Institute for Defense Analyses

Federated searching

“Won’t 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,

I’ll join the happy angel band,Just over in the glory land;

Just over in the glory land,There with the mighty host I’ll 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 isn’t!• 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 Usage345: Google163: JSTOR99: Ebrary61: OCLC FirstSearch WorldCat42: Encyclopaedia Britannica39: EBSCOhost (all totaled)38: American Physical Society37: DTIC

ParadoxWhy 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 InformationBradley E. Gernand

Library Manager

Institute for Defense Analyses

703-845-2405; bgernand@ida.org