SUNCAT updated

SUNCAT has been updated. Updates from the following libraries were
loaded into the catalogue last week. The dates displayed
indicate when the files were received by SUNCAT.

  • Aberystwyth University (15 May 13)
  • CONSER (05 Jun 13)
  • Dundee University (03 Jun 13)
  • Kent University (01 Jun 13)
  • London School of Economics and Political Science (07 May 13)
  • National Library of Scotland (03 Jun 13)
  • Nottingham University (03 Jun 13)
  • Oxford University (24 May 13)
  • Southampton University (02 Jun 13)
  • Swansea University (15 May 13)

To check on the currency of other libraries on SUNCAT please check the updates page for further details.

UK Survey of Academics: implications for SUNCAT

Whilst it is the norm for services such as SUNCAT to carry
out an annual survey (reports are here) of users and their
use of the service, it is also most important for those running such services
to be aware of how users (actual and potential) approach resource discovery
generally.  The report entitled UK Survey of Academics 2012 ,funded by Jisc and RLUK and carried out by
Ithaka S+R, is therefore of considerable interest.  The report details the findings from a survey
of a sample of UK academic staff with just under 3,500 responses received.
One chapter, of particular significance from a SUNCAT
perspective, is that entitled Providing
materials to academics: formats and sources. 
One most interesting finding is:
“In the case of journal collections, about half of all
respondents–slightly more in the arts and humanities than in other
fields–strongly agreed that they “often would like to use journal articles that
are not in [their] library’s print or digital collections.”
(P.38)
Given that SUNCAT’s principal raison d’être is to provide information on the serials’ holdings
(print and digital) of major research libraries (there are currently 90
Contributing Libraries) this makes welcome reading.  Of some worry, though, is the response that, when
locating information at the outset of research: 
“Overall, the largest share of respondents–about 40%–indicated that they
begin their research processes at a general purpose search engine on the
internet or world wide web. A slightly smaller share–about one-third of
respondents–indicated that they begin their research at a specific electronic
research resource/computer database. A relatively smaller share–slightly less
than 15% each–of respondents reported starting with an online library catalogue
or a national or international catalogue or database”.  (p.21)
For a service such as SUNCAT it is vital for all potential
users to know it exists and what facilities it provides.  SUNCAT is assisted in alerting users to the existence
of the service by information provided on institutional websites and EDINA is
very grateful to the many institutions who have promoted the service in this
way.  To assist library staff, a leaflet outlining
specific ways some organisations had promoted the service was distributed in
2011 and proved to be a useful source of information.  We will be looking anew at the information in
the leaflet and updating it where appropriate. 
We will also be looking at other ways of promoting the service and
bringing it to the attention of potential users and would, of course, welcome
any suggestions on ways we might consider. 
There was another response in the report of considerable
interest to SUNCAT.
Roughly 3 out of 5
respondents indicated that they often or occasionally use library-provided
inter-library loan or document delivery services to access journal articles and
monographs. (p.39)
The importance of serving inter-library loan staff has long
been recognised.  In the recent survey
for the provision of feedback on the new interface  there were requests for
the inclusion of British Library Codes and email addresses.  BL Codes will be made available in the
initial release of the service and it is hoped to provide the email addresses
in a future release of the software.
The report, therefore, is of much interest to SUNCAT.  Whilst it does reinforce some of the reasons
for the establishment of the service in the first place, it also is a prompt to
us to review our promotional activities to try and ensure that all who might
have reason to use the service know about its existence.

Posted in Uncategorized

SUNCAT updated

SUNCAT has been updated. Updates from the following libraries were
loaded into the catalogue in the last two weeks. The dates displayed
indicate when the files were received by SUNCAT.

  • Aberdeen University (01 Apr 13)
  • Bradford University (07 May 13)
  • CONSER(29 May 13)
  • Durham University (22 May 13) 
  • Edinburgh University (21 May 13)
  • Essex University (03 May 13)
  • Hull University (24 Apr 13)
  • ISSN (16 May 13)
  • Leicester University (24 May 13)
  • Manchester University (21 May 13)
  • National Art Library (16 May 13)
  • Natural History Museum (25 May 13)
  • Queen Mary, University of London (15 May 13)
  • School of Oriental & African Studies, University of London (15 May 13)
  • Southampton University (26 May 13)
  • University College London (07 May 13)
  • Zoological Society of London (30 May 13)

To check on the currency of other libraries on SUNCAT please check the updates page for further details.

Summer weird and wonderful titles

Summer is here at last, though not today in Edinburgh! Take
a look at some of the weird and wonderful titles we have in SUNCAT.

  • Ally Sloper’s summer number.
  • Annual report of summer tent and open air campaign.
  • Bus enthusiast summer special.
  • The ’Pink ’un’ summer annual, 1913, ed. by W.F. De Wend
    Fenton. More nuts in a nutshell.
  • Report of the Men of the Trees Summer School and Conference
    … 1938 [etc.].
  • Spring into summer.
  • The summer hog outlook.
  • Summer grilling.
  • The summer sheep and wool outlook.
  • Worzel Gummidge summer special.
  • The Alps : (A magazine of light literature and useful
    information for the summer tourist).
  • Machine knitting news. Summer tops collection.
  • Summer salt :
  • Hello! : this is sunny Rhyl.

For more serials with a summer theme and other weird and
wonderful search SUNCAT.

SUNCAT Redevelopment Feedback Survey Report

We made a preview version of the new service available at UKSG in early April and just closed this off a few weeks ago. During this period we put up an online survey and encouraged emails to the EDINA helpdesk to ask our users for their views on the functionality and ease of use of the redeveloped service. A full report is now available on our website.

Overall, the response was very positive and any significant issues which were raised, EDINA were already aware of and are currently busy trying to resolve for the next release, due this autumn. Over 70% of the respondents reported that the preview service was better than the current service and we hope to improve this figure further as we iron out the glitches.

“Very bold design, clear and simple. A great improvement. Will encourage use of the service.”

We are happy that the vast majority of respondents found that the basic search facility was easy to use, 89%, and that the newly introduced post-search filters were found to be useful to 83% of respondents. Respondents reported that both the pre and post search filters would be good tools for reducing large result sets and filtering out holdings which might not be of interest, e.g. electronic or print holdings.

“Having the basic phrases in the first drop down box allows an easy search but also one that can still be refined without having to go to advanced search. Limiting locations and institutions is useful, especially for us as a public library as we know a number of locations will not lend so we can limit to those that do.”

Some respondents reported issues related to the display of the results list and the advanced search and work is on-going to resolve these. We were already aware that the Exact Title search was a little too exact – requiring exact matching on punctuation and letter case! Further, the relevancy ranking was not always working as expected, so these are another two areas we are currently concentrating on getting optimised.

The feedback received has been extremely useful in confirming areas we had concerns about and so helping us to prioritise immediate fixes for the next release, while also highlighting other interesting suggestions we can investigate for future releases.

SUNCAT updated

SUNCAT has been updated. Updates from the following libraries were
loaded into the catalogue in the last week. The dates displayed
indicate when the files were received by SUNCAT.

  • Cardiff University (14 May 13)
  • CONSER (22 May 13)
  • Cranfield University (20 Apr 13)
  • Directory of Open Access Journals (10 May 13)
  • Edinburgh University (21 Apr 13)
  • Glasgow University (06 May 13)
  • Kingston University (11 Apr 13)
  • Liverpool University (15 May 13)
  • Nottingham University (01 May 13)
  • Royal Institute of British Architects (22 May 13)
  • Royal College of Music (17 May 13)
  • Royal Society of Medicine (14 May 13)
  • Scottish National Gallery Research Library (09 May 13)
  • Sheffield University (14 May 13)
  • Southampton University (19 May 13)

To check on the currency of other libraries on SUNCAT please check the updates page for further details.

Glasgow School of Art joins SUNCAT

We are delighted to welcome Glasgow School of Art as a new SUNCAT contributing library.  Just under a thousand of its serial records has just been added to our service. This addition brings the total number of contributing libraries to 91, plus the CONSER database, the ISSN register and the Directory of Open Access Journals.

The Library of the Glasgow School of Art has one of the finest art, design and architecture collections in the UK, reflecting the School’s long history. The School joins a growing number of art institutions in SUNCAT, including:

  • British Film Institute
  • Courtauld Institute of Art
  • Edinburgh College of Art (as part of the University of Edinburgh)
  • The National Art Library
  • Royal Institute of British Architects
  • Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art
  • Scottish National Gallery Research Library
  • Tate Library (Tate Britain)
  • University of the Arts London

For further information and news about SUNCAT please see our website, follow SUNCAT on Twitter (@suncatteam), or contact the EDINA helpdesk at edina@ed.ac.uk.

Weird and wonderful gardening titles

All this week (21st-25th May) the RHS ChelseaFlower Show is taking place in London. For those of you north of the border Gardening Scotland 2013 opens on Friday 31st
May and runs until Sunday 2nd June at the Royal Highland
Centre, Edinburgh. Take a look at some of the weird and wonderful gardening
and horticulture titles to be found in SUNCAT.

  • Burpee … commercial catalog : wholesale prices for
    vegetable and flower seeds, bulbs and roots, lawn grass seeds and grower
    supplies.
  • Flower tech.
  • Fred the possessed flower.
  • Judith Blacklock’s seasonal flower recipes : how to make
    simple & stylish designs for the home.
  • Your garden needs Barteldes seeds / the Barteldes Seed
    Company.
  • The world of flower fairies.
  • 2006 2011 World Outlook for Rubber Garden Hose.
  • An attractive and useful School garden.
  • The country gentlemen’s catalogue : of appliances for the
    house, field, farm, stable, garden, kennel, &c. : to which is added a trade
    and professional directory specially compiled for the use of country gentlemen.
  • The follies journal : the international journal for follies,
    grottoes, and garden buildings.
  • Garden gleanings.
  • The Holding, Poultry Run, Garden & Allotment.
  • Lawn & garden consumables.
  • MY garden : an intimate magazine for garden lovers.
  • The florist and pomologist and suburban gardener : a
    pictorial magazine of horticulture, and register of garden novelties /
    conducted by Thomas Moore.
  • The compost pile : the newsletter for the Louisiana Society
    for Horticultural Research.
  • Green thumb news.
  • The green machine.
  • List of Florida grape nurserymen.
  • B.U.G.S. flyer : the voice of ecological urban horticulture
    : a publication from Biological Urban Gardening Services.
  • Fresh air forum take a breath.
  • Safe electric gardening newsletter.

You can also find out more on the Chelsea Flower Show by
looking at ‘Chelsea Flower Show … : catalogue / The Royal Horticultural
Society’ and ‘Celebrating Chelsea : the best of the Chelsea Flower Show’, both
titles also found in SUNCAT.

For more gardening serials and other weird and wonderful titles take a look in SUNCAT.

SUNCAT updated

SUNCAT has been updated. Updates from the following libraries were
loaded into the catalogue in the last couple of weeks. The dates displayed
indicate when the files were received by SUNCAT.

  • Bristol University (03 May 13)
  • British Library (26 Apr 13)
  • Cardiff University (23 Apr 13)
  • Dundee University (06 May 13)
  • Edinburgh Napier University (06 May 13)
  • Exeter University (03 May 13)
  • King’s College London (02 May 13) 
  • London School of Economics and Political Science (08 Apr 13)
  • London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (03 May 13)
  • Loughborough University (27 Mar 13)
  • National Library of Scotland (03 May 13)
  • Robert Gordon University (01 May 13)
  • Sheffield Hallam University (18 Apr 13)
  • Southampton University (12 May 13)
  • Strathclyde University (22 Apr 13)
  • Sussex University (01 May 13)
  • Tate Library (Tate Britain) (25 Mar 13)
  • Trinity College Dublin (01 May 13)
  • York University (08 May 13)

To check on the currency of other libraries on SUNCAT please check the updates page for further details.

SUNCAT redevelopment survey reminder

The survey on the preview of the redeveloped SUNCAT service and the preview itself is available until Monday 13th May. Please do take a few minutes to have a look at the service and let us have your feedback. All comments are very welcome and will provide us with vital information on any areas which require further development. Thank you to all who have responded so far.