What’s New at the GSU Zach S. Henderson Library

Did you know that WorldCat, an international one-stop searching portal for library catalogs, is available  online for free, and as a Facebook app, and now as a download for PDA’s and smartphones?  (Thanks, Debra!)

Your Task

Unlock the secrets of finding the information you need or want…for research papers or to impress your friends. At your level of gaming (University Freshman and above), Wikipedia is not allowed, unless you want a quick and unreliable glimpse of a topic. (Whatever you do, don’t rely upon it or cite it in a paper! Result: Game Over)

Maps

Your playing field is known as the Zach S. Henderson Library, a hybrid print-and-electronic space (library.georgiasouthern.edu). A brand-new extension will be released in Version 2.0 by the end of September 2008. Updates will be released throughout the fall semester. By Dec. 24, Version 3.0 will include the Learning Commons, with high-tech spaces and integrated support for research and IT questions. Watch for updates at Zach’s News (see #2 below), with RSS available.

Enemies

Beware your devious enemies, such as Plagiarism (touching Plagiarism results in an instant Game Over; walkthrough available at tinyurl.com/plagvid) and Procrastination. Find the sources you need ahead of time, so that you have every object you need when you’re ready to write your paper. (Some of the sources you need might have to be sent from other libraries, so plan ahead; see #9 below.)

Collectible Items

Collect different types of information, from articles to books to multimedia. Try to collect only the most powerful and authoritative sources, which are often known as Scholarly or Peer-Reviewed. Some of the GALILEO Databases will allow you to limit your searches to only these types of sources.

Some will appear as “Full Text,” with the entire source online. Others might have a purple “Find It” button, which will attempt to locate the Full Text in a different Database. If it’s not available online, check the Library Catalog (see #6 below).

Top 10 Tips for Achieving High Scores

10. WorldCat (www.worldcat.org): Locate anything in libraries worldwide. With Facebook app! (tinyurl.com/worldcatfb)

9. Interlibrary loan (ILL) (tinyurl.com/gsuill): Get anything delivered to you from libraries worldwide, free of charge!

8. Electronic Journals A-Z (tinyurl.com/ejournals): Find full-text journals with one search.

7. GALILEO (www.galileo.usg.edu) & Google Scholar (extra tip: Find it in GALILEO for more full text!): Find the sources you’re already paying for!

(Get the off-campus password for GALILEO at tinyurl.com/galileopass)

6. Library catalog (gil.georgiasouthern.edu) & reserves (tinyurl.com/gsureserves): Find anything we have in our library (electronic, print, & multimedia), including course reserves (things your whole class will be reading; some of these are online).

5. Ask a librarian (tinyurl.com/askzach): IM, e-mail, phone, walk-in, one-on-one appointments. Don’t be that student who tells the professor, “The library doesn’t have anything on my topic”! (See #1.)

4. Communicate with your professors. Ask for more time on an assignment if you need it…before the day it’s due.

3. Google Reader (www.google.com/reader): Save time & check your fave sites from one page.

2. Zach’s News (zachsnews.edublogs.org): Impress your friends with the inside scoop from Henderson Library!

1. Your Very Own Librarian (tinyurl.com/ownlibrarian): Find out about your human search engines: the Subject Specialist Librarians/Library Liaisons. The most important guides of all. (See #5.)

Bonus survival tips:

• Zach’s Brews: GSU’s first alternative café, 2^nd floor of the Library. Coffee, cappuccino, espresso, caffe latte, fresh-baked cinnamon rolls, cookies, bagels, blueberry muffins, and croissants. Monday-Thursday, 7:30 am to 10 pm; Friday, 7:30 am to 2 pm; and Sunday, 3 pm to 11 pm.
• Henderson Library is open all day & all night from noon Sundays to 10 pm Fridays, and 9 am to 10 pm Saturdays.
• Music wants to be free (and legal)! pandora.com, free.napster.com, ruckus.com, etc.

When you search in Google Scholar, you’re able to identify scholarly journal articles much easier than in the main Google search. And have you noticed also that many of these are in “full text” (the entire article online), but that you would have to pay for others?

The secret trick you need to know is that, if you’re searching from on-campus, or if you’re off-campus and go to Google Scholar from GALILEO, you will see many more Google Scholar articles in full text than you would normally be able to access from off-campus. Articles from EBSCOHost and JSTOR are two good examples.

This is because our librarians have worked behind the scenes to directly link you from Google to the vast number of full e-journal articles which Henderson Library has already paid for in GALILEO. (Of course, Google Scholar only includes a small part of all that is in GALILEO.)

This is one example of how librarians work alongside Google in delivering the information you need, regardless of the time or location. For another one, check out the Open Worldcat project (with a nifty Facebook application), which lets you search for items in libraries worldwide, including ours, via Google.

Here’s a nifty Facebook application which will allow you to search library catalogs worldwide, including those nearest you. WorldCat is the same database that librarians use for identifying sources for interlibrary loans. It’s available freely online at http://worldcat.org/ You can add it to your Facebook page here (link updated 5-23-08).