LIS454:Class 7

1
LIS-454Class 7

• Factiva and the perils of business searching. The
  discussion around Federated Searching.

2
I Some aside notes

• Advancing Science by making it accessible online
• Geospatial data and security

3
II The perils of business searching

• What are we looking at?
• FIND.COM
• How is business searching different from other
  areas of searching?
• Where is the data usually located?

4
Information quality

• Business research is about high quality
  information
• Business research is about identifying
  information needs

5
Private vs. Public

• Private companies do not have to disclose
  financial information.
• America's Largest Private Companies - Forbes.com
• Sarbanes-Oxley Act - Wikipedia, the free
  encyclopedia

6
Searching for government information?

• Business.gov
• International Trade Commission Homepage
• http//cbdnet.gpo.gov/cbdhints.pdf

7
Numbers and codes

• Sales figures
• Market share
• Demographic indicators
• Charts
• Graphs

8
Industrial codes

• NAICS -- North American Industry Classification
  System
• Fascinating use of controlled vocabulary?
• Used by USA, Mexico, and Canada.
• Verify that you are using the appropriate NAIC
  code (1997 or 2002).

9
Industrial codes

• Kompass UK - Connects Business to Business
• IT Wales - Other nation's Business Directories
• Factiva contains also codes, but the advantage is
  that you can look at them alphabetically.

10
Industrial Codes

• Dialog offers you the option of searching for
  primary (PC) or secondary industry (SC).
• Companies with multiple lines of business are a
  problem.
• Investing News, Personal Finance, Stock Market,
  Mutual Funds, Investments More Reuters.com

11
Reliability and accuracy

• Report numbers in business are usually
  unambiguous.
• Keep your eyes opened though

12
The logical sources

•  The obvious source of corporate numbers is the
  company itself, which issues press releases and
  frequently posts its financials on the corporate
  Web site. Other sources include SEC filings,
  available through many fee-based services as well
  as the SEC itself, and secondary sources such as
  Hoover's, Standard Poor's, ValueLine, and
  Mergent.

13
In the international arena

• Numbers and stats are sometimes difficult to
  find.
• Some nations may not be very interested in
  sharing data.
• Lack of updated stats
• UN/FAO/IMF/World Bank/OECD

14
III Federated Search In the Star Trek world

• What would be the ideal information retrieval
  system? Would it be similar to Star Trek, where
  the patron simply asks the computer a question
  and in a matter of moments receives the
  applicable information in the format needed? We
  have not arrived at this utopian version of
  research libraries, but we are closer than we
  were a few years ago. Technological advances have
  changed the way research is done. Online
  databases enable faster, more precise searching
  than their print counterparts. Many electronic
  databases provide patrons with access to full
  text of the articles from their homes or offices.

15
One finger, multiple searches.

• More Appealing
• Time saving
• Using one only interface is less intimidating for
  the user (Baer, 2004)

16
LIS-454

• In the academic world students can be deeply
  confused by the need to search multiple
  interfaces. 
• Federated search seems to be the solution to this
  confusion.

17
Print and electronic

• Federated search can be useful also for printed
  and electronic collections.

18
The usefulness of Federated searching

• A single search interface seems to be the ideal
• Individual dbases have their unique features
  (commands, syntax, etc.)
• The power of an individual dbase search might be
  sacrificed
• For some people is a step backwards
• The Google style gets privileged

19
Just a couple of keywords

• Records that are not full text may be at a
  disadvantage
• The less terms the better (Curtis Dorner/KQ)

20
Some additional issues

• Implementation of FS is complex
• Sometimes slow response time
• First display results might be a choice
• Good enough results are privileged
• Some high quality results may be missed
• Simplicity is the goal. (Fahey, 2007)

21
Different names

• The use of multiple names to describe the same
  thing plagues the information industry. Federated
  search is no exception. NISO, the U.S. National
  Information Standards Organization, and many
  libraries claim federated searching as
  metasearching. However, vendors in this space
  prefer not to be known as metasearch engines, as
  this conjures up thoughts of searching only
  previously crawled databases such as Google,
  AlltheWeb, and AltaVista. (Fryer, 2004)

22
Marketing names

• Difference between federated searching and
  metasearching
• FS are enterprise software
• FS concentrates on textual information ignored
  usually by web sources.
• Free search is mostly associated with web
  oriented metasearch engines

23
Some Federated Search Products and services

• Some examples www.loc.gov/catdir/lcpaig/portalpro
  ducts.htmlgt.
• http//www.scitopia.org/scitopia/

24
The players?

• http//www.museglobal.com/
• http//www.oclc.org/zportal/default.htm
• http//www.webfeat.org/
• http//www.exlibrisgroup.com/category/MetaLibOverv
  iew
• http//www.tdnet.com/

25
Metasearch and the Google factor

• Google has radically changed users' expectations
  and redefined the experience of those seeking
  information. For many searchers, the quality of
  the results matter less than the processthey
  just expect the process to be quick and easy.
  (Luther, Library Journal, 2003)

26
Metasearch

• One of the major advantages of metasearch is that
  results can be obtained from multiple databases
  without having to repeat a search. Large public
  and academic libraries typically subscribe to
  between 100 and 400 databases. Given the
  multidisciplinary nature of research, users
  looking for "the" answer will find that
  metasearching facilitates discovery of databases
  that they otherwise may not have consulted. The
  novice user looking for "an" answer can find
  results in multiple sources with a single search.

27
Presentation of results

• Merged results
• Separated results
• Matter of debate among users and hosts
• User preferences may affect the purchasing
  decision

28
Some examples

• ARL Scholars Portal
• MuseGlobal
• At its heart, metasearch is about providing easy
  access for the user to complex resources. It is
  not a tool that allows librariansor other expert
  users to search with greater precision. It's not
  for us, it's for the average user.

29
Some potential problems

• It is easy when using a metasearch tool,
  especially if you are a novice user, to choose to
  search all files. After all, more can only be
  better, right? This has caused concern among
  publishers, aggregators, and other content
  providers that their systems can't handle the
  greatly increased usage that occurs when every
  search is run against every database. The
  likelihood of system overload grows with each
  library that adds a metasearch tool, impacting
  system resources and performance. This can be
  particularly problematic for smaller, specialized
  databases that were never designed to support
  such high traffic.

30
Some potential problems 2

• A federated search engine will pass on the search
  to each database, but the individual databases
  interpret the search terms differently. Some
  databases support Boolean logic while some do
  not. Are two search terms entered next to each
  other interpreted as a phrase, or will and or
  logic be used? Is the search limited to the
  title, abstract, descriptors, or full-text of the
  article? Each database interprets the search as
  it normally would, but the differences aren't
  apparent.

31
Some potential problems 3

• Implications for scholarly research but students
  in academic environments
• One-stop searching mentality makes teaching good
  information-seeking habits harder.
• Challenge for Library instruction

32
Some potential problems 4

• Lack of relevance ranking
• What does relevance bring to the search?
• Tension between the seasoned and the average
  searcher.

33
Metasearch nothing new

• Metasearch isn't a new concept. Dialog in the
  1970s and subsequently SilverPlatter executed a
  single search simultaneously across multiple
  bibliographic databases. In the web era,
  meta-search engines such as Meta-crawler merge,
  dedupe, and rank the results of multiple web
  search engines such as Ask Jeeves, FAST (which is
  used by LexisNexis), and Overture (which is being
  acquired by Yahoo).

34
IV Some Factiva tips

• Advice Look at the manual

35
Searching for Brazil

• Factiva Intelligent Indexing
• http// www.factiva.com/collateral/download_brchr.
  asp?nodemenuElem1526learning.

36
Brazil and political and general news
37
Searching for Brazil
38
The Codes 1

• Factiva Intelligent IndexingTM Key Facts
• These terms are based on indexing standards
  including NAICS (for Industry), ISO (for Regions)
  and IPTC (for News). There are up to five levels
  of hierarchy within Factiva Intelligent
  IndexingTM this means that when selecting the
  industry term for Telecommunications, you will
  also be searching all of the granular
  telecommunications terms. Terms are reviewed
  quarterly for new additions customers receive a
  45-day notice before new terms are used. More
  information about Factiva Intelligent IndexingTM
  is available at www.factiva.com/indexing

39
The Codes 2

• Using codes in your search
• There may be times when you choose to use the
  indexing codes in your search rather than the
  terms. To do this click on the next to the
  Factiva Intelligent Indexing term and it will
  automatically be dropped into the Free text box.
  For example, company codes are preceded with fds
  (fds means Factiva Data Symbol). When selecting
  an industry, region or subject term you will see
  the actual code for those terms, such as iniint
  for Internet and Online Services. Codes are
  placed in the Free text box without connectors.
  You must manually place connectors between the
  codes.

40
Look Up feature 1
41
Look Up feature 2

• Reverse Code Look up
• You can also locate Factiva Intelligent Indexing
  terms by entering the corresponding code in the
  Look up box. If you enter the code c181 in the
  Look up box and hit enter, you will get back the
  equivalent Factiva Intelligent Indexing term for
  Acquisitions/Mergers/Takeovers.
• This feature is particularly useful for users who
  have created complex searches using Factiva
  Intelligent Indexing codes. These search
  strategies often include indexing codes that may
  be difficult to identify upon revision. For
  example, a search strategy may look like the
  followingfdsmcrost and nsc181 and ini330202.

42
For more information

• http//www.factiva.com/learning/learning.asp?node
  menuElem1526.

43
Bibliography

• Sci-tech societies to create super research
  site.(2007). Advanced Technology Libraries,
  36(6), 1, 8-9.
• Cervone, F. (2007). Federated searching Today,
  tomorrow and the future (?). Serials, 20(1),
  67-70.
• Fahey, S. (2007). Fed searchers? the debate
  about federated search engines. Feliciter, 53(2),
  62-63.

44
Bibliography

• De Groote, S. L., Appelt, K. (2007). The
  accuracy and thoroughness of a federated search
  engine in the health sciences. Internet Reference
  Services Quarterly, 12(1-2), 27-47.
• Lockwood, C., MacDonald, P. (2007).
  Implementation of a federated search system in
  the academic library Lessons learned. Internet
  Reference Services Quarterly, 12(1-2), 73-91.

45
Bibliography

• Ponsford, B. C., vanDuinkerken, W. (2007). User
  expectations in the time of google Usability
  testing of federated searching. Internet
  Reference Services Quarterly, 12(1-2), 159-178.
• Teets, M., Murray, P. (2006). Metasearch
  authentication and access management. D-Lib
  Magazine, 12(6),
• http//federatedsearchblog.com/
• http//www.niso.org/committees/MS_initiative.html