Conventional Products and

Services UNIT 2 CURRENT AWARENESS

SERVICES (INCLUDING SDI AND
ALERTING SERVICES )
Structure
2.0 Objectives
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Current Awareness Services
2.2.1 Definition and Scope
2.2.2 Characteristics
2.3 Title Announcement Service
2.3.1 Current Contents Type Current Awareness Service
2.3.2 Current Awareness Service Arranged by Subject
2.3.3 Current Awareness Service Arranged by Class Number
2.4 Announcement of Research in Progress
2.5 Selective Dissemination of Information
2.6 Advance Information about Forthcoming Conferences
2.7 Summary
2.8 Answers to Self Check Exercises
2.9 Keywords
2.10 List of Abbreviations
2.11 References and Further Reading

2.0 OBJECTIVES
After reading this Unit, you will be able to:
• explain the meaning of and need for current awareness services;
• describe the types of current awareness services, which are prevalent in the
world;
• compile a current contents type of service;
• prepare entries for the publication namely ‘announcement of research in
progress’;
• prepare user and document profile for SDI service; and
• bring out a publication giving data on forthcoming conferences.

2.1 INTRODUCTION
For any active researcher, it is necessary to keep herself/himself abreast of the
latest developments in the field. Everyday the literature is pouring in all over the
world in different forms and diverse languages. It is impossible for a researcher
to keep track of the entire literature just by going through a few journals being
received in the library. Suppose, somebody’s area of interest is ‘information use
study’. Now, s/he has three options – (i) to search the World Wide Web (hereinafter
28
referred to as Web), (ii) to go through the documents that are likely to contain Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
articles on the topic, and (iii) to search abstracting and indexing services available Alerting Services)
in the relevant field. Searching the Web, definitely a researcher will get some
articles on the topic. Unfortunately that will not be comprehensive since many
articles will not appear in the Web.
It is known that the articles on the topic will be available in the journals on
library and information science. As you know that the journals on library and
information science (LIS) are not few. From India itself, more than twenty LIS
journals appear in English and other languages. If you take the world as a whole,
the number will go into hundreds. Getting all these journals in one library is
impossible. Even if you get them in one library you will not be able to read them
all as they will be in different languages.
You may go through abstracting and indexing services. Some of them will be
available online and their searching will entail cost. Moreover, information that
you will get through these services will be backdated by a few weeks to few
months. The problem is the same for research scholars in all fields. Now, the
question is – what is the way out? Scientists faced this problem long ago. The
problem became acute from 1960s onwards when literature started growing
exponentially. To counter the problem, a new type of service emerged called
current awareness service.

2.2 CURRENT AWARENESS SERVICES

These services appear in various forms to inform researchers as to the appearance
of the latest literature in the field with minimum loss of time. In many cases the
service reaches the researcher within a fortnight after the publication of the primary
source.

2.2.1 Definition and Scope

When current awareness service (CAS) was conceived, at that time the Internet,
Web, e-mail, etc. were non-existent. Print form was the order of the day. Hence,
inclusion of current literature in indexing and abstracting services and their
distribution in the world usually by sea mail used to take time in terms of months.
Take for example, a monthly indexing service operating from USA used to take
one month for the processing of the literature, another month for printing, binding
and dispatch, and one more month for sea mail to reach the document in India,
China or Japan. Users in these places could see the literature in the fourth month
that means after a minimum delay of three months. At that time a service was
necessary to inform users about the latest literature quicker compared to the time
taken by the prevalent abstracting or indexing services. Suppose, a weekly service
that could inform users within a month about the latest literature, the service was
welcome. The situation generated the demand for such a service and the services
sprang up in different forms, size and shape.

CAS at that time was defined as an information service through which users
were informed promptly enough about recently published literature before they
were noticed in regular abstracting and indexing services. Now, the situation has
changed. Everyday a substantial amount of current literature is being placed in
the Web and users from any part of the world are seeing the same on the Web
practically without any loss of time. A question automatically may arise in your
29
Conventional Products and mind – Has CAS become useless today? The answer is negative, because a huge
Services
bulk of current literature is not available on the Web, specifically the literature
generating from developing and non-anglophone countries. The current awareness
services that started in pre-Internet era are still continuing.

In this Unit, we are going to discuss about CAS of pre-Internet era with indications
as to how the same has been affected with the advent of the Internet. The following
types of CAS are prevalent in the world:
1) Title announcement service
2) Announcement of research in progress
3) Selective dissemination of information service
4) Advance information about forthcoming conferences
5) Newspaper clipping service
As ‘newspaper clipping service’ will be covered in Unit 3 of this Block, we shall
discuss here the first four items.

2.2.2 Characteristics
CAS has quite a few characteristics. Some of the characteristics are mentioned
below:
1) It is basically an announcement service brought out usually in printed
form. Many libraries bring out the service in the name of accession list,
documentation list, current awareness list, current awareness service, etc.
Now, they may be brought in digital form and disseminated through the
Internet, intranet, extranet and e-mail.
2) Speed is the essence of CAS. As such, the periodicity of the service usually
varies from weekly to monthly. Because of the short periodicity the
literature in the service appears speedier than usual abstracting and indexing
services.
3) It aims to serve or generate in researchers current approach to
information. The term ‘current approach’ appearing in the sentence needs
to be explained. Studies have identified four distinct types of approaches
researchers follow in their quest for information. They are: i) Exhaustive
approach; ii) Everyday approach; iii) Current approach; and iv) Catching-
up or Brushing-up approach. Using current approach researchers try to keep
themselves abreast of the developments in their respective fields. The
approach is mainly a scanning operation undertaken by the researcher herself/
himself.
4) It does not answer any specific query but provides a broad view of recent
developments. Suppose a researcher is interested in recent papers on user
studies s/he scans through a current awareness service on a broader field
and notes down the bibliographical details of the articles on user studies. In
the next step s/he will gather these papers from libraries, information centres,
etc. and use them for her/his research work.
5) The service is usually on a broader area. Take for example, Current
Contents, the world famous current awareness services. They are on such
30
 broad areas as: Agriculture, Biology and Environmental Sciences, Arts and Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
Humanities, Clinical Medicine, Engineering, Computing and Technology, Alerting Services)
Life Sciences, Physical, Chemical and Earth Sciences, and Social and
Behavioral Sciences. Using any of these services, the researchers get the
papers from the core journals of their field and also from journals related or
alien to their field.

6) The service is a formal channel and supplements the information

received through informal channels. In many cases researchers receive
preprints etc. from the fellow researchers. Even through conversation, e-
mails, letters, etc. they get the glimpse of the latest developments in their
field of activity. These are all informal channels. Whatever is being received
through informal channels is not enough. That is the reason they need to go
through CAS.

7) The service is meant for scanning. Researchers usually scan the pages of a
CAS, and note down the papers of their interest if they spot any.

8) The service is for temporary use only. Whatever appears in CAS, reappears
in indexing and abstracting services afterwards. In essence, it informs the
researcher in advance. In some respect, it resembles a newspaper. Every
morning it updates you with the current news. Similarly every issue of a
CAS updates you with the current development.
Self Check Exercise
Note: i) Write your answer in the space given below.
ii) Check your answer with the answers given at the end of this Unit.
1) Highlight the salient characteristics of ‘current awareness service’.
......................................................................................................................
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......................................................................................................................

2.3 TITLE ANNOUNCEMENT SERVICE

The main purpose of the service is to disseminate the titles of the articles along
with their bibliographical details. The service is provided in various forms such
as reproducing the title pages as they are, without making any changes. This
service is also known as Current Contents type service and was introduced by
Eugene Garfield of Institute for Scientific Information, USA. The generation of
this type of service involves least cost, labour and time. In this type of service
the users have to scan the entire contents to ferret out the items of their interest.
To make the service more user-friendly, titles may be arranged alphabetically
under broad subjects, under class numbers or under the names of divisions,
sections, etc. We shall see how CAS can be produced in all these forms one by
one. First, we will concentrate on Current Contents type service.
31
Conventional Products and 2.3.1 Current Contents Type Current Awareness Service
Services
Suppose, you have been asked by the head of LIS department to provide such a
service. You must know that providing such a service is neither very labour
intensive nor very costly. To start the service you need to follow the given steps.

Step 1 – First of all you must decide the title of the service as well as its periodicity.
Suppose the LIS department on an average receives four to five issues of different
journals in a month. In such a situation a monthly service will serve the purpose.
The title of your service may be Current Awareness Bulletin on LIS. The cover
page of the Bulletin will show volume number, issue number, and the name of
the month and year. This apart, the name of the compiler, and the address of the
Department may be given. You can also obtain ISSN number for this Bulletin
from National Institute of Science Communication and Information Resources
(NISCAIR).

Step 2 – At the beginning of the month, gather the issues that have been received
during the last month. Suppose, the following issues have been received during
March 2010. Annals of Library and Information Studies – March 2010; Collnet
Journal of Scientometrics and Information Management – December 2009;
DESIDOC Journal of Library and Information Technology – March 2010; Indian
Journal of Library and Information Science – January-April 2010; and
Information Studies – January 2010.

Step 3 – Based on the contents of the above mentioned issues you need to bring
out the Bulletin.

Step 4 – At this step you must decide the number of copies you will reproduce
for each issue of the Bulletin. For deciding the number you need to take into
account the number of faculty members (whole time and part time); PhD and M
Phil scholars of LIS department; a few copies may be required for BLIS and
MLIS students; and the head of LIS department may like to send some copies to
other universities. Taking all these into account you may come to the conclusion
that the number of copies required is 50 approximately.
Step 5 – If you have decided to bring out Current Contents type publication,
then you need to make 50 copies of the contents page of each of the five issues of
the periodicals mentioned above. Arrange the contents pages of each periodical
in alphabetical order for each copy of the Bulletin. Staple all these pages along
with the cover page and your CAS Bulletin is ready. It will take the shape as
given in the following pages (33-37).
Step 6 – Current awareness services produced by organisations for local
consumption are usually distributed free. It may be priced if the demand is very
wide or global.
Step 7 – Once in a year you must conduct a use study of the service. As the
service is free everybody will like to have it but may not use it. Through use
study you will know how the service is being utilised and accordingly you will
be able to delete old users and enlist new users.
We have given below the scan copy of the contents of the journals mentioned at
the step 2. These pages are preceded by the cover page of the service. This sample
has been given here to give you an idea about the service.
32
 Current Awareness Services
Current Awareness Bulletin on Library and Information Science (Including SDI and
Alerting Services)
Vol. 1 No. 1 April 2010

Compiled by
(Name of the compiler)

Department of Library and Information Science

(Name of the University)

________________________________________________________________________

Annals of Library and Information Studies

http://www.niscair.res.in

Volume 57 Number 1 MARCH 2010

ISSN:0972-5423
CONTENTS
Applicability to Lotka’s Law to research productivity of Council of Scientific and Industrial
Research (CSIR), India
Narendra Kumar

Motivating parametrs for betterment of library services: an evaluative study among

non-goverment college librarians in West Bengal
Lakshmikanta Jana and Pijushkanti Panigrahi

Scientometric portrait of Nayana Nandu Borthakur: a biometeorologist

Tilak Ilazarika, Dipak Sharma and B. K. Sen

Awareness and use of UGC-Infonet digital library consortium by the faculty members
of Karnataka state universities
R.H. Walmiki, K.C. Ramakrishnegowda and K.R. Prithviraj

Metada initiatives and emerging technologies to improve resource discovery

Jiban K. Pal

Journal based information services in Sri Lankan University libraries: a study

M.M. Mashroofa and C.C. Jayasundara

Use and user perception of electronic resources in Annamalai University: a case study
K. Natarajan, B. Suresh, P. Sivaraman and R. Sevukan

Research practices in herbal medicinal plant: a case study of podophyllotoxin

Shri Ram

Learning resources for distance learners: a case study of BLIS learners of Indira Gandhi
National Open University
Pardeep Rai
33
Conventional Products and
Services

COLLNET JOURNAL OF SCIENTOMETRICS

AND
INFORMATION MANAGEMENT

Vol. 3, No.2, December 2009 ISSN: 0973-7766

CONTENTS

From Editors’ Desk i-iii

Biographical Sketch of Prof. Shabahat Hussain v-viii

The International Conference of Knowledge Visualization - 1-2

Summary of the 5th International Conference on
Webometrics, Informetrics and Scientometrics &
10th COLLNET Meeting
Lin Deming, Hou Haiyan, Liu Zeyuan and Ding Kun

Percentile Rank and Author Superiority Indexes for Evaluating 3-10

Individual Journal Articles and the Author’s Overall
Citation Performance
A.I. Pudovkin and E.Garfield

Distribution of Co-Author Pairs’ Frequencies in Energy Science 11-18

and Technology
Jie Pang, Hildrun Kretschmer and Zeyuan Liu

Bibliometric Study of Indian S&T Publications as Reflected in 19-28

Indian Science Abstracts
R.K.Verma

S&T Contribution of Chandigarh during 1998-2007: A Case Study 29-43

Adarsh Bala and B.M. Gupta

Impact Factor in Institute for Scientific Information (SIS): Quality 45-51

and Quantity of Scientific Publications
Hamzehali Nourmohammadi, Abdolreza Noroozichakoli
and Mohammad Hassanzadeh

Organization of Science in Iran: A holistic review 53-59

Mohammad Hassanzadeh, Hamzehali Nourmohammadi
and Abdolreza Noroozichakoli

34
 Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
DESIDOC Journal of Library & Information Technology Alerting Services)

Volume 30 Number 2 March 2010

Application of Bradford’s Law of Scattering to the Physics 3

Literature: A Study of Doctoral Theses Citations at the
Indian Institute of Science
K. G. Sudhier

UGC-INFONET Digital Library Consortium: Present Services 15

and Future Endeavours
Jagdish Arora and Kruti Trivedi

Visualisation of Relationship among Library Users based 26

on Circulation Data
Sumit Goswami, Anandarup Mukherjee, Mansi Kharbanda,
Abhinav Gupta, and Pulkit Soni

Research Trends in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology in India 40

Lalit Mohan, E.R. Prakasan, B.S. Kademani, Ganesh Surwase,
Anil Kumar, and Vijai Kumar

Information Needs and Use Pattern of District Court Lawyers 59

of Salem and Erode in Tamilnadu
S. Thanuskodi

Assessing Information Literacy Competence among the 70

Undergraduate Students of College of Agriculture, Raichur:
A Case Study
Manjunath B. Hadimani and Iqbalahmad U. Rajgoli

INDEST-AICTE Consortium: Present Services and Future 79

Endeavours
Jagdish Arora and Kruti Trivedi

E-journal Consortium: Is it a Success Story Always? 92

S.J.D. Varaprasad and S. Madhusudhan

35
Conventional Products and Indian Journal of
Services
Library and Information Science
January - April 2010; Volume 4 Number 1

Contents

A case study on the use of Internet resource by research scholars and

students of Annamalai University .................................................. 05
V. Ramesh Babu, M. Nagarajan

Dependency on e-resources social science faculty universities

in Iran .............................................................................................. 11
Mohamad Bagher Negahbari, V.G. Talwar

Knowledge management for future perceptions of library and

information professionals ................................................................ 17
P. Ravichandaran, N.O. Natarajan

Open source and open access licenses: A comparative study .............. 21

Tridib Tripathi, Partha Sarathi Mandal

Usage of electronic information resources and services at IIT,

Kharagpur Library: A survey ........................................................... 25
Bulu Maharana, Bipin Bihari Sethi, Pankaj Kumar Mallick

Use of internet in Karnataka state universities ..................................... 33

Syed Shah Ahmed Sarmast

Creation of PG thesis abstract database of MPKV, Rahuri:

Practical experience ......................................................................... 39
P.A. Shinde, R.N. Ingale

Dr. A. Subbiah: A Bibliometric Study .................................................... 44

S. Nattar

Library building and space utilization: A study of Mangalore

University ......................................................................................... 51
S.S. Kumbar, Pushpalatha

The impact of ‘on time’ reminders on defaulters-a case study of

Islamia College of Science and Commerce, Srinagar .................... 57
Mohammad Hanief Bhat

Use of internet by faculty members and research scholars in the

21st century: A study of University Libraries of Karnataka
state, India ....................................................................................... 61
Gururaj S. Hadagali, B.D. Kumbar

Author instructions................................................................................. 74
36
 Current Awareness Services
INFORMATION STUDIES (Including SDI and
Alerting Services)

Vol 16 No 1 January 2010

CONTENTS

Dr. S. R. Ranganathan and Srinivasa Ramanujan

Editional/A. Neelameghan.......................................................................... 1

Dr. S. R. Ranganathan Page:

Every Library Innovation must be Five Laws Compliant!
DOC-FINDER ........................................................................................... 2

Web-Based Ranking and Link Analysis of Central Universities in

India: A Webometric Analysis
Samir Kumar Jalal; Subal Chandra Biswas;
Parthasarathi Mukhopadhyay ................................................................... 3

Tamil Literary Devices: A Bi-Lingual GSDL Collection

A. Neelameghan; S. K. Lalitha ................................................................... 27

Dependency on E-Resources among Social Science Faculty

Universities in Iran
Mohamad Bagher Negahban; V. G. Talwar ............................................... 43

Google Use and Users: A Survey

T. Saravanan; P. Ushadevi; V. Senthilkumar ............................................. 49

ISSN 0971-6726

The type of service is brought out without any author or subject index. If there is
a strong demand for such indexes they may be provided. That would obviously
entail more labour, time and cost.

Advantages
The advantages of this type of service is that it can be brought out very quickly,
with less cost and labour, and practically without any editing. It serves the purpose
of the users quite well. Suppose a researcher is interested in the articles on use
studies, s/he may go through the pages and notice that the following articles are
there on use studies. It will not take more than a few minutes to locate these
articles. Below is given the list of articles gleaned from the contents pages of the
journals included in the service.The list has been prepared using the MLA
Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 7th ed.

1) R. H. Walmiki, K. C. Ramakrishnegowda, and K. R. Prithviraj. “Awareness

and Use of UGC-INFONET Digital Library Consortium by the Faculty
Members of Karnataka State Universities”. Annals of Library and
Information Studies 57.1 (2010): 33-43.Print.

37
Conventional Products and 2) K. Natarajan, B. Suresh, P. Sivaraman, and R. Sevukan. “Use and User
Services
Perception of Electronic Resources of Annamalai University: A Case Study”.
Annals of Library and Information Studies 57.1 (2010): 59-64. Print.

3) S. Thanuskodi. “Information Needs and Use Pattern of District Court Lawyers

of Salem and Erode in Tamil Nadu”. DESIDOC Journal of Library and
Information Technology 30.2 (2010): 59-69.Print.

4) V. Ramesh Babu, and M. Natarajan. “A Case Study on the Use of Internet

Resource by Research Scholars and Students of Annamalai University. Indian
Journal of Library and Information Science 4.1 (2010): 5-10.Print.

5) Bulu Maharana, Bipin Bihari Sethi, and Pankaj Kumar Mallick. “Usage of
Electronic Information Resources and Services at IIT, Kharagpur Library:
A Survey”. Indian Journal of Library and Information Science 4.1 (2010):
25-33.Print.

6) Syed Shah Ahmed Sarmast. “Use of Internet in Karnataka State Universities”.

Indian Journal of Library and Information Science 4.1 (2010): 33-38.Print.

7) Gururaj S. Hadagali, and B. D. Kumbar. “Use of Internet by Faculty Members

and Research Scholars in the 21st Century: A Study of University Libraries
of Karnataka State, India”. Indian Journal of Library and Information
Science 4.1 (2010): 61-73.Print.

8) T. Saravanan, P. Ushadevi, and V. Senthilkumar. “Google Use and Users: A

Survey”. Information Studies 16.1 (2010): 49-. Print.

Disadvantages
If the service comprises many pages, say 50 or more, then it takes time to locate
the articles of interest. Moreover, in the Current Contents type service there is
little scope for editing allowing thereby mistakes to exist. At times, because of
poor reproduction, some titles become unreadable.
Self Check Exercise
Note: i) Write your answer in the space given below.
ii) Check your answer with the answers given at the end of this Unit.
2) Describe the advantages and disadvantages of Current Contents type of
current awareness service.
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38
2.3.2 Current Awareness Service Arranged by Subject Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
Alerting Services)
To avoid the shortcomings mentioned earlier the CAS can be brought out by
arranging entries according to the subject or class number. The job can be done
manually or with the aid of a computer.

Manual Method – For bringing out this type of service you need to follow the
steps as enumerated under 2.3.1 except Step 5. At this step you need to prepare
an entry for each of the articles. For writing or typing the entries you may use
catalogue cards. The entry should follow a style decided by your organisation.
For such services entries in certain respect are different from the catalogue entries
you prepare for books etc. following AACR-2R or any other code. For example,
in a catalogue entry you do not mention all the authors of the publication if their
number exceeds two (in the case of CCC) and three (in the case of AACR-2R).
For CAS and other secondary services the rule is to include all the authors. The
rendering of the name of the authors however can be done according to CCC or
AACR-2R. At the top of each entry you must write/type the broad subject heading
or the class number. You may prepare an entry like this.
Entry with the Subject Heading

Bibliometrics
Sudhier, K. G. “Application of Bradford’s Law of
Scattering to the Physics Literature: A Study of Doctoral
Theses Citations at the Indian Institute of Science”.
DESIDOC Journal of Library and Information
Technology 30.2 (2010): 3-14.Print.

You may note that in the heading the term used is Bibliometrics and not Bradford’s
law. This is because in CAS we generally use broad subject headings to speed
up the work.

When all the entries for a particular issue of CAS has been prepared, they are to
be arranged first according to the subjects, and then alphabetically author-wise
within each subject. If it is decided to provide an author index, the entries are to
be given serial numbers. For such a CAS, subject index is redundant. However,
See and See also references may be provided such as

Bradford’s Law See Bibliometrics

Lotka’s Law See Bibliometrics

Once the arrangement is complete along with ‘See’ and ‘See also’ references, the
whole matter is to be typed, duplicated and distributed to the users.

Computer-assisted Method – In this method a database is to be prepared using

CDS/ISIS, WINISIS or any other software package. The database should take
care of all the elements that are required for each entry. The data for each entry is
to be inputted. When the data entry for the whole issue is complete, a print-out is
to be taken out which will then be duplicated and distributed to the users. The
issue of the CAS may be placed in the website of the organisation whereby it
will be used by many. The issue may also be e-mailed to users.

39
Conventional Products and 2.3.3 Current Awareness Service Arranged by Class Number
Services
Generally, in CAS, entries are not arranged according to class number. Possibly,
the reason is that in many cases class numbers are not available. Take for example,
the subject ‘bibliometrics’, the class number of the subject is not available even
in the latest edition (22nd) of DDC. However, if it is decided to arrange the
entries according to class number, then the method described under Section 2.3.2
should be followed. The only difference will be in relation to the subject heading.
In place of the subject heading the class number will be written along with the
subject heading as shown in the entry given below.

Entry with the Class Number and Subject Heading

2T Bibliometrics
Sudhier, K. G. “Application of Bradford’s Law of
Scattering to the Physics Literature: A Study of Doctoral
Theses Citations at the Indian Institute of Science”.
DESIDOC Journal of Library and Information
Technology 30.2 (2010): 3-14.Print.

N.B. The class number given in the entry is according to 7th edition of Colon Classification.

In this type of service both author index and subject index may be provided.

2.4 ANNOUNCEMENT OF RESEARCH IN

PROGRESS
In this world at any given point of time, millions of research projects are found
to be on-going. For a researcher, it is more or less compulsory to know the research
work that has already been done in her/his field, and the ones that are going on.
Deficiency in this respect can easily lead to the duplication of research work.
Information about the research work that has already been done is available in
secondary information services, primary journals and to a certain extent on the
Web. Sources of information regarding on-going research projects are not many.
That is why, universities, research organisations, and others from time to time
bring out their respective directories of on-going research projects. Some of the
examples are given below:

1) Inter-University Board of India & Ceylon. Research in Progress. 4 vols.

New Delhi: the Board, 1968-1972. Print.
Vol. 1. – Physical Sciences. 1958-1966. 1968.
Vol. 2. – Biological Sciences. 1958-1966. 1968.
Vol. 3. – Social Sciences. 1958-1966. 1970.
Vol. 4. – Humanities. 1958-1966. 1972.
2) Indian National Scientific Documentation Centre. Current Research Projects
in CSIR Laboratories. Delhi: INSDOC, 1976.Print.

An entry in this type of publication usually contains the name/s of the investigator/
s, address/es of the investigator/s, title of the research project, date of starting of
the research project, the date when the project is likely to be finished, and the
40
abstract. For research projects undertaken for obtaining degrees such as PhD, Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
the names of the degree and the guide are also given. Alerting Services)

It is not compulsory to provide the abstract. If the authorities concerned decide

to provide the abstract, it should be included. It should include among others the
research question, objectives, methodology adopted, work done so far, etc.

A hypothetical entry is given below:

Monika Devi. Use of e-resources in Selected College Libraries of National Capital Region:
A Survey. IGNOU. 2010-2014. Guide: B.K.Sen.

Many college libraries of NCR have opted for e-resources because of their easy access,
up-to-dateness, and a number of other facilities. To answer the question as to the extent
of use of the resources the survey was undertaken. The survey being conducted using
the questionnaire and interview methods intends to find out among others the college-
wise data as to the users, gender ratio, breakdown of the users according to various
streams, gender, type (students, teachers, etc.), problems being faced by the users in
the use of e-resources, fees being charged for every use, and so on. The questionnaire
has been tested and modified. The survey work is continuing. It is expected that in about
three months time, the survey will be completed. Analysis of the data will commence
around September 2010.

Compilation of a Directory
Sometimes universities, research institutions, etc. bring out directories of on-
going research projects. The directory will be compiled in the same way as a
CAS is compiled. While compiling the directory of on-going research projects
you need to take into account the projects that started in the current year and in
the previous years. The number of ongoing research projects in a big university at
any given time may total 500 or even more. Hence, a directory of this type should
be accompanied with an investigator index, guide index, and a subject index.
Self Check Exercise
Note: i) Write your answer in the space given below.
ii) Check your answer with the answers given at the end of this Unit.
3) Describe the contents of an entry of a directory of on-going research projects.
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2.5 SELECTIVE DISSEMINATION OF

INFORMATION
Hans Peter Luhn advanced the idea of selective dissemination of information
(SDI) in 1958 which in due course formed the basis for planning a number of
SDI systems by various bodies. The mechanised SDI system based on Luhn’s
design was first implemented in 1959 at the Advanced Systems Development
Division of IBM Corporation at Yorktown Heights, New York. The success of
41
Conventional Products and the system emboldened others to follow suit and gradually the system spread all
Services
over the world.

In CAS described above a user has to go through the Bulletin to find out the
literature relevant to her/his interest. That means s/he is to put some extra efforts
and spend some time for the purpose. In SDI, an institution does the job and
makes the user aware of the literature, may be free of charge or at a cost. We
have seen above that an individual is to scan the entire Current Awareness Bulletin
on Library and Information Science, vol. 1, no.1 to locate the literature on use
studies. In the case of SDI, the individual will not have to do anything, the entire
list of articles will be mailed to her/him. S/he will get the intended information
practically without any effort or loss of time. Undeniably, the service is of great
help to the researchers and others interested in the latest information. Now, let us
see how the service is provided.

Components of SDI – The two basic components of SDI are the user and the
document.

The whole purpose of SDI is to make the user aware about the document. For
this, first of all a user profile and a document profile are created.

User Profile – A user profile includes the name, address, and the keyword/s that
represent the interest of the user. Suppose, The Head, Education and Training
Division, NISCAIR, New Delhi -110067 is interested on literature devoted to
‘Internet use’. The Head’s profile is given below. In the profile the keyword
‘Internet Use’ represents the interest of the user. If a user is interested in more
than one subject, that should also be mentioned in the user profile. The rest of
the data is the address including e-mail id. As per the need more information can
be added into the profile. Once the user profile is ready it is incorporated into a
user profile file. The user profile may be corrected and needs to be updated from
time to time.

User profile of The Head E&T Division

Internet Use
The Head (Name of the Head)
Education and Training Division
NISCAIR
14 Satsang Vihar Marg
New Delhi – 110019
E mail: (e-mail of the Head)
Document Profile – As the documents are coming, their profiles are also created
side by side. In the document profile complete bibliographical details of the
documents are provided along with the keywords that represent the subject/s of
the document. In the document profile you may use any number of keywords as
the document demands. Moreover, it is not necessary to prepare an entry as per
AACR 2R or any other cataloguing code for document profile. Bibliographical
details may be retained as they are in the original. This is because nowadays
there are many open sources available in the Web wherefrom data can be
downloaded freely to the document profile file. Converting the data in the AACR
2R or any other format will unnecessarily lead to wastage of labour and time.
Elements that are missing such as inclusive pages, keywords, etc. should be
42
added. In the document profiles given below, you may note that the title and the Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
author appear in the same order as they occur in the original title page. Adding Alerting Services)
an abstract in the document profile is optional. If the abstract is readily available
that may be added if time permits. Otherwise, it may be supplied on demand.

Document profile 1

Consortium Use; UGC-INFONET Digital

Library Consortium; Use Study
R. H Walmiki, K C Ramakrishnegowda, and K. R.
Prithviraj. “Awareness and Use of UGC-INFONET
Digital Library Consortium by the Faculty Members
of Karnataka State Universities”. Annals of Library
and Information Studies 57.1 (2010): 33-43.Print.

Document profile 2

Electronic Resources; Use Study

K. Natarajan, B. Suresh, P. Sivaraman, and R.
Sevukan. “Use and User Perception of Electronic
Resources of Annamalai University: A Case Study”.
Annals of Library and Information Studies 57.1
(2010): 59-64. Print.

Document profile 3

Information Need; Use Study

S. Thanuskodi. “Information Needs and Use Pattern
of District Court Lawyers of Salem and Erode in
Tamil Nadu”. DESIDOC Journal of Library and
Information Technology 30.2 (2010): 59-69.
Print.

Document profile 4
Internet Resource; Internet Use; Use Study
V. Ramesh Babu, and M. Natarajan. “A Case Study
on the Use of Internet Resource by Research
Scholars and Students of Annamalai University.
Indian Journal of Library and Information Science
4.1 (2010): 5-10.Print.

Document profile 5

Electronic Resources; Use Study

Bulu Maharana, Bipin Bihari Sethi, and Pankaj
Kumar Mallick. “Usage of Electronic Information
Resources and Services at IIT, Kharagpur Library:
A Survey”. Indian Journal of Library and
Information Science 4.1 (2010): 25-33.Print.
43
Conventional Products and It is always advisable to use the same thesaurus or list of subject headings for
Services
user profile as well as document profile. It is to be noted that Library of Congress
List of Subject Headings or Sears List of Subject Headings may not serve your
purpose because the users’ demand in most cases will be on literature on specific
subjects and which may not be included in the aforesaid lists. Instead of keywords,
class numbers may also be used both in the user profile and document profile.
Here, the problem is that in many cases you will not find the class numbers for
specific subjects in classification schedules. Leave aside Lotka’s law or Bradford’s
law, even the class number for ‘bibliometris’ is not available in the latest edition
(22nd) of Dewey Decimal Classification.

Matching – In this process user profile file is matched with the document profile
file. Usually the matching is done by using a computer. Whenever the computer
finds a match, it indicates either giving the serial number of the document or any
other code that has been used to uniquely identify the document. While matching
The Head’s user profile file, the computer will pick up the keyword ‘Internet
Use’ and match this with every document profile file. If it will find a match in
document profile 4. The computer will indicate the same.

Notification – The Head will now be notified by e-mail, or any other

communication means about the document that has matched her/his profile.

Feedback – Along with the document, a feedback card will also be sent. The
user is supposed to fill in the card and send it back to the agency providing the
service. The feedback card may be as follows:

Feedback Card
Please return the feedback card after ticking the correct
statement.
The information being provided to you is:
1. Fully relevant
2. Partially relevant
3. Irrelevant
4. Backdated
5. Already received

Feedback Analysis
On the analysis of the feedback received, if it is found that the user is not satisfied
with the service, then the reason for her/his dissatisfaction will be investigated.
There may be several reasons for this. The information supplied may not be
relevant, the information may be backdated, or the user has got the information
from some other source before.
If the information supplied is not relevant, then it is possible that there is something
wrong in the user profile, especially with the keyword/s depicting the user’s
interest. The user profile given above shows that the interest of The Head is
Internet Use. Now, Internet is used for various purposes such as chatting,
e-mail, searching answer for some queries, entertainment, etc. If the user’s interest
is limited only to the use of Internet resources and not any other thing, then the
44
keyword Internet Use is to be changed to Internet Resource Use.
If the user complains that the information being supplied is backdated, then the Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
reason should be found out. May be there is delay in the processing of information Alerting Services)
or in the dispatch of information. Whatever may be the case, the corrective
measures will have to be undertaken.

Users get information from various sources such as authors, fellow colleagues,
students, the Web, etc. The moment an article goes to the press, the information
about the article may be disseminated to the prospective users. In this case the
user will get the information much before it is supplied by the SDI agency.

There is not much difference between ‘Web Use’ and ‘Internet Use’. The user
has not given the keyword Web Use. As such, the user may be getting information
on Web Use from some other sources. If the user is requested to supply some
samples of information that s/he is not getting from the agency, the cause will be
found out. The sample may indicate that the user was getting information on the
use of Web resources from some other source. Now, this will require change in
the user profile, and the list of subject headings or thesaurus. In the list of subject
headings or thesaurus, Web Use and Web Resource Use will have to be added
and against these subject headings Internet Resource Use as well as Internet Use
will have to be shown as Related Terms (RT). Similarly, against the terms Internet
Use and Internet Resource Use, Web Use and Web Resource Use will have to be
shown as RTs.This type of modification is a continuous process and this is to be
done to ensure better service.

Flowchart – The SDI service can be depicted very well with a flowchart as
given on the page 46.

SDI – A Computerised Service: Originally SDI was conceived as a computerised

service involving thousands of users and tens of thousands of documents. If the
number of documents and users is small SDI can be provided manually and at
local level.

SDI at a Local Level – Suppose in an organisation there are about a score of

users and it receives about a dozen primary periodicals. In such a case the librarian
prepares the users profile manually and keeps it on her/his table. While scanning
the newly arrived issues of primary periodicals, the moment the librarian finds
an article matching with the profile of a user, s/he immediately informs the user
by telephone or some other means. Hereafter the user may come to the library
for the article or ask for its photocopy.
Self Check Exercise
Note: i) Write your answers in the space given below.
ii) Check your answers with the answers given at the end of this Unit.
4) Write down the contents of a feedback card.
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
45
Conventional Products and 5) In the organisation you are serving, there are 25 research scholars and it is
Services
getting about 40 research periodicals. Describe how are you going to provide
the SDI service to the researchers.
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................
......................................................................................................................

SDI Flowchart

Documents Document Document User profile User profile

received profile profile file file

Profile User’s
modifi- Analysis
assess-
cation ment

Matching Notification User

2.6 ADVANCE INFORMATION ABOUT

FORTHCOMING CONFERENCES
Every year numerous conferences are held all over the world. These conferences
are organised by various organisations and are devoted to one or more subjects.
They are usually local, national or international in scope.

In the field of library and information science, a number of national and

international conferences are held every year. BLA, IASLIC, ILA, DELNET,
INFLIBNET, etc. respectively organise their annual conferences. The conferences
organised by BLA annually are generally local in scope, whereas IASLIC, ILA,
DELNET, INFLIBNET organise confrerences which are national in scope. TERI,
once in two years, organises an international conference. IFLA and many other
international organisations also organise annual conferences. About a dozen
number of conferences are organised in India on LIS.

Professionals in all fields attend conferences to present papers, exchange ideas

with professional colleagues, up-date their knowledge, etc. For presenting a paper
in a conference, generally you need to send an abstract well in advance on or
before the stipulated date. Based on the abstract, the organisers decide whether
or not to accept the paper. If the answer is on the affirmative, then the full-length
paper is to be submitted within the stipulated date.

46
All these factors demand that the information about forthcoming conferences Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
should be provided well in advance to the professionals. That is why, many Alerting Services)
publishers bring out serial publications listing the forthcoming conferences. If
there is a demand, then such publications may be subscribed by a library.

In many cases, local and national conferences organised by developing countries

are not recorded in those serial publications. As a result libraries should bring
out serial publications listing the forthcoming conferences.

Compilation: For the compilation of a list of forthcoming conferences, you

need the following:

i) Information about forthcoming conferences

Organisers of the conferences send out leaflets, e-mails, circulars, letters,
and various other materials relating to the conference they are going to hold
in future. Many organisers also place the information on the Internet. A
page of the information brochure of the conference titled LIS-edu-Vision
2010 and an e-mail on the forthcoming International Conference on Digital
Libraries and Knowledge Organization (ICDK 2011) are given on the
following pages as examples.

ii) Collection of Information

The moment information is received in any form about a forthcoming
conference, it is to be placed in a file. The entire information is to be sorted
and used for the publication.

iii) Scope
Local, national, and international – all conferences are to be included.
Announcements relating to international conferences are made four years
in advance. Hence, the coverage in terms of time should be up to four
years. If you are compiling the publication for the month of June 2010, then
you can cover conferences up to May 2014.

iv) Entry
The information required by a professional for a forthcoming conference is
as follows. Hence, an entry relating to a conference should include the given
items.
a) Name of the conference
b) Date of the conference
c) Venue of the conference
d) Date of submission of the abstract
e) Date of acceptance of the abstract
f) Date of submission of the full-length paper
g) Date of payment of the registration fee
h) Arrangement for accommodation
i) Arrangement for transport

47
Conventional Products and j) Contact information: Name of the person, postal address, e-mail address,
Services
phone number – all are to be given. If there are different contact addresses
for different activities such as registration and accommodation, they
are also to be given.
k) Other information if any related to weather at that time of the conference,
type of clothing needed, local sightseeing, map of the city, important
places to be visited,etc. can be added.

Front Page of the Brochure of the Conference

48
 Conference Information through E-mail Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
Alerting Services)
Dear Colleague,

We are pleased to announce the call for papers & registration of the forthcoming International
Conference on Digital Libraries and Knowledge Organization (ICDK 2011) to be jointly
organized by Management Development Institute (MDI) and Indian Association for Special Libraries
& Information Centres (IASLIC) during 14-16 February 2011.

Background & Objectives

The advancement of Digital Library technologies provide an effective medium for Library & Information
professionals to reach out to the users as never before. Same time, the rapid proliferation of the
digital resources poses an unprecedented challenge to information professionals in generating efficient
information services.

Libraries and information centres have long been involved in systematically organizing knowledge
using techniques such as indexing and classification. These traditional knowledge organization tools
lay the foundation for modern knowledge organization languages in the digital era. Knowledge
organization systems can improve the organization of digital libraries and facilitate better access to
their content. In a technology driven world, libraries play a crucial role in the fostering of knowledge
for development.

The goal of the conference is to bring together librarians, information engineers, educators as well as
experts and professionals in other related fields, from both India and aboard, to exchange ideas and
share research findings about digital libraries and knowledge organization. The conference will generate
valuable ideas for advancing services for knowledge creation through research.

The conference will focus on the theoretical and methodological issues involved in the qualitative,
longitudinal study of the developers, users, policy makers, etc., involved in the development of digital
libraries. It will provide a forum where these theoretical and methodological interests and insights
may be advanced, exchanged, and debated, and where experiences with differing technologies,
contexts, and methodologies may be compared and contrasted.

The specific objectives of the conference are:

To provide a£ forum for scholars from different fields and backgrounds to share their views and
perspectives on how to advance research in the area of digital libraries and knowledge organization
tools and techniques.
Identifying£ best practices in all the spheres of digital library development and knowledge
organization.
To provide£ strategic directions for the development of digital libraries
To prepare a£ sustainable knowledge organization framework for digital library development
Themes (but not limited to)
• Digital Libraries Development
• Tools and Techniques for Managing Digital Repositories
• Digital Resource Management Strategies
• Evaluation of Digital Libraries
• Content Development: Tools and Techniques
• Cultural Issues of Online Services
• Technology Issues in Online Services
• Standards and Specifications for Digital Objects
• Metadata Standards, Interoperability and Crosswalks
• Case Studies of Digital Libraries and Institutional Repositories
49
Conventional Products and • Multilingual Digital Libraries
Services
• Digital Preservation Strategies
• Web Retrieval Tools and Strategies
• Information Retrieval in Indian Languages
• User Interface and Patron Interactions Tools
• Open Source Software Tools for Digital Library Development
• Open Access Initiatives, Open Access Repositories
• Open Access for Scholarly Contents
• Information Management Using Web 2.0/3.0 Technologies
• Social Networking Tools for Information Services
• Knowledge Organization Techniques
• Knowledge Representation Models
• Emergent Techniques for Search Algorithms and Context Sensitive Indexing
• Semantic Web Technologies for Knowledge Representation and Management
• Ontologies and Approaches to Building Ontologies

Important Dates:
Submission of full paper : September 30, 2010
Workshop/tutorial proposal : August 10, 2010
Notification of acceptance with reviewers’ comments : October 30, 2010
Submission of the final paper : November 30, 2010

For further information about the conference, please visit the conference site at http://
www.mdi.ac.in/ICDK/Home.html

v) Compilation mode
Compilation should better be done using a computer. The entries should be
arranged chronologically. The conferences which are going to be organised
sooner will come first and later will figure afterwards. Once the compilation
is over, it takes the form of a publication. Now, it can be easily placed on
the organisation’s website, if need be print-outs can also be taken.

vi) Periodicity
If the periodicity is once a month it will be quite satisfactory. It can be
increased to bimonthly or quarterly in case the number of conferences is
less.

vii) Dissemination
The publication can be e-mailed to the members who have e-mail ids. The
print-outs can be sent by post to others.

viii)Updation
For such a publication, updation is a continuous process. In a computerised
format updation is very easy. The conferences which are occurring in the
present month will be deleted while bringing out the next issue, and
conferences of one more month will be added at the end. Suppose, in the
present issue you have included conferences of July 2010 to June 2014. In
the next issue you will include conferences of August 2010 to July 2014.
50
 Current Awareness Services
2.7 SUMMARY (Including SDI and
Alerting Services)
While discussing current awareness service, its importance, definition and scope,
types, as well as characteristics have been highlighted.

Title announcement services are of varied types. Of these Current Contents type
is possibly most popular. Steps involved in its compilation have been detailed so
that depending on the need one can start the service. The advantages and
disadvantages of the service have also been pointed out. The service can also be
provided by arranging entries under subject or class number. How this can be
done has been discussed.

Announcement of research in progress more often than not appears in the form
of a directory. How it is to be compiled and what will be the components of an
entry have been detailed.

The history of SDI service has been outlined, and its various components have
been described in detail. How SDI service can be provided at local level without
the help of a computer has also been highlighted.

While dealing with list of forthcoming conferences, the importance of such a

publication has been pointed out and collection of information, scope of the
publication, components of an entry, mode of compilation, periodicity, mode of
dissemination, and updation discussed.

2.8 ANSWERS TO SELF CHECK EXERCISES

1) The salient characteristics of current awareness service are as follows:
i) It is basically an announcement service brought out usually in printed
form.
ii) Speed is the essence of CAS. The periodicity of the service usually
varies from weekly to monthly.
iii) It aims to serve or generate in researchers current approach to information.
iv) It does not answer any specific query but provides a broad view of recent
developments.
v) The service is usually on a broader area.
vi) The service is a formal channel and supplements the information received
through informal channels.
vii) The service is meant for scanning.
viii)The service is for temporary use only.

2) The advantages of Current Contents type service is that it can be brought

out very quickly, with less cost and labour, and practically without any
editing. It serves the purpose of the users quite well. They are just to scan
through the pages to see whether any paper of their interest has appeared
recently. Suppose somebody is interested in the articles of library
classification. S/he may find articles of Dewey Decimal Classification, Colon
Classification, classification in general, etc. It is possible that in some issues
of this type of service there may not be any article on classification.
51
Conventional Products and If an issue of the service contains many pages, say around 50 or more, then
Services
it takes time to find out the articles of interest. Moreover, in the Current
Contents type service there is little scope for editing. At times, because of
poor reproduction, some titles become unreadable. These are some of the
disadvantages.

3) An entry in the directory of research in progress contains the name/s of the

investigator/s, address/es of the investigator/s, title of the research project,
date of starting of the research project, the date when the project is likely to
be finished, and the abstract. For research projects undertaken for obtaining
degrees such as PhD, the names of the degree and the guide/s are also given.

4) The contents of a feedback card will be as follows:

Please return the feedback card after ticking the most relevant statement.
The information being provided to you is:
1) Fully relevant
2) Partially relevant
3) Irrelevant
4) Backdated
5) Already received
5) First of all, I shall make a list of all the 25 research scholars. The list will
contain the names of the researchers, their areas of interest, their telephone
numbers and e-mail addresses. Within a short time I hope the areas of interest
of all the researchers will be in my memory.
The library receives 40 research periodicals, of which one or two will be
weekly and the rest will be monthly, bimonthly, quarterly, etc. It is expected
that in a day two to three issues will be received. After recoding is done, I
shall go through the contents of the issues, and inform the researchers as I
come across the articles relevant to their interests. From time to time I shall
gather their feedback, and will modify their profile as per the need.

2.9 KEYWORDS
Core Journal : A journal fully devoted to a particular field of study.
For example, Annals of Library and Information
Studies is a core journal in the field of library and
information science.
Formal Channel : Conventional channel such as a printed publication.
Informal Channel : Non-conventional channel such as correspondence.

2.10 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AACR : Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules
BLA : Bengal Library Association
CAS : Current Awareness Service
CCC : Classified Catalogue Code
52
DELNET : Developing Library Network Current Awareness Services
(Including SDI and
DESIDOC : Defence Scientific Information and Documentation Alerting Services)
Centre
IASLIC : Indian Association of Special Libraries and Information
Centres
IFLA : International Federation of Library Associations and
Institutions
ILA : Indian Library Association
INFLIBNET : Information and Library Network
INSDOC : Indian National Scientific Documentation Centre
ISSN : International Standard Serial Number
LIS : Library and Information Science
NISCAIR : National Institute of Science Communication and
Information Resources
SDI : Selective Dissemination of Information
UGC : University Grants Commission
Web : World Wide Web

2.11 REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING

Guha, B. “Current Awareness Services” Training Course in Documentation and
Information Services – Course Material. New Delhi: INSDOC, 1976. Paper IV.4.
Print.

---. “Information Services and Products – Different Types”. Training Course in

Documentation and Information Services – Course Material. New Delhi:
INSDOC, 1976. Paper IV.1. Print.

---. “Services from a Branch Information Centre – Selective Dissemination of

Information (SDI)”. Workshop on Planning of Branch Information Centres in
CSIR. New Delhi: INSDOC, 1975: 35-39. Print.

Luhn, H. P. “A Business Intelligence System”. IBM Journal of Research and

Development 2.4 (1958): 314-319. Print.

---. “Selective Dissemination of New Scientific Information with the Aid of

Electronic Processing Equipment”. American Documentation 12.4 (1961): 131-
138. Print.

53