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Discovery tools are emerging in libraries. These tools offer library patrons the ability to concurrently search the library catalog and journal articles. While vendors rush to provide feature-rich interfaces and access to as much content as possible, librarians wonder about the usefulness of these tools to library patrons. To learn about both the utility and usability of EBSCO Discovery Service, James Madison University (JMU) conducted a usability test with eight students and two faculty members. The test consisted of nine tasks focused on common patron requests or related to the utility of specific discovery tool features. Software recorded participants' actions and time on task, human observers judged the success of each task, and a post-survey questionnaire gathered qualitative feedback and comments from the participants. Participants were successful at most tasks, but specific usability problems suggested some interface changes for both EBSCO Discovery Service and JMU's customizations of the tool. The study also raised several questions for libraries above and beyond any specific discovery-tool interface, including the scope and purpose of a discovery tool versus other library systems, working with the large result sets made possible by discovery tools, and navigation between the tool and other library services and resources. This article will be of interest to those who are investigating discovery tools, selecting products, integrating discovery tools into a library web presence, or performing evaluations of similar systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efforts to provide increased remote access to library materials have taken center stage over the last decade. Librarians can be justly proud of the results of their efforts to date, with most bibliographic indexing tools now available electronically and library catalogs accessible at all times via the Internet. Full-text materials are increasingly available on the Web and desktop delivery is more common than ever. Great progress in the cataloging of maps was also made during this time period and the use of maps concomitantly increased. Maps still lag behind other library resources, however, in the ability of the remote user to identify the needed item to the proper granularity. Unlike the remote user who, needing a journal article, can search any one of a number of bibliographic databases to identify articles down to the journal title, volume, issue, and page number, remote users who need a map have few electronic bibliographic tools to aid them. The inclusion of records for maps in online catalogs greatly increased during the last decade, so remote users have a good chance of determining that maps covering their geographic regions exist.

Analyzes the changes that automated online public access catalogs (OPAC) have represented to the structure, administration and maintenance of catalogs, retrieval systems and user interfaces. Examination of structure of database; Repercussion of applying rules and formats developed for manual systems to OPAC.

Presents the results of research on the feasibility of using scanner technology to capture contents pages of monographs, and to extract the bibliographic information of each work and process it with a standardized language, such as SGML, for tagging electronic documents. How data can be used or storied in an online catalog (OPAC); Background; Methodology; Development; Conclusions.