[Web4lib] RSS

Mon Aug 8 13:53:56 EDT 2005

Hi all,
 In response to Rose's question "Can anyone tell me how RSS can improve 
library services?",
 I would like to share what we have done at Drexel for our engineering:
 Blog:
Engineering Resources
http://englibrary.blogspot.com
 Math and Sciences Blogs:
http://drexelphysics.blogspot.com 
http ://drexelmath.blogspot.com <http://drexelmath.blogspot.com/> 
http ://drexelbioscience.blogspot.
com<http://www.library.drexel.edu/services/http%20://drexelbioscience.blogspot.%20com>
Article in our Library Newsletter:
 http://www.library.drexel.edu/news/0602/researchday.html
 "In addition, Jay Bhatt, Engineering Librarian, Peggy Dominy, Sciences 
Librarian, and Andrew Wheeler, Engineering Library Assistant, presented a 
poster aimed at assisting faculty and students in keeping up-to-date in 
their area of research using subject specific blogs, RSS (Real Simple 
Syndication/Rich Site Summary) feeds and Listservs. Blogs (a combination of 
the words "web" and "logs") and RSS feeds are an informal but valuable means 
of communication to keep track of the ever-increasing flow of new 
information. A variety of blogs and RSS feeds from different disciplines 
such as engineering, physics, and nanotechnology were illustrated. During 
the session, a web based service called
Bloglines<http://www.bloglines.com/>was used to show how RSS feeds
from different providers can be set up to
keep up to date in a variety of fields. Many journals such as Nature, Nature 
Biotechnology, Nature Materials and those from the Institute of Physics are 
utilizing this technology for Table of Contents tracking. A complete listing 
of all RSS feeds from Nature titles is available at Nature
Newsfeed<http://npg.nature.com/npg/servlet/Content?data=xml/02_newsfeed.xml&style=xml/02_newsfeed.xsl>.
The use of RSS feeds alleviates the need for researchers to subscribe to 
e-mail alerts, since they can view new information that they have chosen via 
a single RSS portal. Several faculty members and students stopped by the 
booth and saw how Blogs and RSS feeds work and expressed interest in this 
new technology as a way of keeping up with the latest developments in their 
fields. A copy of the poster may be found at 
http://www.library.drexel.edu/archives/misc/drexelblogs36x72.ppt and a copy 
of the handout is available at 
http://www.library.drexel.edu/archives/misc/blogsposterhandout.doc."
 For our engineering design students working in group and our graduate 
students, we show them how to set up RSS feeds from journals table of 
contents, (ingenta provides RSS icon of journals that provides feeds), and 
also show them how to set up feeds on keyword searching from engineering 
village2/INSPEC to keep them uptodate with articles on their search queries. 

 Please refer to http://www.bloglines.com/public/bhattjj for examples of 
using blogs and feeds for journal article alerts and keyword search alerts 
using ei village2 . Look for the folders Ei Copmpendex, electronic journals 
and hubmed in the left column. HUBMED; http://www.hubmed.org provides alerts 
to searching in Pubmed database.
 Our presentation on integrating RSS feeds into webCT is available from:
*Integrating* *RSS* *feeds* and information blogs in courses usig
*WebCT*<http://showme.physics.drexel.edu/bradley/DrexelCoAS017-JayAtWebCT.ppt>
http://showme.physics.drexel.edu/bradley/DrexelCoAS017-JayAtWebCT.ppt 
 This was presented at the Regional webCT conference

*Integrating RSS feeds and informative blogs into courses taught using WebCT 

*Jay Bhatt 
http://www.drexel.edu/IRT/services/webct/WebCTConf2005/schedule.html 
The need for our faculty and students to keep up-to-date with new 
information and latest developments in their area of research has always 
been crucial. Integrating tools that provide up-to-date information on new 
journal articles into courses using webCT is envisioned as an efficient way 
of informing students enrolled in such courses. Since faculty involved will 
be primarily responsible for selecting and linking new journal articles and 
citations based on search queries, it is imperative that they will need to 
get familiar with this concept and how to implement it in their courses. 
This presentation illustrates how variety of RSS feeds and informative blogs 
can be integrated into webCT courses using another tool called Bloglines. 
EGMT581, Problems in Human Relations course offered in the Engineering 
Management Department of the College of Engineering at Drexel, is currently 
experimenting with bloglines to provide links in webCT to the new journal 
articles related to the subjects covered in class. Collaboration with the 
faculty member teaching EGMT581, the library and the students is another 
facet that is highlighted. In addition to it, faculty members can assign 
readings based on new journal articles by providing their links into their 
webCT courses. It is our belief that efficient use of these current 
awareness tools will help our faculty and students in keeping informed with 
new research as it unfolds worldwide and in the process learn how it is 
relevant to what they are experiencing in the courses using WebCT. 
 Using Blog: we created an entry for our Bionanotechnology class:
http://englibrary.blogspot.com/2005/06/bionanotechnology-bmes460bmes480-new.html
 For Body Synthetic class;
http://englibrary.blogspot.com/2005/06/related-books-and-databases-for.html
 ACM talk to Computer Science students
http://englibrary.blogspot.com/2005/06/acm-computer-society-talk-imporatnt.html
 Announcements of new services such as Encyclopedia Britannica providing RSS 
feeds
http://englibrary.blogspot.com/2005/07/encyclopdia-britannica-online-daily.html
 Patents -pat2pdf new patent searching tool
http://englibrary.blogspot.com/2005/07/pat2pdf-free-patent-search-tool.html
 and many more.
 Please also refer to the recent entry on LISnews under "This week in 
LibraryBlogland"
http://www.lisnews.com/
 Steven Bell has compiled some very useful sites on RSS feeds and blogging.
 "Steven Bell, the *Kept-Up Academic Librarian,*
points<http://keptup.typepad.com/academic/2005/08/students_look_a.html>to
a USA today article about college students using RSS for up-to-date
research. Ken Varnum ( *RSS4Lib)* says his library has a new
guide<http://blogs.fletcher.tufts.edu/rss4lib/archives/000820.html>to
using RSS for research alerts.
*misc.information*
points<http://blog.educause.edu/mpasiewicz/archive/2005/07/29/13220.aspx>to
links <http://www.hyperorg.com/blogger/mtarchive/004281.html> about RSS and 
blogging within the Academic/Research/Scientific community. Dave Mattson, of 
the *Ten Thousand Year Blog,*
points<http://www.davidmattison.ca/wordpress/?p=1182>to a list of
Things You Can Do With RSS ("Basically, you can perform any
task with RSS that requires search or information retrieval from a server"). 
"
 In the fall term, we are planning to present this to our student 
associations, classes and other faculty members. We are very very optimistic 
that this will not only help in learning and teaching new information 
sources and tools but increase in usage of our databases and circulation of 
books since we will be announcing new acquistions through blogs from our 
blogsites.
 Regards and best,
 Jay Bhatt 
Information Services Librarian (Engineering) 
Hagerty Library, Drexel University 
TEL 215-895-1873 
AOL IM jaybhatt59 YAHOO IM jay_bhatt_98
FAX 215-895-2070 
EMAIL bhattjj at drexel.edu 

Engineering Assistance page: 
http://www.library.drexel.edu/services/refengineer.html

Engineering Resources Blog
http://englibrary.blogspot.com