[Sigia-l] multiple search index usability/conceptual model

[Charles Hanson]

I would think that it's fair to say that end-users (and librarians, for that matter) would *like* to be able to search multiple databases simultaneously, since it does save tremendous amounts of time.  The data integration difficulties you allude to tend to prohibit such searching from taking place.   

On the other hand, aggregators certainly exist, and can provide a single interface to search all (or most) of the databases using the same search syntax and set of tools, but this costs money. 

Charles 
  


-----Original Message-----
From: Tanya Rabourn [mailto:rabourn at columbia.edu] 
Sent: Thursday, May 16, 2002 1:09 PM
To: SIGIA
Subject: Re: [Sigia-l] multiple search index usability/conceptual model


Jeff Lash wrote:
> Ideally you could search all of the databases/catalogs at one time, 
> and have

I know that sounds like a good idea at first, but you really don't want to search all of them at once. Each has it's own fields for searching and many are special to a particular discipline.  Plus, the number of online indexes alone is enormous with more added every week. Pitty the poor general reference librarian that's expected to know the search syntax for every one of them. Here's our A-Z list http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/eresources/databases/alphabetical_list.html

-Tanya
___________________________________
Tanya Rabourn <rabourn at columbia.edu>
[User Services Consultant]
AcIS R & D <www.columbia.edu/acis/rad>
tel: 212.854.0295


Content Management Symposium, Chicago O'Hare Marriott, June 28 - 30. See http://www.asis.org/CM

ASIST SIG IA: http://www.asis.org/SIG/SIGIA/index.html
_______________________________________________
Sigia-l mailing list
Sigia-l at asis.org
http://mail.asis.org/mailman/listinfo/sigia-l