Institute for Defense Analyses Federated searching

Wont it be Wonderful There Won't it be wonderful there..... Having no burdens to bear..... Joyously singing With heartbells all ringing.... O won't it be wonderful there?......

Just Over in the Glory Land Just over in the glory land, Ill join the happy angel band, Just over in the glory land; Just over in the glory land, There with the mighty host Ill stand, Just over in the glory land!

Environment 22,000 printed volumes 75,000 e-books –Books 24x7 (aggregator) –Ebrary (aggregator) –Elsevier (all) –Springer-Verlag and Kluwer (all) –Wiley (all) 80 site licenses

Political Environment Library receives excellent support –Monetarily –From top leadership –From research staff Partners with IT –A trusted partner –Helps populate the intranet –Help manage collaboration tool (SharePoint)

Previous Tools Library catalog Journal finder EBSCOhost –Stocked with 15 licensed databases (INSPEC, Medline, PsycINFO, etc.) –Underlying CrossRef linking utilized –Proved the concept!

Federated Searching Corporate concept with top billing Came about as part of wholesale revision of intranet and creation of digital library All products seemed the same (Sirsi, WebFeat, Central Search, etc.) Engaged WebFeat

Philosophy …To duplicate as much of the print-world environment as possible, with a balanced mix of… Encyclopedias Books Journals and conference proceedings Other

70 targets Books –Encyclopedias and general reference –Research Journals and conference proceedings Abstracting and indexing services General databases

What we left out Intranet (due to information security concerns) Library catalog (due to firewall issues)

Implementation: Rocky! Two launch dates missed IP address for vendors was wrong! No sense of process or procedure Single target or multiple targets? –CRC Press: 9 targets, not one (+$5,000) –EBSCO: 15 targets, not one (+$9,000) What about large, complex sites?

Service: Questionable! Service failed; no backup at WebFeat Targets fail; we must ascertain Searching across all targets simultaneously: good or bad?

Popularity: It isnt! WebFeat is not popular (averages 10 searches per day) Change of culture not happening Slowest common denominator rules the roost (for us it is Oxford Reference Collection) Some targets do not respond well (CQ)

June-September Usage 345: Google 163: JSTOR 99: Ebrary 61:OCLC FirstSearch WorldCat 42: Encyclopaedia Britannica 39:EBSCOhost (all totaled) 38: American Physical Society 37: DTIC

Paradox Why are the most popular databases in our organization faring the worst in WebFeat?

Management tool? Statistics cannot offer big picture No current collection development uses

The Future Federated searching will remain May switch to WebFeat Express (lite) Tool may change Vivisimo may be engaged as well –Library catalog –Intranet –Internet –Federated searching

Contact Information Bradley E. Gernand Library Manager Institute for Defense Analyses ;