9/12; Searching for references using the ASU Libraries and GEOREF
If you are doing geologic research, how can you find out what research has been
done before on a subject or by a certain scientist?
ASU Libraries
You can search the ASU Libraries for books and journals.
let's try it.
Go to the ASU Libraries web page
(http://www.lib.asu.edu/),
see what is there, and then go to the
Catalog link
(http://catalog.lib.asu.edu/).
Try to find some books on computers and geology.
Note the different ways of viewing your search, emailing it to yourself,
and browsing related subjects.
GEOREF
One thing that you will see is that you can only search for books that the
ASU libraries have when using their main catalog database. how do you
find out about more references, especially journal articles, theses, maps,
etc. that might relate to your questions?
The American Geological Institute,
a professional organization for
geologists, has developed and maintains a database of geologically related
references. That database is called
GEOREF. It is the
most comprehensive database in the geosciences. You should have a look at
their web pages and see the description of georef.
The University has its GEOREF delivered on CD-ROM. The CDs are in a CD
jukebox somewhere in the library.
You can search these CDs at one of the Library terminals by clicking on the
Silver Platter icon.
The
Silver Platter software provides an interface and network tools to
search CD databases.
We are fortunate to have this software loaded on the
Win95 side of our GICF computers. Here is how to access GEOREF from
them:
Accessing Georef via WinSPIRS
1) Use the Command-return key sequence to go to the Win95 side of the lab
computers.
2) At the Start menu, go to Programs, choose the WinSPIRS folder, and then
choose WinSpirs.
3) The way we have it set up now, you will have a couple of error
messages. Click ok on the first that says something about the EC_Expired,
and then click Cancel when you are asked for a username and password.
4) You will get to a dialogue box that asks you to choose databases.
Those on the left represent the CDs that you can choose from. Scroll down
to the GEOREF discs. You should see 5: the Georef serials, and Georef
discs 1-4. Holding the shift button, click on each to highlight. Then
click the >>add>> button so that you will see those five databases on the
right as databases to use. Then push ok.
5) Now you are ready to search. You may see an About Georef screen.
Click OK.
Searching with Georef
The main way to search is to type words in the search box and see what
happens.
You have three main fields in the screen. The uppermost is for search term
entry, the middle field shows the searches that you have done (so you can
go back to one that you did previously), and the lower field shows the results of
the search that you have selected.
For example, type earthquakes. You will get about 69000 hits.
We need to limit that a bit, don't you think? You can limit it in a couple
of ways. The first is to make your search string more specific. Now try
arizona earthquakes. You will see it search first for earthquakes,
then for arizona, and then it does an intersection to see which results
have both. I found 4. Note that the matching words are colored red and
you can see the information about the reference that includes the authors,
the date of publication, the source, etc.
Another way to limit the search is to use the limit tool on the eadge of
the upper field in the screen. Select the earthquakes search that we did
at the beginning. Click on limit. You can perform some simple logical
functions on the fields of the search. Say we were looking at the early
research on earthquakes and we wanted to look at pre1900 publications.
On the left, click on publication year, and in the middle click on less
than, and on the right scroll down to 1900. Notice in the lower left, it
is writing our the logic operation that it will apply to the search:
Number 1 and PY less than "1900". Then push enter. It will apply
that limit to the search, and you come back with about 224 publications on
earthquakes before 1900.
Searching for publications by certain authors
Note that you can search for authors. Type in their names, and if you
need to limit the search to include their first name, do so by separating
the name elements by dashes: peacock-simon-m.
Marking records
Once you have narrowed the search sufficiently, have a look at the
records. Those that interest you can be marked by clicking the cursor on
the little book on the left side of the record. Your cursor will turn
into a pencil. Click the book and a magenta line will appear next to the
marked record.
Printing
Once you have marked the records, you can click on print (along the upper
row of buttons at the top of the screen), and you will look at a dialogue
box that will let you specify features of your print job. If you leave the
radio button clicked for printing marked records, it will do so. You
could also print the entire search (but don't waste lots of paper!).
Downloading the results to the computer as a text file
Once you have marked the records, you can click on download (along the upper
row of buttons at the top of the screen), and you will look at a dialogue
box that will let you control the download of your data. Choose a suitable
location and file name. Note that under the options you can change
certain parameters of the downloading. You may be prettyhappy with the
default, so I would not change anything unless you want to. The file that
you download is an ascii text file that you can view in Microsoft Word or
even Simpletext (Macintosh) or the Notepad (Win95).
Pages maintained by
Prof. Ramón Arrowsmith
Pages last modified on Thurs Sept 11 1997.