Tools Of Information manager cum Librarian

[Govinder Singh]

Dear All,

Here I need yours a valuable suggestion and comments

On which types of tools needed today by a information specialist or librarian to answer the user Enquiry in short and complete information in all aspects. As all you know the power of Google so we have to be an extraordinary than Google to provide the information. 

[Siddhartha Shankar Ray]

Dear Sri Bunty0018,

Pardon me, but I must confess that I could not follow exactly what you want to know. However, from the last sentence of your post I could gather that you might have meant the cyber resources!! You see the replies or comments to your queries may be quite diverse as there might be two schools of thoughts: the old and new. Still admittedly, as I perceive personally, the tools are the same but their FORMS have been changed. And, never-the-less, there are two ways: one is the orthodox way where you learn by reading and practice and the other quite glamorous though, is a bit technology oriented.But I must admit that the first thing require individual competence and differs person to person more visibly!!

Example !)   Say for instance, Cataloguing, one can do it by consulting the AACR & Sear's list. However, at present, this can also be done by Copy Cataloguing from LOC and various other sources. There is an undenying argument that when technology is available, why not take its advantage? Certainly one can do it and rather one SHOULD do it but if it so happens that a person who solely depends upon copy cataloguing and is unable to do it manually through traditional way, it is certain that the individual is adopting a short-cut method to suppress his/her weakness!!

Example 2) The change in the form is a big blessing. The traditional hard copy materials especially for Tertiary Sources of Information now gave way to electronic media. Earlier, one had to leaf through volumes of LISA to prepare lists of pertinent articles  to write Review of Literature. It would easily took at least a week to complete the tedious work. Now with the same thing available as online database, it takes a day's toil at the best to complete the work!! and that too without possible human error!

Providing short or long information depends upon the requirements. suppose in an examination, a question was "What is database searching? If you see that the question carries just 2 marks, it is presumed that you have to write a short answer. But if the same question carries 12 marks, you have to be ready to write a long answer. You have to mention the boolean logics and their implications so that the examiner can understand the depth of your knowledge and give you good marks.  If you are a Medical Librarian & were asked a general Inquiry on history of AIDS, you can simply consult Wikipedia and provide the answer (with references, of course!) But if the same question is asked to prepare a write up to be published in University Magazine or for an Inter-College Debate, you have to be far more elaborative and your information should be in depth. You may have to explain about the nature of Virus, then the nomenclature, the early reports in British Medical Journal, the pioneer article in Epidemiological Reviews, the LAV & HTLV-III controversies, the Robert Gallo & Luc Montaigner episodes etc. etc. As such, you see that the information needs to be tailor-made for the purpose of the user. This, as we all know is called Re-Packaging of Information.  So the concept of Short and Complete Information is rather elusive but of course, the information should always be compact and direct as far as possible!! No body wants to hear stories because the information seekers approach the librarians for purpose of business and not for sheer time passing!

I hope I could answer to your queries at least to some extent!

Sincerely,

Siddhartha S. Ray, Calcutta

[Govinder Singh]

Thank you Siddhartha Shankar Ray ji i am satisfying from your answer but not fully coz u not understand the question but what you understand you answer it in good way.
In Today life of Cyber age i mean i find alot of questions on google insted of searching educational search engines.
i want to know the subject wise list of Searching tools like Scopus etc....

[Siddhartha Shankar Ray]

Dear Sri Bunty0018,

Thanks for your post.

You are absolutely correct,

I could not understand your question Fully. And I mentioned it at the very onset of my post and at the bottom end as well!

Regarding your query about searching google in stead of educational search engines, My honest opinion is please abstain from it!!

If you are not aware of specific databases on subjects (it is quite natural) you can search google to know the subject specific databases (or searching tool as you have mentioned it)

By the way, barring a few, like Medline through PubMed or ERIC (on education) most of the databases are commercial products and are not open source.

For example Scopus is a product of  Elsevier Group of Publications and it is quite costly!

If one is not subscribing to it, it is not possible to get full access to that database.

Sincerely,

Siddhartha S. Ray, Calcutta