An end user search service with customized interface software
William H. Mischo, Melvin G. DeSart · Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) · 1987
Libraries are presently investigating three methods of providing enhanced online access to periodical information. These are: ( 1 ) mounting commercially produced bibliographic databases in local online systems, often using the same software employed in the online catalog; (2) making available fixed-cost searching utilizing optical disc (CD-ROM) databases; and (3) providing an end user searching service utilizing front-end search software and/or the less expensive after-hours commercial vendor systems. Many academic libraries are exploring all three options. There are economic, service, and retrieval advantages associated with each approach. Clearly, the most comprehensive access to the periodical and report literature is through the commercial database vendors with their broad "information supermarkets" and sophisticated retrieval software. This continues to be particularly true in the sciences which possess numerous large and complex databases which have not readily lent themselves to optical storage and retrieval technologies. This article describes a project at the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign Library that has focused on the third option described earlier i.e., providing enhanced access to the periodical literature through an end user searching service which utilizes the commercial database vendors. This demonstration project employs customized microcomputer interface software designed to facilitate the search process for end users. The service offers controlled end user searching as an option within an online catalog interface.