Bibliographic database
- For computer programs to manage an individual's bibliographic references, see Reference management software
A bibliographic database is a database that contains descriptive records of books, periodical articles, conference proceedings, and audio-visual collections. It may be a database containing information about books and other materials held in a library (e.g. an online library catalog, or OPAC) or, as the term is more often used, an electronic index to journal or magazine articles, containing citations, abstracts and often either the full text of the articles indexed, or links to the full text.
Many scientific databases are bibliographic databases. Within Chemical Abstracts, for example, there are databases of chemical structures and within Entrez there are databases of sequences. Outside of science, the same holds—there are databases of citations to articles in art history journals, and there are databases of images, such as ARTstor.
A well structured bibliographic database is an indispensable tool for modern researchers to find descriptive records of relevant information sources.
Library book databases
These databases are intended to be employed by college and university students to identify and locate books for class work and research. The books are then usually obtained through the catalog of the specific library, or via interlibrary loan.
OCLC
This very widely used database, known as WorldCat has input from almost all US academic and large public libraries, and from many in other countries. It is available to libraries that subscribe to the service.
A somewhat less powerful free version is now available, called simply Worldcat.org. In a version known as Open WorldCat, it can be integrated into web browsers.
WorldCat
WorldCat is a union catalog which itemizes the collections of more than 10,000 libraries which participate in the OCLC global cooperative. It is built and maintained collectively by the participating libraries from more than ninety countries. Created in 1971, it contains more than 90 million different records pointing to over 1.2 billion physical and digital assets in more than 360 languages, as of November 2007. It is the world's largest bibliographic database. WorldCat itself is not directly purchased by libraries, but serves as the foundation for many other fee-based OCLC services (such as resource sharing and collection management).
Specific libraries
The catalogs of the largest libraries, especially the major national libraries, can be used for general purpose bibliographic searching; they can be assumed to include all significant titles, and information then used to search more specific library catalogs. The catalogs of individual libraries can be used for finding books in those particular libraries.
Online general-interest book databases
Some databases are intended primarily for general rather than academic use, and are constructed less formally than those mentioned above.
Internet Book Database
The Internet Book Database (IBookDB) is an online database with information about books and authors with an added social networking component. It was started as an effort to be the IMDb equivalent for books. It currently contains information on over 94,000 books (over 316,000 ISBNs), 28,000 authors and 2,200 series[1] making it one of the largest online databases of author and book information. Unique features include finding historical publication information for books using their 'Other Versions' feature on every book page. They also provide price comparisons.
Registered users can catalog and manage their book collections online, find users with similar books, authors or series' and discuss books on the forums. They can also rate and review books in addition to Tagging them. Users can also rate and tag authors and series'. Other features offered include showing random books from users catalogs on their websites, blogs or on their pages on social networking sites, and search web sites of various bookstores. IBookDB also holds a monthly giveaway in which they giveaway around 10 books each month to users of the site, most of which are signed by the authors. Users can request editor status which currently allows them to enter and correct series related information.
IBookDB also offers services to authors such as hosting their official forums for free, getting their books listed, updating their Biography and other book publicity services, providing a platform for authors and readers to connect. Currently IBookDB hosts the Official Forums for several authors, including Paul Levine, Susan McBride, Becky Garrison, Kristina O'Donnelly and Danielle Girard.
Internet Book Database of Fiction
The Internet Book Database of Fiction (IBDoF) is an online database for books, mostly works of fiction. The site also hosts a message board specifically geared to the discussion of books. The Database currently holds information for over 35800 books and 4730 authors, the community consists of roughly 1330 active members who have made 123500 forum posts in over 6400 topics.
Members of the IBDoF are able to and encouraged to add books and authors to the database as well as rate and write reviews on existing books. The message board, which is now shared with the Internet Book List, includes discussion areas on some of the more popular authors in the database and also hosts official discussion boards for several authors including: Charles Pellegrino, L. E. Modesitt, Jack McDevitt, Lois McMaster Bujold, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (joint board), Debra Doyle and James D. Macdonald (joint board), Heather Gladney, John Dalmas, Elizabeth Bear and David B. Coe.
Social networking book databases
There are several databases intended primarily or partially for social networking. They encourage users to make their own catalogs, to rate the books on the site, and to use this information to identify others with similar interests. LibraryThing is a large and well-known example.
Book retailer databases
Aimed primarily at selling books and other products.
- AbeBooks
- Amazon.com
- Barnes & Noble
- Play.com
- Powell's Books
Compilations of other databases
Also known as book meta-search engines, these combine the output of catalogs from a number of libraries and other sources.
ISBNdb.com
ISBNdb.com [1] is a website that attempts to build a free database of books by querying various libraries across the world for book data. The results are then indexed by a variety of parameters (authors, publishers, subjects, similarity, etc.) and presented on the website in an organized format. Original MARC records are available for download as well. As of May 2006, the site has data on more than 2 million unique ISBNs and corresponding books searchable by title, ISBN, author, subject, and other criteria. 2000-5000 records are added daily.
The ISBNdb.com website also offers book price comparisons for availability and pricing in many online stores, including both general dealers such as Amazon and large used book dealers (AbeBooks, Alibris, etc). ISBNdb.com displays the pricing information immediately, in parallel to normal book browsing.
Effective July 2005, ISBNdb.com offers an XML based remote access API that allows access to all of the same data that is displayed on the website itself. ISBNdb.com was started in 2001 as a hobby project by Andrew Maltsev. It is now a project of his company, Ejelta LLC.
Digital Bibliography & Library Project (DBLP)
The Digital Bibliography & Library Project (DBLP) tracks citations in computer science. As of July 2007, the DBLP website listed more than 910,000 citations to articles on the computer science field, mirrored at five sites across the Internet.
Journal and magazine article databases
General
- ProQuest
- Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature
- Scopus - large scale commercial database of social science journals indexed by subject and with cross-references
- ISI Web of Knowledge - large scale commercial database of scientific, social science, and humanities journals indexed by subject and with cross-references
- Informit (RMIT Publishing)[2] - Australian aggregator of bibliographic databases and journals.
Subject-specific
- Anthropological Index Online (AIO)
- Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) - free database by U.S. Department of Education
- Rock's Backpages
Publisher-specific
- ScienceDirect
Open-access journal article databases
- Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)
See also
External links
az:IBList
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