untangling_the_web

DOCID: 4046925
UNCLASSIFIEDiiFOR OFJiICIAL USE ONLY
OAlster
Add to your deep web bookmarks OAlster (pronounced "oyster") to help you "find
the pearls." This information retrieval resource now contains a very impressive
9,950,256 records from 729 institutions (as of 10 January 2007). GAlster states,
''The service encompasses as broad a collection of resources as possible (i.e., with
no subject parameters). It is accessible to the entire Internet community, without
bounds." However, as you might have guessed, OAlster is not for run-of-the-mill
searches.
So just what sort of information does GAlster index? The project seeks to provide
easy access to actual digital records, not just lists, links, or bibliographies. What are
these digital resources? They "can range from a 1959 photograph of an A&P bakery
(from the Library of Congress American Memory project) to poems by Emily
Dickinson (from the University of Michigan Digital Library Production Services
American Verse project). Digital resources include items such as:
~ electronic books
~ online journals
~ audio files (e.g., wav, mp3)
~ images (e.g., tiff, gif)
~ movies (e.g., mpeg, QuickTime)
~ reference texts (e.g., dictionaries, directorlesj''l'"
Let's take a sample query and see what we come up with in GAlster. Here's a
simple phrase query-["turing machine"]-asking for results to be listed in
descending order by date (most recent first). Since many of the resources in OAlster
have reliable dates (e.g., journal articles), using the date sort option should work
fairly well.
101"What Are Digital Resources?" Wheeler Library, Otero Junior College, Colorado,
(18 January 2007).
264 UNCLASSIFIEDNFOR OFFl61AL l:JSE ONLY