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Casting assignment - find a recent article 8/26/2008 3:51:40 PM
This assignment comes up every year and it is back again this semester: Engineering students have been asked to find an article on casting. The best resource for this is the engineering database, Compendex*Plus. When you connect to the Ei Engineering Village, which is the platform Compendex is loaded on, the first thing you should show students in this case is how to de-select the other databases (GeoBase, INSPEC, etc.) at the top so they are left just with Compendex. Searching on "casting" in Compendex will yield huge sets and so you will want to prompt the students to refine their search,. One way to do this is for them to choose a particular type of casting (die casting or sand casting, for example). BUT they should also limit by language (English), by document type (journal article), and by year or range of years (the article is supposed to be "recent"). You will see the various LIMIT options on the first screen once you connect to the Ei Village, directly under the search boxes. Please refer to me any students who need more help. - Nancy Schiller, schiller@buffalo.edu - Nancy Schiller
BIO 205 Biochemistry 1/25/2008 4:57:10 PM
Students have a biochemistry lab project related to molecular structure.
They are given a CD-ROM software product RASTOP that allows for 3-D visualization of molecules.
Their first exercise is outlined in a handout they received in class and slightly more detailed in their "manual"
The software works apparently only on GREEN-TOPPED PCs. The instructions SHOULD be self-explanatory from the manual--they are learning the VERY basics of how to manipulate 3-D models (in the case given them a simple protein) and answer several questions in their manual, which they then have to provide to the UBLearns site for the class.
If there are problems or issues contact me or have the student contact me via email ( fstoss@buffalo.edu) or phone 645-2947 ext. 224
Historic Maps Assignment: HIS 319 (dues thurs 1/31) 1/25/2008 4:22:29 PM
You may start seeing students from today till next thursday who have a map-related project to do.
They each have a theme and a blank (outline) map to fill in for the world or a part of it. The 1st student in was looking for maps showing world boundaries in 1919 (post WWI).
They can go to many sources but for good starting points, if you get stumped, try going and searching the following online:
http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/maps/researching_maps.html
go to the University of Texas at Austin site on this page:
http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/maps/researching_maps.html#locate
and once on the UT site, use the left column menu "Historic Maps" page. You can find many maps showing specific years or periods.
Also try:
http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~dbertuca/maps/e-maps-examples.html#t
scroll down to "historic maps" for a list of collections.
one link is:
Historical Atlas of the Twentieth Century
http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/20centry.htm
If these do not answer, you can refer to historical atlases in both ref collections, OR to atlases in the Map Room or Lock stacks. DON'T try to find atlases or maps for an exact date or period, but rather maps printed ABOUT a period.
You may also use BISON for reference type books on specific historical periods because these may contain the best maps on the theme (though you will need to look a little harder if you are not familiar with the topic).
Any further questions, contact me and I can assist. - David J. Bertuca
Soil Surveys for UB Amherst & Precipitation data 12/3/2007 2:52:24 PM
Just in case you find yourself at the desk and this question comes up, I have included the answer below:
There is a hydrology class that has students looking for soil composition mainly for UB Amherst campus. In addition to some other materials that I have provided, the one item that is being requested are actual soil surveys.
Use the following book. note there are copies on both campuses. Using the index in the front you can locate the 4 plates covering the campus. just after the index is the legend that explains what soil types are on the plates:
SCI/ENGR Book Collection: S591 .A22 N.Y. ErieLibrary Info
CAPEN LIBRARIES / Reference: S591 .A22 N.Y. ErieLibrary Info
LOCKWOOD LIBRARY / Documents Collection: US A 57.38: Er 4/
ARCHITECTURE PLANNING LIBRARY / Book Collection: S599.N7 S55 1986
ARCHITECTURE PLANNING LIBRARY / Reserve: S599.N7 S55 1986
Soil survey of Erie County, New York / United States Department of Agriculture, Soil Conservation Service ; in cooperation with the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station.
Published [Washington, D.C.?] : The Service, 1986. Description xi, 384 p., [4], 130 folded p. of plates : ill., maps (some col.) ; 28 cm.
we have at least 5 copies in SEL but 3 are already checked out. I am hoping now that most of the class has gotten their data and these may be the late ones. If you have further questions or needs let me know. THE CLASS I FOUND OUT IS HYDROLOGY AND THE PROJECTS ARE DUE FRIDAY--that doesn't stop people from rushing in late :<
Oh and they may ask about precipitation data by month for the area as well. Use Buffalo NWS station. see link on the Climate & Weather page:
<http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/climateweather.html#ncdc>
use link:
Local Climatological Data Publications for Buffalo, NY. select NY, then: Buffalo NY by year range. Look for 'annual' cumulation reports. the data by month is included in each of these.
Precip data is for 'total' monthly precip (not average, otherwise).
David J. Bertuca, Map Librarian
225 Capen Hall
University at Buffalo
Buffalo, NY 14260-1672
716-645-2947 x229
dbertuca@buffalo.edu
- David J. Bertuca, Map Librarian
Univ. of Chicago Press Journals - URL's all changed 12/3/2007 9:06:51 AM
I've contacted database support. Univ. of Chicago changed all their URL's last week. As of Monday morning, Dec. 2, they still haven't figured out how to do redirects on the new production system. So all old links are broken-- individual title and home pages. New URL for home page is http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/ - A. Ben Wagner
World Civilizations assignments... 10/18/2007 2:41:37 PM
Hi all...
Soon you will begin to encounter students from sections of the UGC-111 course (World Civilizations: Prehistory to 1500 CE) taught by professors William Baumer, Alfred Price and Donald McGuire. Together, these sections of the course amount to better than 600 students, and each of those students is required to write a term paper.
For the Baumer and McGuire sections, students are expected to find at least four-six secondary sources related to their topics (which have been assigned or pre-approved by the instructor), and those sources are expected to be primarily scholarly books and journal articles. Tertiary sources can be consulted, but they cannot be cited as references. Students are allowed to cite one-two web sources if they are deemed to be reputable and authoritative.
For Dr. Price's section of the course, students are required research and write about an ancient city civilization. For this paper, students must to find at least one relevant book on archeology or cultural anthropology; one book on history, sociology, or technology; two scholarly journal articles, and one map or illustration of the selected civilization. The same rules noted above apply to the use of tertiary sources and the web. Additional details regarding this assignment can be viewed at: http://www.ap.buffalo.edu/%7Eadprice/ugc111/TermPaper.htm
Thanks much...
- Chris Hollister
Casting assignment 9/4/2007 1:10:49 PM
This assignment comes up every year and here it is again: engineering students in a manufactures class have been asked to find an article on casting. The best resource for this is the engineering database, Compendex*Plus. Searching on "casting" in Compendex will yield huge sets and so you will want to prompt the students to refine their search, say by choosing a particular type of casting (die casting or sand casting, for example). They can also limit by English language and should also limit by year since the article should be recent. Please refer any students to me who need more help. - Nancy Schiller, schiller@buffalo.edu
ARC 201 Assignment 9/4/2007 9:31:12 AM
Students in the Sophomore Architectural Design Studio ARC 201 are looking for info on Flak- turms in Vienna or the Dutch Water Line. What I didn't realize is that the structures for which these students are seeking info are all fortifications. After a study of the various fortifications, the studio will eventually address the transformations of the
fortifications into contemporary structures. The course description was
helpful to me:<http://www.ap.buffalo.edu/pdfs/architecture/courses/fa_07/201.pdf>.
Since there seem to be very few publications entirely about individual fortifications or military structures, there may be more info. in books entirely about bunkers, fortifications, military architecture, etc. in the 16th century etc. Only one book is on reserve now for ARC 201 -- titled "Bunker Archaeology."
Subject headings for possibly useful books include:
Fortification -- France (or netherlands, China, etc. etc.)
Military architecture or archaeology.
I also found some articles in the Avery Index on adaptive reuse of such buildings, and some of them may contain plans, sections, etc. the materials the students are now seeking. I would also suggest that other articles or entries may be found in Art Index, Art Index Retrospective, JSTOR.There's also an entry in Grove Art Online on "Military rchitecture and fortification." This article provides a very brief overview and then some
entries by country. Don't forget to click on the illustrations and images in the bar at the top, which provide plans and images the students may be able to use.
It may also be useful to search by the title of individual structures, like Great Wall, etc. There's a bibilography for this entry and most likely indiv. bibs for indiv. structures.
- Dorothy Tao, singtao@buffalo.edu
Special NTIS Full-text database DARTS - 1964-2000 - updated access info 5/10/2007 12:33:11 PM
As a result of UB being a federal depository library, NTIS, the central clearinghouse for U.S. government technical reports, has provided us with free access to approximately 240,000 digitized, full-text reports from 1964-2000. This represents about 11% of the total number of NTIS reports available for this time period.
The database is called DARTS (Depository Access to Reports, Technical & Scientific). Access is by a single user i.d. and password with one concurrent user allowed. The user i.d./password cannot be given out to patrons for obvious reasons.
USER ID: ksmith2
PASSWORD: BErVg7Z$
[Note this is a new i.d. and password. The old one stopped working for undetermined resaons. --Ben Wagner 12/13/2007]
When I tested access, I was getting error messages while trying to log in with IE, but it worked fine with Firefox. This may be a temporary glitch.
Especially those that order government documents will want to remember to check this resource.
I will soon update the main technical report guide to note the existence of this material and ask that they contact a reference desk for access. Guide at < http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/tech_repts.html>
In brief, the process for finding out if we have a full-text of a given NTIS report is:
1) Search the BISON catalog by author/title words.
2) Search the NTIS database to verify citation and determine all associated report numbers.
3) If report is between 1964-2000, try the DARTS database described above. You have much better odds than the lottery!
4) Physically check the microfiche shelves in the Multimedia Center under ALL report numbers since many of our microfiche reports are not cataloged.
5) Many agencies have digitized reports and placed them on their web sites at no cost, sometimes going back several decades. Many of the larger digital collections are identified in our technical report guide (URL above), but it doesn't hurt to visit any of the funding agencies' web sites.
6) Go the ILL route or purchase the document from NTIS.
- A. Ben Wagner
Journal Title Coverage in Databases - a Reminder 4/12/2007 1:42:34 PM
Yesterday a faculty question proved to be a classic reminder about the pitfalls of journal title coverage in databases. The faculty member searched Web of Science (WOS) for an article in Smart Materials and Structures, Vol. 2, 1993 and could not find it. This journal is from a well-known publisher, Institute of Physics (IOP). It turns out that WOS was not indexing this title for the first 3 volumes. This was NOT inadvertent, but a matter of policy.
I noted in my reply to the faculty member that it is tempting to assume that such a large and multi-disciplinary database like WOS covers "everything". But precisely because it is so large and multi-disciplinary, it is a very expensive operation to run. One of the policy decisions that WOS producers have made is that they usually do not start to cover a journal until it has proved itself in the market place. Given the rate at which hundreds of new journals are started each year (and scores, if not hundreds, cease each year), even journals from a well-known publisher like IOP are not routinely covered starting with the first volume.
In this case, WOS did not start covering Smart Materials & Structures until v. 4, 1995. In certain cases, they will retrospectively index issues once coverage begins, but this, of course, is quite expensive and time consuming, so it is not unusual that they did not go back and index v. 1-3.
This is why we as librarians must continue to encourage all UB patrons to search at least 2-3 databases when it is important to not miss articles. In the case of the 1993 article under question, it is indexed and can be readily found in either Inspec or Compendex (Engineering Index). Inspec and Compendex have the advantage of having an engineering focus (a much smaller universe to cover than WOS), and hence they did start indexing this journal as soon as it appeared in 1992 with v. 1. - A. Ben Wagner
Legislative research-Professor carter 3/21/2007 12:02:59 PM
Professor Carter’s class in American Pluralism is upon us once again. Take a deep breath. This assignment is difficult, very difficult, but it is also a very good one. After helping these students you will either have a large bunch of personal satisfaction or you will need a hard drink—or perhaps both.
Professor Carter gave the students a bill number to research. Students must:
- Summarize the bill.
- Locate Congressional hearings and/or floor debates about their bill. If neither are available, comparable information about a related bill or related issues suffices.
Hearings are the debates and proceedings before the committees and/or subcommittees.
Floor debates (students may refer to these as floor fights) are the debates and proceedings in the House and Senate.
- Determine which Congress people/Senators are Democrats and Republicans. When giving the assignment, Professor Carter selected half of students to represent each party’s viewpoint during class debates.
The guide I prepared for this class is at http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/busdoc/instruction/ugc211sp07.pdf.
LOCATING CITATIONS TO HEARINGS USING CONGRESSIONAL UNIVERSE (Also called LexisNexis Congressional)
(http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/e-resources/cis.html)
If hearings were held on the bill--
Upon opening Congressional Universe, the system defaults to Congressional Publications. Select “Search by Number” along the top tabs and choose “Find Congressional publications related to a bill or law.” Click bill number, select the relevant Congress, select H.R. (House bill) or S. (Senate bill), type the bill number, and click search. Students must know the Congress number. You cannot go further without that information.
If hearings were not held on the bill—locate hearings on related bills or issues during the identical Congress.
Use Congressional Publications (cited along the left side bar) “Basic Search” or “Advanced Search.” Enter appropriate keywords, be certain to select the relevant Congress, and click Search.
Note titles, SuDoc numbers, and CIS accession numbers. (They may still be called
Important: Students must see how Republican and Democratic Congress people interact with the witnesses. Congressional Universe usually provides full texts of witnesses testimonies that is insufficient for the students needs. Students must see the complete hearing to determine how witnesses and committee members interacted.
LOCATING THE HEARINGS
- Most hearings will be available in paper in the Government Documents collection shelved according to SuDoc numbers cited in the Congressional Universe record.
- Online hearings: check the relevant committee home pages. Start with either http://www.house.gov or http://www.senate.gov and follow links to the Committee Web sites. Note that locating information on Committee Web sites was far easier when Republications controlled Congress. The Democrats don’t seem to be able to prepare Web pages as well.
- Microfiche: The Koren Center (Law Library) maintains microfiche copies of Congressional publications organized by CIS numbers.
LOCATING FLOOR DEBATES (FLOOR FIGHTS)
Select “Legislative Histories, Bills & Laws” along the left side bar.
Select “Get a Document” along the top tab, and choose bill tracking as the “Select document type” box. Select the appropriate Congress, H.R. or S., type the bill number, and click search.
Alternative—Select the “Keyword Search” tab, enter relevant keywords, select bill tracking, select the appropriate Congress, and click Search.
If there were no floor debates on the selected bill, use “Keyword Search” to retrieve information about the issues.
Results will refer you to Congressional Record citations.
LOCATING PARTY AFFILIATIONS
Congressional Universe Bill Tracking provides party affiliations of those presenting speeches on the floor, but students will still have to go further to see party affiliations of committee members.
Use Biographical Directory of the United States Congress at http://bioguide.congress.gov/biosearch/biosearch.asp. Enter the Congress number under “Year OR Congress” and click Search. Results will offer in one alphabetical list all Congress people and Senators in that Congress, and their party affiliations.
- Ed Herman
Case Studies - Teaching of Science National Center Contact Info 3/14/2007 10:53:48 AM
During Nancy Schiller's sabbatical, please refer all questions about case studies conferences, web site, submission and review of materials to:
Carolyn Wright
National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science
University at Buffalo
109 Cooke Hall
Dept. of Biological Sciences
Buffalo, NY 14260
Phone: 716-645-2363 x111
Email: cwright2@buffalo.edu
- A. Ben Wagner
2006 taxes 3/1/2007 5:29:34 PM
A guide to 2006 taxes are now online at http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/busdoc/TaxQuickGuide.html
It covers federal and state forms, and suggests resources that offer tax tips. The Tax tips section includes directories to free tax preparation services both on and off campus. - Ed Herman
SOC 370:Political Sociology 2/20/2007 11:25:52 AM
Michael Lichter's Political Sociology class is searching for biographical information on business leaders, wealthy/upper class individuals. Students will be asking for the Who's Who sources. BIOGRAPHY & GENEALOGY MASTER INDEX, WHO'S WHO IN THE WORLD and zoominfo.com are key sources that will answer most of their questions. If this doesn't work, feel free to refer them to me. Thanks!
- Glendora Johnson-Cooper
CHE 376 - Landolt-Bornstein Assignment 2/19/2007 7:16:04 PM
Step One - Find the correct volumes that cover crystal structure.
Use the Comprehensive Index 1996 (it is on the only dark blue volume with a prominent yellow stripe on the spine and usually is at the end of the set). This is NOT a compound index, but a general subject/keyword index. They are looking for crystal structure, but Landolt Bornstein has different volumes for crystal structure for inorganics vs. organics. Depending on whether they have an inorganic or organic (they should be able to tell you), they will have to look under "crystal ..." or "x-ray ...". This is tricky. Most of them simply look under "crystal...", if they can even figure out to look under that. Try to get them to think of other terms, in this case, x-ray crystallography is the prime method for determining/reporting crystal structure. Unfortunately, many students do not know this.
Step Two - Hopefully they can find the right entry in the Comprehensive Index. Organics are found in Group III, Vol. 5 and Inorganics in Group III, Vol. 7, but try and get them to figure this out for themselves. Vol. 5 and Vol. 7 both are actually composed of many physically separate subvolumes. There are prefaces, compound indexes, and keys to lit. references codes all in these volumes. - A. Ben Wagner
USA Trade Online 2/15/2007 4:44:48 PM
I received a request for access to a database, usatrade online. It provides very detailed statistics of foreign trade among the US and all other nations. GPO gave us login codes and passwords for 2 simultaneous users. We cannot give out this information, but must sign the library user on ourselves.
Note, this database is limited to US trade with other countries. It will not give import/export data between France and Germany, only US trade with those countries.
I am uncertain when he will show up.
URL: http://www.usatradeonline.gov
Login code: F0433 (number zero)
Password: F0433 (number zero)
The following email from the library user and my response to him puts this in context. Questions? Please let me know.
Ed
_______________________________________________________
Sorry I have not responded sooner. I was away visiting my daughter in Washington for about a week. We have access to USAtrade online through the GPO depository system, but we do not have an open subscription. The government Printing Office gave us passwords for 2 simultaneous users. You cannot get in on your own because we are unable to make the passwords public.
I will be certain that all reference librarians in lockwood library have the password and login code so that you can access the information without waiting for me. Unfortunately, this makes the database unavailable off campus. If you want to talk about this or if you need help using the database, give me a list of 4 or 5 times you are available in the next week or two. This database is an important one, but it is requested very infrequently. Thus, our existing access is usually sufficient. Unless we get more requests for it, I cannot justify paying for a subscription when we already have free access for 2 simultaneous users.
Another option, if it becomes very difficult for you to be on campus, email me very precise and clear instructions about what you need, and I will try to reply with an Excel file. This, however, can be difficult because what you preceive as correct statistics may be a bit different than what I perceive as being correct. We all know what games statistics can play with our minds.
Ed H
--On Thursday, February 08, 2007 10:38 AM -0500 "Johnston, Christopher" <Christopher.Johnston@thompsonhine.com> wrote:
> Ed: I have another question. I am trying to access the following
> database: USATradeOnline. Everytime I try to access I get the following
> message below. Can you look into it, thanks
>
> To allow
> /connect?session=sbdWAWM4NePnZiDd&url=http://www.usatradeonline.gov/ to
> work, your EZproxy administrator must first authorize this within the
> ezproxy.cfg file. Within this database's section of the file, the
> following line must be added: Host www.usatradeonline.gov
> The EZproxy server must then be restarted to make this change take
> effect.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: lolherma@buffalo.edu [mailto:lolherma@buffalo.edu]
> Sent: Friday, October 20, 2006 03:19 PM Eastern Standard Time
> To: Johnston, Christopher
> Subject: OECD Database
>
> Chris:
>
> Since speaking to you about the OECD International Direct Investment
> database, we had that bad storm. The University was closed for a couple
> of days, and I was out when my house lacked power. At this point, all
> is beginning to return to normal.
>
> The price of the database is questionable. OECD lists it as $215 per
> year, but I question if that is correct. I have a call into OECD about
> this. If we purchase it, we would want a site licence for the entire
> campus. $215 seems far to low for a campus of 25,000. I will get back
> to you once I have additional information from the publisher and an
> answer from the purse keepers about purchasing it.
>
> This brief note is to let you know I haven't forgotten about you or your
> request. It is just taking a bit longer than expected.
>
> Additional questions, concerns-- please contact me.
>
> Ed Herman
>
> __________________________________________________________________________
>
> Edward Herman
> Lockwood Library
> University at Buffalo
> Buffalo, NY 14260-2200
>
> Email: lolherma@buffalo.edu
> Voice: 716-645-2814 x 431
> Fax: 716-645-3859 - Ed Herman
Regional Knowledge Network 1/29/2007 8:33:52 AM
The Regional Knowledge Network (formerly Regional Information Network - RIN) produced by the University at Buffalo Regional Institute is greatly expanding the data and information available through and in it. See below for the most recent information. We do have a PDP for this resource, thanks to Ed Herman () and I encourage you to take a look at it. There is a lot of information which would assist in the requests we get for local information via email, desk, etc. I will also post this to the Reference Alerts page. Thanks
POLICY BRIEF FOCUSES ON PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT IN WNY (01/22/07) The Buffalo metro economy is slightly more reliant on public sector employment than that of the United States, but less dependent than New York State as a whole and surrounding rural counties, according to the latest Regional Institute Policy Brief focusing on "The Public Sector in WNY." http://www.buffalo.edu/news/fast-execute.cgi/article-page.html?article=83690009
PUBLIC SAFETY DATA, MAPS ADDED TO REGIONAL KNOWLEDGE NETWORK (01/25/07) The latest data on violent crime, fire fatalities andalcohol-related motor vehicle accidents in Western New York are among 52 Public Safety variables just added to the Regional Knowledge Network, an online information resource developed by the University at Buffalo Regional Institute. http://www.buffalo.edu/news/fast-execute.cgi/article-page.html?article=83810009 - Margie Wells (mwells@buffalo.edu)
CHE 376 - Intro to Chem Literature - General Information 1/23/2007 9:59:29 AM
Subject: It must be spring because CHE 376 is here! [Send to ASLREF on 1/19/2007]
Yes, 36 eager students in CHE 376 Introduction to Chemical Literature with 16 ambitious library-intensive assignments, not to mention the major literature search project. I know in some years I have not keep up and annotated the assignments as quickly as I should have. Determined to turn over a new leaf (ah, spring), I have used my instructor access to pull down the entire set of assignments. The entire set is now annotated and available in a green binder in the bottom filing drawer of the UGL/SEL reference desk.
Though I will document unexpected problems using the Reference Alert system as we move thru the semester, I did want make a few general comments about helping students in this class.
1) Please do not release assignments before they are available to the students (you will know, they will have them with them as they have lots of blanks to fill in).
2) As with library students doing reference assignments, do you best to point them in the right direction while not answering the questions for them.
3) Many of the assignments ask questions that can only be answered by reading the front matter, footnotes, or end matter of the table, section, chapter, or volume they are using. One of the prime objectives of the course is to get students to realize that most reference sources do explain themselves if you simply read the introductory material, footnotes, etc. If they don't understand what a column in a table means, assure them that it is explained within the work.
4) Many assignments use student assignment numbers that key into a list of compounds or properties. Hence every student is doing the same assignment, but looking up different compounds or properties. If they are directed to a reference source and can not find their compounds, first have them check the original assignment sheet on UBLearns to make sure they didn't misspell it. Then make sure they are in the right section/table. If they still can't find it, they perhaps need to look it up in the table or the index by registry number, molecular formula or under a synonym different than what the assignment sheet gives (that's a tricky one, but Mrs. Clarke is trying to teach the students that some times what you want isn't always under the name you are given.
5) Last year, some students demonstrated a rather amazing lack of basic chemical knowledge. I certainly don't expect you to calculate molecular formulas or classify compounds for them. If you run into someone that doesn't understand the chemistry of what they are looking up, please refer them to me.
6) The students are told by Mrs. Clarke that part of the value of the course is in them figuring out how these things work. They should not be coming to the reference desk needing help with every single question on an assignment.
7) I trust you all know that I never mind getting a call from the reference desk to come down and help out if I'm here. Some of these assignments require significant chemical knowledge, especially the Ring System Index and some of the physical property assignments. Feel free to ask for my assistance.
-- A. Ben Wagner Sciences Librarian - A. Ben Wagner
NTIS and Technical Reports at the Reference Desk 12/4/2006 11:25:37 AM
I didn't expect such an immediate impact from our moving the NTIS
database onto a new platform. NTIS provides citations plus abstracts to
technical reports. This past week we moved the NTIS database from OVID
to the Engineering Village II platform so it can be searched along with
Compendex (Engineering Index). As a result, I have been getting email
from engineering students and you may start seeing some of these technical
report citations at the SEL/UGL Reference Desk and at the Media Center
Desk.
Of course we've had access to NTIS before this on OVID, but on the
Engineering Village platform the _default_ setting for searching is to
include it with Compendex and the other database on the system, INSPEC.
Before, students had to select it on OVID, and very few of them knew what
NTIS was or how it might be relevant to them. With this new bundled
arrangement, students are going to come across technical report citations
now with greater ease and frequency. The students I helped last week had
emailed me to find out (a) what sort of publication these were (!) and (b)
because they turned out to be highly relevant to their research, whether
UB had them.
This is good. The thing is, because students have never seen these
kinds of citations before and are more familiar with journal or book
references, when they emailed me, they did not include the report and
accession numbers from the NTIS record which we need in order to check
up here in the Capen Media Center to see whether we have them in our
extensive microfiche collection. We file technical reports in fiche by
accession and/or report number.
How will you know what a student is showing you is a citation to a
technical report? Citations for technical reports often carry a
sponsoring organization's name - that's one way to know them. Often
(though not always) the sponsoring organization is affiliated with the
government, so EPA or the Air Force, say. Another way to identify them is
by what's _not_ in the citation - there won't be a journal name, no volume
numbers, no publisher's name, etc.
If the student has the NTIS record printed out or has copied down the
report number and accession number from the database, that's great - send
them on up to the Media Center with it. If not, you can help out by going
into NTIS and searching by author and some combination of title keywords
to bring up the Complete/Full Reference and print it out. That will have
the accession number (usually starts with a PB- or AD- or AD-A) and the
report number. With that, they can go upstairs and get help at the Media
Center Desk.
I had two queries from engineering students last week and it turned out
we had both of the reports, filed under the PB- accession numbers.
I can always help with these, as can Michael Kankiewicz. Michael's
contact info is 645-2947 ext. 268, michaelk@buffalo.edu
Thanks!
Nancy
Nancy Schiller
Engineering Librarian
University at Buffalo, State University of New York
Science and Engineering Library
228 Capen Hall
Buffalo, NY 14260-1672
email: schiller@acsu.buffalo.edu
voice: 716-645-2947 x225
fax: 716-645-3710
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Premium news at news@nature.com 11/16/2006 5:48:36 AM
Patrons may come across links to "premium" news content items on various pages on the nature.com (Nature magazine and all its spinoffs). These links direct you a separate and distinct news@nature.com web site where the patron likely will be blocked from reading the full-text. Our institutional subscription to nearly all of nature.com content does not include premium content at this separate news@nature.com (actual url: http://www.nature.com/news/index.html).
In a shameless move that I have never seen the likes of, many of these premium news items are actually republished news items published in Nature and available to us via our subscription to nature.com content. I am indebted to Dana Roth at CalTech for pointing out this fact and for providing the following procedure below for tracking down the full-text of premium news@nature.com articles that we supposedly can not access.
==================
I would first copy the title of the news item and paste it into the search box on the 'Nature' site and search all of Nature.com
If this doesn't work, I would then search it in Google ... As it may have been copied into another source.
It also appears that 'news' items are dumped into NatureNews prior to their appearance in the next issue of Nature. For example, I just received the contents of the Nov. 16 issue of Nature (which isn't on the Nature.com site yet) and see the ones below, which were on the NatureNews site as well ...
The politics of breathing p248
Both sides in a US pollution dispute claim that science is on their side. Emma Marris explains how environmental laws have forced them into this position. 10.1038/444248a Full Text | PDF
WHO boss faces test of independence p250
China's candidate secures top job at health agency. Declan Butler 10.1038/444250a Full Text | PDF
================ - A. Ben Wagner
UGC 211 - American Pluralism Assignment 10/18/2006 9:52:18 AM
Approximately 100 students in this class are working a legislative history of a bill. They should have the bill number and the Congress. A handout for this class is at http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/busdoc/instruction/ugc211f06.pdf.
More simply, use LexisNexis Congressional Universe to locate information about the bill. The system defaults to the basic search form.
1. Select "Search by Bill Number," one of the three tabs.
2. The following page has 2 options, "Select task" and "Search on."
3. Under Select Task, "Find Congressional publications related to a bill or law."
4. Under "Search On," select "Bill number," the appropriate Congress number, H.R. or S. (House of Representatives or Senate bill), type the bill number, and click search.
5. A list of publications relating to the said bill should then appear.
Ignore the section entitled, "Search within."
Questions, Concerns? Please let me know.
- Ed Herman, lolherma@buffalo.edu
American Chemical Society Journals Access Problems 10/17/2006 2:28:04 PM
Over the past few days, there has been an interesting problem when attempting to browse issues of ACS journals, especially J. of the Amer. Chem. Society. When clicking on "Browse Issues", one may see 2/3 of the screen filled up with a message in several languages indicating that the ACS web site is under going maintenance with the typical "Select Decade" "Select year" "Select Pages" browsing screen way off to the right.
To clear this problem, clear your cookies and temporary Internet files using "Tools: Internet Options" in MS IE (or the equivalent in other browsers). Apparently at some point over the past few days, the ACS journal site was sending out a faulty cookie or there was a cache problem that does not clear properly. I did not notice the problem with Mozilla FireFox, but then I seldom use that browser, so I may have simply never gotten the bad informaiton stuck in the cache.
Please let me know if you continue to have problems accessing ACS articles. - A. Ben Wagner
World Civ assignments... 9/27/2006 11:07:11 AM
Professors Steve Jurek, William Baumer, and Al Price all have research paper assignments for thier World Civ students this semester. Together, their sections for the course constitute about 800 students. We are completing library instruction sessions for their classes this week. As a reminder, the resources on our World Civilizations 1 subject page will be useful to a good portion of the students in these classes...
Cheers!
Chris - Chris Hollister
Census Assignment: Environmental Design Workshop 9/20/2006 9:33:18 AM
> Professor Bis' Environmental Design Workshop class has a census question.
I sent the following message yesterday without realizing overlooking the point that some of the tables in chapter C are subdivided by sex.
Chapter C: General Social and Economic Characterists will give
> educational attainment. Depending upon the size of the place one of the
> following tables will likely work:
>
> 50,000 or more--table 119
> 10,000-50,000--table 157
> 2,500-10,000--table 166
> smaller than 2,500-out of luck
Students need totals for males plus females.
Ed Herman
Students must locate the population of a place, selected educational
> attainment data for that place, and then compare the same to 2000.
>
> 1980 data:
>
> Use Characteristics of the Population.
>
> Chapter A: Number of Inhabitants will give the total population, in most
> cases on table 5.
> Chapter C: General Social and Economic Characterists will give
> educational attainment. Depending upon the size of the place one of the
> following tables will likely work:
>
> 50,000 or more--table 119
> 10,000-50,000--table 157
> 2,500-10,000--table 166
> smaller than 2,500-out of luck
>
> These volumes are bound together on the document shelves at US
> C3.223/5-8:980... with a separate series for each state. There might be
> a circulating copy for NYS if not borrowed. A copy for NYS is also in
> Lockwood reference in the HA.. series with the other census volumes.
> They are also online in pdf format at
> < http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/decennial/1980cenpopv1.htm>
>
> 2000 data:
>
> Use American FactFinder ( http://factfinder.census.gov) The students
> already know how to use this.
> - Edward Herman
Census Question - Message from Ed Herman 9/20/2006 8:23:41 AM
Professor Bis' Environmental Design Workshop class has a census question. Students must locate the population of a place, selected educational attainment data for that place, and then compare the same to 2000.
1980 data:
Use Characteristics of the Population.
Chapter A: Number of Inhabitants will give the total population, in most cases on table 5.
Chapter C: General Social and Economic Characterists will give educational attainment. Depending upon the size of the place one of the following tables will likely work:
50,000 or more--table 119
10,000-50,000--table 157
2,500-10,000--table 166
smaller than 2,500-out of luck
These volumes are bound together on the document shelves at US C3.223/5-8:980... with a separate series for each state. There might be a circulating copy for NYS if not borrowed. A copy for NYS is also in Lockwood reference in the HA.. series with the other census volumes.
They are also online in pdf format at < http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/decennial/1980cenpopv1.htm>
2000 data:
Use American FactFinder ( http://factfinder.census.gov) The students already know how to use this.
Ed Herman - Ed Herman
Chemistry/Engineering Encyclopedia by Onken 9/13/2006 10:59:29 AM
Students in a chemical engineering class, most likely, have been asked to come over to Capen and take a look at "a chemistry-engineering encyclopedia by Onken." We believe that the work they are to look at (and get a sense of what it covers and how it is organized) is the major, multi-volume: Vapor-liquid equilibrium data collection by J. Gmehling and U. Onken, call number: UGL/SEL Reference QD503 .G59. Students can examine the volumes here and read the prefatory material at the beginning of the work to understand its scope and layout. - Nancy Schiller
Assignment on metal casting 8/30/2006 12:08:09 PM
There is a mechanical engineering class with an assignment to find a
"basic article" on casting and write a 2-page paper on it.
We've seen this assignment before, but then we had access to Compendex
(the major engineering article and conference proceeding database) on
OVID. We are now accessing it on a new platform, Engineering Village II,
so the strategy for helping them has changed a bit. Also, all of the full
text links are not yet working on the new platform (more on that below).
Compendex remains the best resource for this, but as before, if you do this
as a keyword search you will get way too many results.
Click instead on the Thesaurus tab at the top.
Enter the word casting, then select it from the listing you will get and
search on it.
You still will get too much - some 4,200 hits.
But on this new platform, you will see over to the right a Refine Results
option.
Scroll down and under Controlled Vocabulary there will be some ways for
the students to refine their search by sub-category or topic, though this
is fairly limited.
Keep going, and you can also select just "Journal article."
They can also refine by English language only, if they wish, and by Year.
This will help provide them with a more manageable set to browse.
Finally, (or to begin with!) you can also ask students what aspect of
casting they are most interested in. Just now the student I was working
with said sand casting, and that got us far fewer results and almost every
article we pulled up on the first screen worked for him.
About the full text links: There are some full text Links working but
SFX has not been turned on yet and so there is much more full text
available to us than is currently showing in the database. Please keep
that in mind as well when you are helping these students. They can
double check for print or online in BISON and also using Electronic
Journals, since some of these may be for trade magazines we have access
to inside another (probably business) database. We are hoping to have the
full text links operational soon, perhaps in the next few weeks.
Nancy Schiller
Engineering Librarian
University at Buffalo, State University of New York
Science and Engineering Library
228 Capen Hall
Buffalo, NY 14260-1672
email: schiller@buffalo.edu
voice: 716-645-2947 x225
fax: 716-645-3710
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Income Tax information & workshops for UB International Students 2/7/2006 9:22:00 AM
Income tax time is a challenge for many people, but it can be especially confusing for international students and visiting professors. The Office of International Student and Scholar Services offers many services to help international students and visiting scholars meet their tax filing obligations. The following links will prove to be very useful to the international UB community:
* http://wings.buffalo.edu/intlservices/tax.html
* http://wings.buffalo.edu/intlservices/workdesc.html#tax (Income Tax Workshop listing)
* http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/international/article/0,,id=96431,00.html
- Don Hartman
High School student history papers 12/12/2005 1:59:38 PM
A class from Lancaster High School may be visiting the library in the following weeks for a paper each student has due mid January. Each student has a different topic but all have to do with some aspect of U.S History--Civil War, Vietnam War, laissez-faire. Their teacher emphasized that they use scholarly journal articles so they will need step by step help with the process of finding articles online and in print. A group of 4 came in on the weekend. - Ligaya Ganster
Climate Meetings in Montreal 11/28 - 12/9 11/28/2005 3:04:46 PM
Historic Climate Change Gathering in Montreal
From the 28th of November to the 9th of December 2005 at the Palais des Congrès de Montréal in Montréal, Quebec, Canada will host the first meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol in Montreal in conjunction with the eleventh session of the Conference of the Parties to the Climate Change Convention.
Scientists, policy makers, educators, heads of state and their representing delegations, leaders of NGOs from around the world will gather for this historic event. Not only will the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) be meeting for the 11th time by the Conference of the Parties (COP 11), but this meeting also marks the first meeting of the Parties to the Party (MOP 1), since the enforcement of the landmark international treaty, the Kyoto Protocol. This United Nations Climate Change Conference is set to be the largest intergovernmental climate conference since the Kyoto Protocol was adopted in 1997. Some 8,000–10,000 participants are expected. Because of the nature of emissions trading and energy technologies leading towards use of non-carbon sources, this conference is attracting unprecedented business interests.
The following is a list of resources that might be helpful for faculty and students to stay abreast of the scores of programs, events, and issues, especially those related to pan-European emissions trading and the Clean Development Mechanism (a tool to promote sustainable development and combat climate change) is operational.
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
http://unfccc.int/meetings/cop_11/items/3394.php
This is the site from which detailed information with regard to the agendas, daily programs, listings of the climate talk series, listings of the scores of parallel and side events and exhibits, links to the conference Webcasts, and the he Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB), a balanced, timely and independent reporting service covering the Conference, in print and electronic formats are found. Numerous links to preceding reports and events are also found on the UNFCCC site.
International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD)
http://www.iisd.org/
IISD is one of the largest NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) providing comprehensive coverage of the COP 11 Conference. They will provide the international communities with authoritative, neutral coverage of negotiations through the Earth Negotiations Bulletin (see above UNFCCC site), and of official side events through ENB on the Side. IISD's Reporting Services Team will provide comprehensive daily coverage of the COP-11/MOP-1 negotiations and selected side events in English, French and Spanish, including text, audio and photos.
Climate-L
http://lists.iisd.ca:81/read/?forum=climate-l
Climate-L is a news and announcement email discussion list focusing on climate change policy and issues. Postings include breaking climate news, announcements of workshops and conferences, job listings, new books, scientific and policy reports, and information on new publications and online resources.
The Pew Center on Global Climate Change
http://www.pewclimate.org/
The Pew Center on Global Climate Change was established in 1998 as a non-profit, non-partisan and independent organization. The Center's mission is to provide credible information, straight answers, and innovative solutions in the effort to address global climate change. Working on an issue that is often polarized and politicized, the Pew Center provides a forum for objective research and analysis and for the development of pragmatic policies and solutions. The Pew Center has emerged as one of the more progressive organizations involving innovative and meaningful contributions addressing issues related to global climate change.
The Helios Centre and ÉcoRessouces Consultants
http://www.ecoressources.com/ or http://www.centrehelios.org/en/
This organization has produced a Guide to the COP/MOP process, entitled “Navigating the COP/MOP.” It is a short, user-friendly guide to assist participants in better understanding the new layer of the climate change negotiations and is provided in English, French and Spanish can be downloaded at no cost.
What’s Your Carbon Footprint?
www.bp.com/
On the eve of the COP 11/MOP 1 conference I saw a commercial asking the question, “What is your carbon footprint?” An eclectic group of black, white, Latino, Asian, young, old, rich, not-so rich, men and women did not know. The commercial closed by saying, “If you don’t know what it is you can’t answer the question.”
While the United States, as non-signator to the Kyoto Protocol is not playing a major role in these ongoing negotiations, there are several excellent sources of global change data and information:
Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center
http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/
(see their Trends: A Compendium of Data on Global Change at http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/trends/trends.htm)
Global Warming Impacts: Great Lakes
http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/globalwarming.nsf/content/ImpactsWaterResourcesGreatLakes2.html
Global Warming Where You Live: New York
http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/globalwarming.nsf/content/us-NewYork.html
NASA’s Earth Observing System (EOS)
http://eospso.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Our Changing Planet: The U.S. Global Change Science Program for FY 2006 (A Report by the Climate Change Science Program and The Subcommittee on Global Change Research, A Supplement to the President's Fiscal Year 2006 Budget)
www.usgcrp.gov/usgcrp/Library/ocp2006/default.htm
US Government Agencies Participating in the USGCRP
http://www.usgcrp.gov/usgcrp/agencies/
U.S. Global Change Data and Information System (USGCDIS)
globalchange.gov/ (has not been updated by current Administration since Dec 2004)
U.S. Global Change Research Information Office (GCRIO)
www.gcrio.org/
U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP)
www.usgcrp.gov/
World Data Centers (WDCs)
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/wdc/wdcmain.html
(for details see: Stoss, F.W. 2005. “World Data Centers.” In: Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science—Online Version at:
For more Websites related to Global Climate Change U.S. Research and Policy see ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/environment/ecochange.html
(based on an article by Frederick W. Stoss, “The Heat Is On! U.S. Global Climate Change Research and Policy [Web sites]. EContent v. 23 no. 4 (August/September 2000) p. 36-44) - Fred Stoss
Census data-Professor Price's class 11/15/2005 9:59:36 AM
Professor Price’s students in PD312, “Design of Cities,” will be in the library in the next two weeks working on an assignment. They have to evaluate changes in their home communities for each decennial census since 1900.
Decennial census volumes are available in paper format between 1900 and 1960 at US C3.16: year. The paper collection during this period has many gaps. Use the microfilm described below to fill in the holes. Data for 1970 and 1980 are at C3.223. Use American FactFinder (http://factfinder.census.gov) for 1990 and 2000.
Note: Prior to 1980, the Bureau of the Census published very limited information for towns. The majority of data is for cities and villages. Someone who lives in a town may want to use a city or village closest to their town.
The Libraries own a complete set of decennial censuses on microfilm housed in the Capen Multimedia Center at MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 reel#. Arrangement of microfilms is by year and then type of census.
The call number MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 1 1900.1 is the first title on reel 1 of the 1900 Census of Population. 1900.2 is the second title on the same reel. Michael Kankiewicz should be able to help students locate relevant films given the following information. All citations below include information for New York State. If people need data for other states, consult BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REEL INDEX: A GUIDE TO THE MICROFILM EDITION OF UNITED STATES DECENNIAL CENSUS PUBLICATIONS, 1790-1970. (Lockwood Reference and Capen Multimedia Center HA195 .R47 1975)
1900
Census reports. Twelfth census of the United States taken in the year 1900. Population.
Volume 1 MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population 1900.1
Volume 2 MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population 1900.2
1910
Thirteenth census of the United States taken in the year 1910. Washington, D.C., U.S. Government Printing Office, 1913¬1914. Volumes I-IV.
Volume I. Population: 1910. 'General report and analysis. 1913.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 1 1910.1
Volume III. Population: 1910. Reports by states, with statistics for counties, cities, and other civil divisions. Nebraska-Wyoming, Alaska, Hawaii, and Porto Rico. 1913.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 2 1910.3
1920
Fourteenth census of the United States taken in the year 1920
Volume I. Population: 1920. Number and distribution of inhabitants. 1921.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 1 1920.1
Volume II. Population: 1920. General report and analytical tables.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 1 1920.2
Volume III. Population: 1920. Composition and characteristics of the population by states.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 2 1920.3
1930
Fifteenth census of the United States: 1930.
Volume I. Number and distribution of inhabitants. Total population for states, counties,' and townships or other minor civil divisions; for urban and rural areas; and for cities and other incorporated places.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel1 1930.1
Volume II. General report. statistics by subjects. 1933. vi, 1407 p.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel1 1930.2
Volume II Pt. 2. Montana-Wyoming. 1932. iii, 1395 p.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 3 1930.4
1940
Sixteenth census of the United States: 1940.
Volume I. Number of inhabitants. Total population for states, counties, and minor civil divisions; for urban and rural areas; for incorporated places; for metropolitan districts; and for census tracts. Comprising the first series of population bulletins for the states, territories, and possessions.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 1 1940.1
Volume II. Characteristics of the population. Sex, age, race, nativity, citizenship, country of birth of foreign born white, school attendance, education, employment status, class of worker, major occupation group, and industry group. Comprising the second series of population bulletins for the states.
Volume II Pt. 5. New York-Oregon.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 4 1940.6
Volume III. The labor force. Occupation, industry, employment, and income.
Pt. 4. Nebraska-Oregon. Comprising the third series of population bulletins for the states. vii, 1010 p.
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 7 1940.12
1950
Bureau of the Census
Census of population: 1950. A report of, the seventeenth decennial census of the United States.
Volume I. Number of inhabitants. 1952. 1428 p., tables, charts, maps. [Contains total population for states, counties, and minor civil divisions, (townships, etc.); for cities and other incorporated places; for unincorporated places of 1,000 inhabitants or more; for wards of cities of 5,000 inhabitants or more; and for urbanized areas. Organized into separate chapters for the states, the District of Columbia, the territories and possessions, with a summary for the United states. Incorporates the 54 Series P-A bulletins, Number, of inhabitants, 1951-1952, which were paper-covered preprints" of separate chapters of Volume I.]
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 1 1950.1
Volume II. Characteristics of the population. Number of inhabitants, general and detailed characteristics of the population. 1952-1953. Various paging, tables, map. Parts 1-54 in 51 v. [Contains data for age, sex, race, nativity, citizenship, education, marital status, changes in residence between 1949 and 1950, number of married couples, families and households, country of birth of the foreign-born white, employment status, occupation, family and individual income, relation to head of household, etc. Each part of Volume II comprises the 3 bulletins for that area:
Series P-A, Number of inhabitants; P-B, General characteristics; and P-C, Detailed characteristics. Within a single binding, the three bulletin series become Chapters A, B, and C of the corresponding state or area part of Volume 11.]
Volume II, part 32 New York
MicFilm HA 195 U5 1975 Population Reel 8 1950.33
This note includes a lot of information that is difficult to follow, particularly if you have limited experience with the Census. Please let me know about any questions or concerns. - Edward Herman
Archaeology 11/11/2005 1:24:43 PM
Dr. Zubrow's Archaeology class has an assignment due soon and students are starting to stop by ASL reference desks or making appointments with me. The assignment is to write a fiction paper based around an archaeological site so they need a "site report". To help students find books they will need to have an idea of what area of the world they want to focus on. We have the Encyclopedia of archaeology : History and discoveries at Lockwood reference, call number CC100 .E54 2001, if they have no clue what area to choose. If they know a country you can do a catalogue search using the subject heading "excavations (archaeology)", which is then broken down into country or region. You can also find site reports using the name of the country as a subject then choosing the subheading "antiquities". This usually leads to a subject listing of specific archaeological sites and students can choose a site from that listing. Oftentimes students think just typing in the term "site report" will get them what they want but reports usually don't use that term. Archaeologists get creative, see Kenneth Holum's "King Herod's dream : Caesarea on the sea". If students don't get enough information from books then they can use JSTOR but they will definately need the name of a site for that kind of search. The website ArchNet http://archnet.asu.edu/ contains links to archaeology associations, projects, and government agencies. You can click "Regional Views" and then select an area on the map. From there students can browse by country. Some places don't have site reports but some have excellent interactive project websites like those at K'axob http://www.bu.edu/tricia/index.shtml.
As always students can make an appointment with me for further assistance. - Cindi Tysick
EAS 480/580 Technical Communication for Engineers Assignment 10/27/2005 8:23:18 AM
Dear Colleagues,
Students in EAS 480/580, Technical Communications for Engineers, are working on their major project for that class, which is to write a proposal for some new product, process, innovation, technique, etc. They have to provide background information and a context for their idea as well as sufficient technical information. They also often need to include cost information, man (woman) hours, etc., if relevant to their proposal. No two students are working on the same thing. I have one student in the class proposing collapsible goal posts while another is working on ideas for improving traffic flow through urban intersections. I met with the class yesterday and gave them an overview of the various engineering and other relevant databases they can search. Compendex is a good place to start any of them in, but they should also be searching some of the business databases, and their guide directs them to do that). The guide is online at:http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/asl/guides/engineering/tech_proposal.html
While this provides a framework, some of them may be looking for small bits of information that are often hard to find. We've had a student in today looking for the cost of electricity per kilowatt (we have a number of statistical sources of information for energy in our collections and online through BISON) and I had another who contacted me on email who needed the price of industrial gases (in the end, we called the local company, Praxair, for that one). I've also had others who have needed to identify manufacturers of piston cylinders and UV light systems (the Thomas Register is good for that--and it's on the guide).
Please feel free to direct these students to me. Best way for them to contact me is by email (which is also on their guide!). Thanks very much!
Nancy Schiller, Engineering Librarian, schiller@buffalo.edu - Nancy Schiller
MGF 656 Assignment 10/26/2005 5:26:00 PM
Students may come to the reference desk looking for "return on equity for SIC 5943." More specifically, the students need to get the return on equity (ROE) for Office Depot and its corresponding industry. A professor for an accounting and law class sent around an email directing students to the ValueLine Investment Surveys.
You can always refer these students to me (and the professor mentioned me in the email). That said, if you do get cornered by an ROE seeking student, here's how to get the data from ValueLine:
1 - The ValueLine binder is in the ready reference collection at Lockwood (Ref HG 4501 .V26).
2 - In the index at the beginning of the binder, look up the page numbers for the Office Depot profile and the corresponding industry (Office Equip/Supplies) profile. Profile for Office Depot is on page 1143; profile for the Office Equip/Supplies industry is on page 1137.
3 - ROE is a data point that can be found on each of the profiles under the heading "Return on Shr. Equity." They should look at the figure for 2004 (most recent completed year). Office Depot's ROE is 11.7% and the industry ROE is 20.2%.
Some context:
There are about 80 people grouped in twenty teams in the class. The teams get to choose whether or not they want to use ROE for the assignment, so not all of them will be stopping by. The assignment is due Friday.
Just FYI, some other resources for this type of data (industry statistics / ratios / norms) are:
*1 - Almanac of Business and Industrial Financial Ratios* (Ref HF 5681 R25 A46)
*2 - D&B Industry Norms and Key Business Ratios* (Ref HF 5681 R25 I525)
*3 - RMA Annual Statement Studies* (Ref HF 5681 B2 R6) - Charles Lyons
Legislative history--Daemen College Assignment 10/24/2005 9:57:46 AM
A Daemen College class has an assignment to locate the voting record for a bill in the Congressional Record, and then determine what states and parties those voting represented. The Professor already gave students a bill to work with.
or
follow links from the ASL Staff Web page. Select
Manuals and Training Documents
Workshop Documents [ASL]
- Edward Herman
Legislative history project 10/21/2005 12:51:22 PM
A Daemen College class is using the Libraries to do a legislative history of a bill. They need to know who voted yea and nea, and who did not vote. Afterwards, they must determine how a state delegation voted on the bill. Students must use the Congressional Record to get the vote and the Congressional Directory to determine state delegations.
A guide to answering this question is at < http://libweb.lib.buffalo.edu/aslstaff/trainingdocs.html>, or go to the ASL Staffweb page and select Manuals and Training - Workshop Documents - Congressional Record --Bill Histories. Ed H - Ed Herman
ARC 231/531: History of Architecture 10/14/2005 4:27:58 PM
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ARC 231/531: History of Architecture: Research Skills
Dorothy Tao, Arts & Sciences Librarian
Phone: 829-3505 (APL) or 645-2814 ext.438 (LML)
e-mail: singtao@buffalo.edu |
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Workshop Objectives:
Become familiar with the UB Libraries http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries
- Become familiar with a research plan http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/units/ugl/tutorials/choosingoverview.html
- Find background information on your topic in encyclopedias and texts
- Refine your topic; come up with a variety of subject terms (keywords) on your topic
- Find books, case studies, and technical reports on your topic in the BISON catalog
- Find articles in databases using subject (keywords).
- Find Images
- Find Web materials on your topic
- Review evaluation of materials and citation in proper format
TASK: Find Background Information
TOOL: Encyclopedias, Dictionaries. Web search engine, guides
Browse general overviews or surveys in encyclopedias, dictionaries, texts or Web sites that present ideas on your subject. These publications provide general background information, images, and diagrams on a topic. They can help identify key issues and themes and define terms and concepts. They often include bibliographies or lists of resources for more information.
EXAMPLES:
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