From lpsmail@access.digex.netMon Jul 22 18:05:58 1996 Date: Mon, 22 Jul 1996 11:36:55 -0700 From: Shipment Reply to: Discussion of Government Document Issues To: Multiple recipients of list GOVDOC-L Subject: ADNOTES: PATHWAY SERVICES UPDATE: FARRELL/DOSSETT THE MESSAGE BELOW IS FROM ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES, VOL. 17, #10 (July 25, 1996) PATHWAY SERVICES UPDATE AND DEMONSTRATION BEFORE THE FEDERAL DOCUMENTS TASK FORCE BY MAGGIE FARRELL AND RAEANN DOSSETT Internet Specialists 1996 Annual ALA Conference New York, NY July 6, 1996 Good morning! Already you have seen some of the tools and many of you have either seen our demos or used our Web page so we will not go into great detail this morning. The best way to see our services is to check out the Pathway Services Web page . When we started Pathway Services, we designed the tools to mimic the reference process within libraries. We have two general categories: browse and search. Patrons usually use one of these methods to locate information in libraries. Robin has already demonstrated the Browse Titles function. The other two browse functions are Browse GILS and Browse Topics. Browse Topics was the original concept of Pathway Services over a year ago. Browse Topics is for individuals who are browsing for general or broad subjects. Browse Topics is similar to library guides which you create for your patrons. The topics are based upon terms from the Subject Bibliographies and there are approximately 160 topics. One example is "coins and medals": . We choose Internet sites from available Federal Internet sites which have significant content on the chosen subject. Browse Topics points to the site or sub-site level of information. The topics reflect intelligent selection as opposed to computer selection such as the Pathway Indexer. If you perform a computer search for medals using an indexer, the results would include biographies of all the military generals listing their military medals. Under Browse Topics, however, you will retrieve descriptions and pictures of military medals. You will see this more clearly when we discuss search tools. As much as possible, we draw the annotations directly from the site. If an Internet site does not have a good description, we will develop a brief annotation to assist individuals in analyzing Internet sites. There are other Internet sites, both governmental and private, which have a topical approach to government information on the Internet. An example is FedWorld which contains about 40 topics mostly on science and technology. However, each topical listing is geared towards the unique clientele of that site. We have tailored our services to depository librarians by using topics which you are familiar with and which are general enough for the public. Another browse function is Browse GILS. This was a demonstration project developing a discreet set of GILS records for Federal agencies. The GILS record includes the SuDocs classification stem for the agency as well as information which promotes the Federal Depository Library Program for locating Government information. Hot links to the Monthly Catalog, the agency s main Web site, and to the agency s GILS information (if available) are also included. The Pathway GILS are available through the Pathway Services page or directly on the GPO GILS page . Pathway Services also has two search functions: the Monthly Catalog and the Pathway Indexer. Tad Downing already discussed the Monthly Catalog and actually this is not a Pathway product but it complements the other Pathway tools. The Pathway Indexer searches keywords of selected Federal Government Internet sites. The Pathway Indexer points to the file level and is much deeper and detailed than the Browse Topics. The Indexer consists of a robot which crawls Federal Internet sites and generally these are .gov and .mil domains. The robot creates a database and individuals query the database to locate the information they need. The Pathway Indexer is good for detailed and specific searches. The Indexer is similar to other commercial indexers such as Yahoo! and Open Text, however; it is limited to Federal Internet sites. The URL for the Pathway Indexer is . If we do a search such as: "'environmental protection' and wildlife" we will retrieve 50 items, which is the default maximum result set, but you can set the search options to different parameters. The first result is information from the "Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge Superfund Site Cleanup" from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Wildlife Refuge System, and we are retrieving information from a specific file on the NWRS Internet server. Currently the Pathway Indexer is in a prototype stage and we are working on increasing the size and scope of the database. We hope you will test all of the Pathway Services and let us know what you think of these services. If you have questions or comments, please e-mail us at ets@gpo.gov or call (202) 512-1698. Raeann and Maggie's Farewell Song ALA New York was the final site for demonstration of Pathway Services for Raeann and Maggie. To say goodbye, they sang the following song to sum up their Washington, DC experience. Thank you to all of you who supported Raeann and Maggie during their project at the Government Printing Office. (sung to the tune of the Beverly Hillbillies) I LL TELL YOU A STORY ABOUT MAGGIE AND RAEANN WORKING IN THE FIELD, DOCUMENTS LIBRARIAANS AND THEN ONE DAY THEY WERE SURFIN' ON THE NET UP FROM THE WEB CAME PATHWAY SERVICES FINDING TOOLS DYNAMICALLY LINKED SERVICES SO THE FOLKS AT GPO SAID WE GOT A GREAT IDEAR GODORT SAID NOW MOVE AWAY FROM HERE THEY SAID THE CAPITAL IS THE PLACE YOU OUGHT TO BE SO THEY LOADED UP COMPUTERS AND HEADED TO DC WASHINGTON POLITICS BLIZZARDS NOW A YEAR'S GONE BY AND OUR WORK IS MOSTLY DONE WE WANNA THANK YOU KINDLY AND IT'S BEEN A LOT OF FUN TO THANK EVERYBODY WOULD BE A REAL TRICK A FEW WE'D LIKE TO MENTION ARE JAY, JOE AND RIC YOUNG PASKOSKI DAVIS NOW IT'S TIME FOR RAEANN TO GO BACK TO ILLINOIS AND MAGGIE TO MONTANA, TOGETHER IT'S BEEN A JOY DUNCAN'S TAKING OVER AND WE WISH HIM LOTS OF LUCK MAKING THE TRANSITION, DOING POLITICAL KINDS OF STUFF