Choosing the Database for the Job

1
Choosing the Database for the Job

• Where do I start?

2
Start with a good reference interview

• So youre pretty sure you have a handle on what
  the person wants - factors like
• What subject area?
• A specific factoid, or an overview or other
  type of article, discursive material?
• Current information or historical?
• Lots or just some? (e.g. number of resources)
• Research or popular?
• And so forth all the things we talked about in
  the reference interview lecture.

3
Knowing some of those things

• First and foremost, what resources do you have
  available to you?
• Scenario A Youre at your schools name here,
  with its hundreds of databases - start by looking
  at databases by Subject, or at Guides developed
  by librarians that might suggest the best
  databases for different topical areas. Read the
  descriptions of their coverage, currency,
  material types go in and see if its possible to
  tweeze out research articles (if thats what you
  need)
• And of course you have the Internet as well.

4
Resources available cont

• Scenario B youre in your school library, and
  you have a handful of databases available. OK, so
  which ones might be most appropriate, given their
  coverage, currency, record structure
  (searchability), ability to identify research
  (Sound like database evaluation? It should!)And
  you have the Internet as well.

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Resources available cont

• Scenario C you dont have any subscription
  databases available! OK what free stuff can you
  get to on the Internet?
• Actually, there are some (subscription) databases
  provided free thru the public library system
• There are some other free versions of dbs on the
  Net - the Internet Public Library can be a good
  way to identify these
• There are authoritative websites such as
  governmental ones (.gov), or ones run by
  organizations (.org) like the American Cancer
  Society (www.cancer.org)
• You can try at least two web search engines )

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Scenarios B C

• If you dont already have guides to your
  resources, develop them! Make a list like your
  school name heres, with brief annotations about
  your resources.
• If you are Scenario C, maybe just a set of
  bookmarks is all you need. But a webpage might be
  really handy.

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Basically

• Choosing a resource to start with involves a lot
  of the factors you use to evaluate a database
• What subjects does it cover? What types of
  material are included? What level of material?
• Does it cover the right time period?
• If not full text, are the sources mostly
  available in your library?
• How searchable is it - does it offer controlled
  vocabulary to focus your search, does it offer
  keyword searching of all fields, for finding the
  needle in the haystack?

8
The question I dread

• When should I use a database and when should I
  use the Internet?
• Chapter 10 lists criteria that the author often
  uses to decide database or web - but your
  thoughts about this, based on your experiences,
  are just as valid. Lets discuss.