Films on Demand Releases New Enhancements

September 2nd, 2011 Posted in eResource News, General
Sep, 02 2011
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Films On Demand, the streaming-video documentary web site, has been redesigned. The platform is now simpler to navigate and use and easier to find the videos you need.

Films on Demand offers over 6,000 free streaming documentary videos available to all UMass Lowell students, faculty, and staff, with unlimited simultaneous viewing available everywhere 24/7 on campus and off campus over the web. And now with its new enhanced features it should be more functional and user friendly than ever.

Redesigned Interface

The new streamlined interface includes a revised home page that features a drop-down dynamic list of all of the individual subjects to which UMass Lowell subscribes, showcasing recently added videos for each. In addition, each subject now has a unique landing page with an authenticated page link. To access a subject page, you can click on the new “Subjects” drop-down menu at the top of any page. To view a complete index of all of the subjects in your institution’s collection, click on the new “Index” link at the bottom of any page.

New Video Player

Also featured is a new video player that provides dynamic bit-rate switching for the optimum viewing experience, automatically adjusting within a 200K-through-1.5mb-bit-rate range depending on the type of device being used and your available bandwidth; users no longer need to select their target bandwidth themselves from a drop-down menu. As a result of this new player, the Windows Media format is no longer available. Any users with Windows Media as their default setting will be automatically converted to the new embedded player.

Now iPad Friendly

All of the Films On Demand videos have been re-encoded in H.264 format to allow playback on any iOS device. With the new video player, users can now watch any titles in the UMass Lowell 6,000+ Films On Demand collection on an iPad, iTouch, or iPhone. The new design is optimized to allow easy navigation of the Films On Demand platform from either a computer or an iPad with an Internet connection.

New Special Collections from Key Producers

Another new feature is an additional way to easily browse titles from some of the most popular producers of videos in Films On Demand. The “Special Collections” tab at the top of every screen lists these producers; just click on any producer’s logo to access a list of all their titles in the collection, organized by subject category.

Improved Search Options

The basic search has been enhanced with a new Search Assist autocomplete feature: when users type a keyword in the search box, suggested full titles or segment titles that contain that keyword appear. Users can now also cross-search multiple subjects and Special Collections using the Advanced Search options.

Access Films On Demand now and begin enjoying it’s superb educational offerings!

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European Film Gateway (EFG) now available online

July 28th, 2011 Posted in eResource News, New eResources
Jul, 28 2011
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The European Film Gateway (EFG) is now publicly available online in beta release. It offers free access to about 400,000 digital videos, photos, film posters and text materials. By its completion the archive will contain 600,000 items from 16 film archives from 15 European countries.

Included will be material from film archives that have been hidden in obscurity. These include unique magic lantern slide collections from France, erotic films made in Austria in the early 20th century, advertising films from Norway, newsreels from Lithuania and a comprehensive film poster collection from Denmark. In addition, Cinecittá Luce from Rome has included a famous Italian newsreel collection along with a collection of early films by great masters like Rossellini, Antonioni, Comencini, and other famous names of Italian filmmaking. An extensive collection of set photos to films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder contributed by the Deutsches Filminstitut will also be available for the first time online from August on.

The EFG was developed by the Deutsches Filminstitut together with the European Association of Cinémathèques (ACE – Association des Européennes Cinémathèques) and its members. It started in September 2008 and is expected to be complete by September 2011.

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NetLibrary eBooks now Ebsco eBook Collection

July 26th, 2011 Posted in eResource News, New eResources
Jul, 26 2011
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The new Ebsco eBook Collection site is now live and available for access.

Last year Ebsco Publishing purchased the NetLibrary ebook platform. As of July 20, Ebsco has completed the rollover from the old NetLibrary platform to hosting the eBooks on the Ebscohost database platform. This new eBook Collection site shares the same interface design as all of the other Ebsco online databases.

UMass Lowell Libraries currently subscribes to 25 database titles from Ebsco, including popular sites such as Academic Search Premier, Business Source Premier, Historical Abstracts, and PsycInfo. Now when you search any of the regular Ebsco online databases, you can also easily add the eBook collection into a multi-database search.

The Ebsco eBook Collection contains over 5,000 titles. It can be searched in much the same manner that NetLibrary allowed, by keyword, date, author, title, ISBN, or publisher.  By clicking on the eBooks link in the top menu bar, users can also browse by subject category, Latest Added titles, and Featured Books.

With an Ebscohost account, available for free to all users, bookmarks and notes can be added for future reference. You can also add titles to folders for easy access. Only one user, however, can read a book at a time. When a book is opened by a user, it is effectively checked out and unavailable for others to use at that time.

For further information about using eBooks on the Ebsco site, please view this help page –

http://support.epnet.com//help/?int=ehost&ver=live&lang=en&feature_id=eBooks

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Springer Images app for iPhone, iPod, and iPad

May 12th, 2011 Posted in eResource News, General
May, 12 2011
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Springer Media has released a new Images App that provides three levels of access to the SpringerImages database:

  • Basic: Free Access to scientific images from peer-reviewed, Open Access articles.
  • Medical and Life Sciences: Paid mobile access to over 1.6 million medical and life sciences images. Available via SpringerImages.com
  • Full: Paid mobile access to the complete collection of over 2.8 million images. Available via SpringerImages.com

The SpringerImages app is available for iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad.

SpringerImages is a continually updated and expanding collection of over 2.8 million images spanning the scientific, technical and medical fields. The SpringerImages database is composed of photos, graphs, diagrams, figures and tables from Springer’s ebook collection, journal portfolio and images.MD.

  • View images and related text.
  • Search image captions, keywords and references to refine search results.
  • Bookmark images for later research.
  • Email images to your friends and colleagues.

More information about SpringerImages can be found on the SpringerImages Help pages.

SpringerImages is provided by Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com), a leading global scientific publisher.

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RDS Business Suite available from the MLS

April 4th, 2011 Posted in eResource News, New eResources
Apr, 04 2011
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The the Commonwealth of  Massachusetts through the new Massachusetts Library System (MLS) is providing regional affiliated libraries, including UMass Lowell, with access to multiple Gale Cengage online databases. The newest edition of these available resources is the RDS Business Suite.

RDS comprises three separate business information databases that can be searched through one single interface: Business & Industry, Business & Management Practices, and TableBase.

Business & Management Practices (BaMP) content focuses on practical approaches to management processes and methods. BaMP offers highly-focused coverage from more than 300 current professional and trade journals containing information relevant to the fields of management, planning, production, finance, marketing, information technology and human resources; as well as an additional 1,000+ more general business journals and newspapers.

Business & Industry (B&I) is a broad-based business information database that focuses on facts, figures, events and market information about companies, industries, products and markets.  It covers all industries and is international in scope.  B&I draws content from over 1,800 trade and industry publications, regional, national and international newspapers, business dailies and newsletters.

TableBase is a database comprised of tabular information of a strategic nature. Every record has a unique table title. Many of the table records also have textual content which supports the data in the tables.  The tables provide information such as: market share, market size, capacity, production, imports, exports, sales, product and brand rankings, forecasts, healthcare statistics and demographics.

The Massachusetts Library System (MLS) provides services to 1,700 Massachusetts libraries of all types and sizes throughout the Commonwealth.  MLS was established in 2010 to consolidate the services of six former regional library systems. An Advisory Committee agreed to renew Gale database previously subscribed for state-wide library access by the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners. In all MLS is providing 13 Gale databases, including the RDS Business Suite, through June 30, 2012.

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Test Drive the New Books In Print Web Site

March 25th, 2011 Posted in eResource News
Mar, 25 2011
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Bowker has officially launched the new version of their Books In Print web site. Books In Print has long been the standard source for information regarding book and ebook publications used throughout the book-buying world by buyers, sellers and readers. The new web site has been designed to appeal to all levels of users. Bowker states that its “new visually-appealing and user-friendly interface is comprehensive enough for professionals, but easy enough for anyone to use.”

The new site offers a number of advanced features that allow users to search, discover, and connect to what they need. One major change, resulting from user feedback, is that search results are title-weighted by default rather than keyword-driven. So a search of “Boston,” for example, in the new version produces a list of books titled “Boston.” In the older version, the same search defaults to keyword and produces a broad assortment of titles that in the first 15 results includes subjects ranging from astronomy to spectrometry, and from Victorian romance to Shakespeare’s sonnets.

What is more likely to be noticed first, however, are the assortment of new paths to discovery presented in the forms of a word cloud on one side of the search results and faceted search refinements on the other side. These easy sidelinks offer keyword choices on the one hand and search limits on the other. In the case of  a “Boston” search, keywords like “november,” “stage,” “hold,” and “party” hardly seem relevant… all right maybe the last one. But the facet options — format, author, language, status, availability, and price — are useful and extensive. Scrolling below the fold reveals other groups of options for Publication Information, Opinion, Target Audience, and Subject.

The new site also offers extensive social media options that allow users to create accounts in MyDiscovery and make lists, tag and rate items, and write reviews.   For librarians the site offers a Collection Development List feature that allows librarians to create and save “wish lists” with relevant bibliographic details for purchases. And, if the Hook to Holdings feature is enabled, anyone can easily search the local catalog collection for titles they find in Books In Print.

Finally, Advanced Search has been expanded with option boxes that allow users to either copy and paste or upload a csv file with up to 85 ISBNs for a quick search.

To try out the New Books In Print go to http://www.booksinprint2.com. Links are available on the home page for training opportunities.

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Two new journals available focused on Mechanics

March 24th, 2011 Posted in eResource News, New eResources
Mar, 24 2011
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Two new journals covering different aspects of mechanics are being introduced this year by the ASCE and AIP. Complimentary access is being offered by the publishers on a temporary basis:

Journal of Nanomechanics and Micromechanics (current issue available for free access)

Published by the ASCE, this Journal brings science and applications together on nanoscale and nanostructured materials with an emphasis on • mechanics • processing • characterization • design • modeling and • applications of materials containing true nanosize dimensions or nanostructures that enable novel or enhanced properties or functions based upon tailored nanostructures.

Theoretical and Applied Mechanics Letters (TAML) (free access available through 2011)

TAML is published by AIP on behalf of the Chinese Society of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, and features short, original articles in all areas of mechanics, as well as in interdisciplinary fields including aerospace and aeronautical engineering, coastal and ocean engineering, environment and energy engineering, material and structure engineering, biomedical engineering, mechanical and transportation engineering, and civil and hydraulic engineering.

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Classical Musical Scores Online Library is now complete

February 24th, 2011 Posted in eResource News
Feb, 24 2011
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Alexander Street Press announced that their Classical Scores Library is now complete at over 400,00 pages. On February 11, 2011, Classical Scores Library was updated with 66 scores and 999 pages .
As of this update there are 24,368 scores and 400,088 pages in Classical Scores Library.

The final release includes material from Universal Edition, A-R Editions, and Wirripang. New scores include material from composers Girolamo Frescobaldi, Antonio Vivaldi, Diana Blom, Adriano Banchieri, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Colin Brumby, and more.

Classical Scores Library contains classical scores from both in-copyright and public domain editions. The major composers output is represented, as well as many lesser known composers and works.

Content in the database includes in-copyright material from Boosey and Hawkes and selected material from the University Music Editions microfilm series.

The collection includes works spanning time periods from the Renaissance to the 21st century. Coverage of score types is comprehensive, with full scores, study scores, piano and vocal scores, and piano reductions.

The database has been indexed to enable users to search on musically relevant fields, such as composer, work/opus number, key, genre, instrument, time period; as well as score-specific fields, such as score type, duration, editor, arranger, publisher. We hope that this will enable users to search, analyze, and research scores in a simple but powerful manner.

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Google releases its new Art Project web site

February 3rd, 2011 Posted in eResource News, New eResources
Feb, 03 2011
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In collaboration with some of the world’s most famous museums, Google recently launched its Art Project web site. Applying its Street-View technology within museums, the site allows visitors to virtually
explore galleries within seventeen major museums from around the world, such as MoMA, The Frick, Versailles, Uffizi, Tate, and Van Gogh. In addition, Artwork View enables incredable close-up zooming capablilities for selected paintings. Finally, additional educational information is provided for each of the selected works.

Another feature of the site allows users to create their own collections. The ‘Create an Artwork Collection’ feature allows users to save specific views of any of the 1000+ artworks and build their own personalized collection. Comments can be added to each painting and the whole collection can then be shared with others.

Current partners in the project include the following museums:

  • Alte Nationalgalerie, Berlin – Germany
  • Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian, Washington DC – USA
  • The Frick Collection, NYC – USA
  • Gemäldegalerie, Berlin – Germany
  • The Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC – USA
  • MoMA, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC – USA
  • Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid – Spain
  • Museo Thyssen – Bornemisza, Madrid – Spain
  • Museum Kampa, Prague – Czech Republic
  • National Gallery, London – UK
  • Palace of Versailles – France
  • Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam – The Netherlands
  • The State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg – Russia
  • State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow – Russia
  • Tate Britain, London – UK
  • Uffizi Gallery, Florence – Italy
  • Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam – The Netherlands

For more information about the project, view this FAQ page. Access to the site has been added to the Library website’s Art Databases page.

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Oxford English Dictionary releases new website design

January 25th, 2011 Posted in eResource News
Jan, 25 2011
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The new design of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is now available. Besides a new look and feel, the site offers many new features:

  • Search results move from simple lists to visualizations/timelines
  • They can also be filtered according to a number of categories (e.g. all English words derived from Italian from the field of Music which are first recorded in English in the 18th century)
  • New pages on the OED‘s most-cited authors and texts
  • Links to other online resources—such as the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
  • A new series of descriptive articles on language, past and present, called ‘Aspects of English’
  • Perhaps the most important new feature involves the Historical Thesaurus to the OED, published in book form in 2009. The entire text is now integrated with the OED Online.

Currently on the new site, among other monthly features, the following articles are highlighted:

Other special features include Word of the Day, Shapers of English, and English in Time.

Until the end of March 2011 access to the older OED site at dictionary.oed.com will remain available to enable users to update bookmarks and other links. Any bookmarks to dictionary.oed.com should be updated to www.oed.com.

The OED is widely acknowledged to be the most authoritative and comprehensives dictionary of English in the world, and the definitive record of English language development over the last 1,500 years. It traces words from their beginnings (which may be in Old or Middle English) to the present, showing the ways in which words have been used over time and illustrating the changes with quotations which add to the historical and linguistic record.

The first edition of the dictionary was published in parts between 1884 and 1928, with the title A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles. A ten-volume edition appeared in 1928. The title was changed to The Oxford English Dictionary in 1933 when it was reissued in twelve volumes plus one supplement. Four more supplements were published between 1972 and 1986. All this material was amalgamated to produce the twenty-volume second edition in 1989. Since March 2000 the dictionary has been an online publication with quarterly updates conducted annually.

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