A c t i o n f o r L i b r a r i e s — J u l y 2 0 0 4

In Reference...

Edited by Brandie Baumann

H.W. Wilson Expands Biography Reference Bank
New entries from Oxford University Press (OUP), Congressional Directory and James Clarke & Co. have added more than 14,000 licensed biographical articles to Wilson's Biography Reference Bank database. The database encompasses biographies on approximately 490,000 individuals, with access to profiles drawn from the Oxford Dictionaries of earth science, chemistry, physics, folklore and sociology and OUP's Concise Oxford Dictionaries covering literature, theater, music, politics, religion and mathematics, as well as to the Oxford Companions to Shakespeare, philosophy, poetry and art.

New profiles licensed from James Clarke & Co., from the Encyclopedia of Middle Ages and the Encyclopedia of the Early Church, are included along with a complete list of source volumes, including Wilson biographical resources and others.

Additionally, some 540 entries from U.S. Congress' Congressional Directory have been incorporated, bringing researchers handy information about the backgrounds and electoral districts covered by their congressional representatives, including contact information.

Go to www.hwwilson.com/Databases/biobank.htm to sign up for a free trial and to see a complete list of available titles. For pricing and subscription information, contact Karen Graham (kgraham@bcr.org) at BCR.

Enhancements to WorldCat on OCLC FirstSearch
The WorldCat database on FirstSearch moved to a new technology platform in April that has allowed OCLC to add several new features. The keyword (default) index for WorldCat is changed to include Author Keywords, ISBNs and publication dates. In addition, new indexes and minor display changes are designed to improve searching results. Users will get different results from the same searches they did previously; however, neither the old results nor the new results are incorrect. Only the indexing has changed.

The Union Lists of Periodicals Database on OCLC FirstSearch will be discontinued for both per-search and subscription users on Tuesday, August 31. The database will also be removed from the OCLC Base Package at that time and will not be updated in August 2004. However, users will continue to have access to local data records created by their libraries in WorldCat where they will be significantly more visible and more likely to be used. Further, the discontinuation of the Union Lists of Periodicals database does not impact the Union Listing service in any way. For more information as well as subscription options available to you, contact Karen Graham (kgraham@bcr.org) at BCR.

Oxford University Press News
A number of Oxford University Press products have received updates and new features designed to give users the most current and expansive information available today in the reference database world. In addition, each of these products can be test driven for free at www.oup-usa.org/networkfreetrials.

Oxford Scholarship Online (OSO) Selected by Library Journal as one of the Best Reference Databases of 2003, OSO has been enhanced with the addition of new content, bringing the number of books with complete text to 744. The disciplines of philosophy, economics and finance, political science and religion now include expanded title lists. See the What's New section for a complete list of new titles (www.oxfordscholsarhip.com/oso/public/).
Oxford Reference Online: Premium Collection and Core Collection
Three new titles have been added to the Premium Collection including the Oxford Dictionary of English, the Oxford Companion to Military History and the Oxford Companion to Archeology. Both the Core Collection and the Premium Collection have been enhanced with the addition of the Concise Oxford-Hachette French Dic- tionary, the Concise Oxford-Duden German Dictionary, the Concise Oxford Spanish Dictionary, A Dictionary of Ecology, the Oxford Dictionary of Art and the World Encyclopedia.
Grove Music Online New content, features and functionality highlight the enhancements to OUP's Grove Music Online. Approximately 300 biographies from the New Grove Dictionary of Women Composers are scheduled to be added, works-lists of a number of 20th century composers have been updated, and 55 Sibelius-enabled Renaissance musical examples are now included, forming a core of 75 sound examples of some of the most important musical features of early music. The Explore feature offers an index page to direct users to three special categories of content in Grove Music Online: Biographies, Research Resources and Sibelius Musical Examples.
Grove Art Online Significant revisions to 85 articles on Classical Art have been made, including changes to advanced search pages. The What's New page now provides users with access to lists of new and substantially updated articles by category and month of update, and the first major review of all art image Web links has been completed to ensure access to reliable quality images from collections in museums and galleries around the world.

For more information on any Oxford University Press database, please contact Laura Chittivej at BCR (lchittiv@bcr.org).

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