dd de Presno AT OP

ulletin Board. (Hard copy versions can be bought through THINKNET, PO BOX 8383, Orange CA 92664-8383, U.S.A.). If you're on The Well, read the to

@VMTECMEX) The BIT

ail to LISTSERV

ing in the TEXT

yourfirstname

can discuss and ex

sites, Filelists,

lated

MPLEVM) BITNET/CREN/I

TSERV@TEMPLEVM.BI

yourfirstname

tware related to the Internet and BITNET networks. The library contains sever

erest Groups List of Lists is available by electronic mail from mail-server

nfo/inter

rately sized pieces. You can search the List of Lists by email. Say you're looking for a mailing list rel

rch JOB

Search

les

obotics

n

botics in

n

botics in

n

le on the Internet. It is for people with Internet accounts who want to explore beyond their local computers, to take advantage of the wealth of information and services on the net. Services for discussion include: * things you can telnet to (weather, library catalogs, databases, and more), * things you can FTP (like pictures, sounds, programs, data) * clients/servers (like MUDs, IRC, Archie) Every second week, a list of Internet services called the "Special Internet Conne

X SI

ings. It distributes announcements about tools, conferences, calls for papers, news items, new mailing lists, ele

et-happenin

llows access to documents and files via email. To use it, send email t

her them, whenever we find something of interest. The "corpses" are dumped in a high pile on the floor. To retrieve a story in this pile is difficult and time

Mag

a PC Maga

ne Utilitie

zine Edit

ine Progra

ine After

ne Product

- Take

ions to P

rs to t

ibe to PC

normal CompuServe access rates. ZiffNet also offers Magazine Database Plus, a database with stories from over 90 magazines covering science, business, sport, people, personal finance, family, art and handicraft, cooking, education, environment, travel, politics, consumer opinions, and reviews of books and films. The magazines include: Administrative Management, Aging, Changing Times, The Atlantic, Canadian Business, Datamation, Cosmopolitan, Dun's Business Month, The Economist, The Futurist, High Technology Business, Journal of Small Business Management, Management Today, The Nation, The New Republic, Online, Playboy, Inc., Popular Science, Research & Development, Sales & Marketing Management, Scientific American, Technology Review, UN Chronicle, UNESCO Courier and U.S. News & World Report. In the next chapter, we will present another ZiffNet magaz

IBSYS, a database operated by the Norwegian universities' libraries. I am into transcendental meditation. I'm therefore constantly looking for books on narrow topics like "mantra". To se

21 Jul 93 1

ERV@POLLUX

Searchi

request

se-id

result

erences. I have forwarded it to

er : Go

terpretation in th

J.

den : E.J.

ll : X

entalia Rheno-

90-04

3324 - UHF/IN