Search

The Joint Information Systems Committee and the National Science Foundation programme, Digital Libraries in the Classroom (DLiC), addresses implications for the learning of the revolution in scholarly communication. What are the obstacles to undergraduates ‘ “writing” on and for the Internet’? Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) is a partner in one of the DLiC-funded projects, Spoken Word. At GCU the focus was on the practical demonstration of the implications and potential for learning of a remote electronic library extremely and extensively rich in culturally significant multimedia; the archives of the British Broadcasting Corporation. This paper considers one significant objective—embedding the developments generated in the project. It considers the reactions of major stakeholders to the attempts of the project team to raise institutional awareness of developments and pursue a strategy to induce change. This account is interim; the project has a 5-year life, from 2003 to 2008. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

'Can I get full text from ERIC and what on earth is Dialog Datastar?' was a Facebook status update by the student author of this paper in 2009. The post highlighted the sometimes confusing experience of working with journal articles online. This article provides an introduction, from a personal perspective, to some of the joys, fascinations and frustrations of being both a real and virtual student in real and virtual worlds. It suggests that e-learning should be considered a broad term which covers a variety of digital tools, environments, pedagogies and experiences. For students taught fully online, e-learning can mean experiencing the university, the library and its resources purely 'at the interface'. However, it is argued here that e-learning incorporating social networking, online communication tools and virtual worlds can be a socially and culturally rewarding learning experience which can cross boundaries of 'place' and 'time'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Advertisement: With two great options designed to meet the needs - and budget - of every member, the IEEE Member Digital Library provides full-text access to any IEEE journal article or conference paper in the IEEE Xplore digital library. Simply choose the subscription that's right for you. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Currently, there exists little evidence concerning how various characteristics of research cultures are associated with patterns of use of electronic library resources. The present study addresses this gap by exploring how research-group membership, across-fields scattering of literature, and degree of establishment of research area are related to patterns of digital library use. The analytic dimensions are derived from Richard Whitley's (1984) theory of the social and intellectual organization of academic fields. The article represents a first attempt to operationalize Whitley's concepts in a large-scale study of e-resources use. The data used in the study were gathered in 2004 by the Finnish Electronic Library (FinElib) through a nationwide Web-based user questionnaire (N = 900). Membership in a research group significantly increased searching in journal databases, the importance of colleagues as sources of information about electronic articles and journals, and the use of alert services. A significant interaction effect was found between degree of across-fields scattering of relevant resources and degree of establishment of research fields. A high degree of across-fields scattering of relevant literature increased the number of journal databases used mainly in less established research areas whereas it influenced the use of journal databases less in established fields. This research contributes to our picture concerning the complex set of interacting factors influencing patterns of use of e-resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]