Internet Searching and Indexing: The Subject Approach

Citation

Chowdhury, G.G. (2001), "Internet Searching and Indexing: The Subject Approach", The Electronic Library, Vol. 19 No. 4, pp. 261-265. https://doi.org/10.1108/el.2001.19.4.261.4

The book begins with an introduction by the editors followed by 11 articles presented under three sections, viz. “Search engines: characteristics and effective use”, “Classification and its contribution to Web organization, indexing and searching”, and “Sub‐cataloguing and the World Wide Web”. The first section contains five articles and the second and third sections contain three articles each.

The five articles in the first section describe the features of various Web search tools. The first article by Scot Nicholson describes the features of Web search tools. He proposes a classification of Web search tools into five major categories – directory‐based search tools, full‐text search tools, extracting search tools, subject‐specific search tools, and meta search tools. The second article, by Catherine Hume, is aimed at library and information professionals who are novice or infrequent Internet users. It provides a brief introduction to the Internet, the Web, html, etc., and then provides a very general description of search engines, with some tips for their selection. Kurt Munson, in the third article in this section, provides a quick overview of the indexing policies of the search engines. Susan MacDougall, in her article, proposes the use of signposts to improve access to information on the Web. Such signposts include browser bookmarks, indexes and directories, metadata, and so on. She finally proposes that online vocabulary control tools can be used in the construction of Web indexes, in the same way that they are used in indexing online databases. The last article in the search engine section by Sarah Clarke describes the features of some search engines with particular reference to the indexing and ranking mechanisms.

The next three articles in this book discuss the contribution of the traditional classification and cataloguing tools in the organization of Web resources. The first article in this section by Ellis and Vasconcelos discusses how the concept of facet analysis can be used in indexing and searching information resources on the Web. Alan Wheatley focuses on the use of bibliographic classification schemes in organizing electronic information. He describes and compares the current practices of indexing the Web, and concludes that in the future human classification of Internet resources may fade away under the influence of economic pressure. In the third article in this section, Broughton and Lane provide an overview of the use of bibliographic classification schemes in the organization of the Internet resources. They argue that faceted classification schemes like the Bibliographic Classification will be more suitable for organizing the Web resources.

The first article in the last section by Chris Long discusses the issue of subject searching in Web‐based OPACs. She proposes some design guidelines for improving subject searching in OPACs. In the second article, in this section, Dunsire discusses how the Internet is used by information professionals for cataloguing and classification activities in Scotland and in other parts of the UK. He discusses the use of various online discussion groups and Web sites related to classification and cataloguing. The last article in this book is by William Studwell who discusses USE (Universal Subject Environment), a subject access system that combines a controlled vocabulary with other techniques for subject retrieval, and justifies how this system can be used for cataloguing Internet resources.

The articles in this book are interesting and topical. However, it would be more appropriate if there were some articles describing the actual projects of cataloguing and indexing the Internet resources using traditional cataloguing and classification tools. The number of articles describing the general features of Web search tools could be reduced to include more practical projects dealing with the subject approach. Nevertheless, the book will definitely be useful for the library and information science professionals, many of whom nowadays spend the greater part of their days trying to find, often with difficulty (and frustration!), information from the Internet. This book will help them understand the process of the organization of information resources on the Web, and will stimulate their thinking about the various ways and means of using classification and cataloguing tools and techniques to organize the Web resources.