Final CTEC 115 post - E-books

The Rise of E-reading

This article is based on surveys completed by the Pew internet & American life project. The survey used included multiple demographic groups. Based on information found in this article I concluded that E-books have made an impact on the amount people read.

Device owners read more often. On any given day 56% of those who own e-book reading devices are reading a book, compared with 45% of the general book-reading public who are reading a book on a typical day. Some 63% of the e-book device owners who are reading on any given day are reading a printed book; 42% are reading an e-book; and 4% are listening to an audio book (Web).

This article not only discussed whether people are reading more with E-books, but also included:

1.       The general reading habits of  Americans

2.      Americans and their E-reader and tablets

3.      The state of E-book reading

4.     Where and how readers get their books

5.      The differences among E-book readers

Positively impacting E-book usage is the ever increasing amount of available titles not only for sale, but also for rental or check-out from the public library. What I did not see was a detailed discussion regarding the impact of usage of E-books for textbooks.

I found that not only were people reading more now, but more and more people have E-readers or other devices for reading, and those that read E-books , read more books than they had previously. The print portion of the book market has 72% of the market share.

Lee Rainie, Kathryn Zickuhr, Kristen Purcell, Mary Madden and Joanna Brenner. The rise of e-reading. Pewinternet.org, 13 Sept. 2007. Web. 10 Dec. 2012. http://libraries.pewinternet.org/2012/04/04/the-rise-of-e-reading/

The article I reviewed above was my open web resource. I used Google with the search term “Are people reading more because of eBooks?” This gave 153,000 results, several of which referenced the Pew Research studies. In lieu of using second information (and because I already Pew to be reputable) I went directly to their website www.pewinternet.org & use their site search with eBooks as the search term.  They had many studies/articles available for review, but this one was closest with the information I needed. Pew is a USA based non-profit research group. This article is current (10/2012), relevant and relevant.

The article that I found with my deep web search through ProQuest actually utilized the same Pew study in the article above. I used this article because I was having difficulty locating appropriate article that did not reference Pew for their data. This particular article discusses several key points with eBooks that the Pew article did not, such as:

1.       Public libraries

2.      Academic libraries

3.      McGraw-Hill

4.     E-Textbooks

5.      Knovel

6.      E-books for business & law

7.      Pricing

My search terms to locate this article was “ebook AND (read OR reading)”.This article was relevant and complimentary to the other information that I found It was published this last summer (2012) and it is an industry trade journal.

Sabroski, Suzanne, and Marydee Ojala. "Ebook Updates." Online 36.4 (2012): 37-40. ABI/INFORM Trade & Industry; ProQuest Research Library. Web. 10 Dec. 2012.

Unit 10 - Final CTEC 115 Blog Post - HTML

Here is the link to the web page I created for CTEC 155 http://twoplayfulotters.com/student/shanelucas.html.

Several years ago I had the opportunity to create my own, very extensive retail web site and I did so using Microsoft Front Page. That was quite an adventure and a great learning experience. Until returning to school this year I had not had the need or desire to use HTML. This quarter I had two classes (including this one) that required the use of basic HTML to create a web page for familiarity with process. I think this is a fun exercise and very easy to learn with the free and readily accessible tools.

In the context of our digital age (free web 2.0 tools) and education, I do not know that the average student would/will have need to use HTML, however I think this basic exposure is relative to our course material since everything was Internet based. It is also helpful to give a general understanding of what makes a web page work. I found it to be a time worthy class period. By the way I did not use the same web page for both classes, I used some of the same elements and framework, but make significant variations as well.

Thanks for sharing knowledge Instructor Bullock. I would recommend for students to enroll for this class during their first or second quarter, and definitely before taking any ENG& classes if they wish to receive maximum benefit.

Open web resources - unit 9

For my open web searches I used Google, since I found better ways to use it more effectively it is always my go to; the Boolean is pretty easy and their advanced search tools and other options are great. In an effort to try to explore with Bing, I did try it first and they do not have advanced search options available, though in fairness I did not try just straight Boolean operators (until now). I just tried .edu with the same search phrase listed below, except in the Bing search field and it returned 39,000 results (compared to 93,500 Google), and with two ads versus one. I also appreciate how Google give you a half screen page preview as an option.

"Public Access" (open OR wireless) (network OR wifi OR wi-fi) site:.gov

I went with result #3 of 150,000. This was exactly the type of resource I would be looking for and the type of information I would expect to find on a .gov website. There was ample, free information, with specific reference to a private citizen’s security while using public access wi-fi services. There was no legal mumbo jumbo or citation of specific laws on this landing page, however two of the four topics of focus were consumer tips for “Don’t Assume a Wi-Fi Hotspot is Secure” & “Protect Yourself When Using a Public Wi-Fi”. The page itself was dated September 2011. As the title would suggest, they also had lots of information about protecting yourself online in general. I would use this as a resource for research.                       

http://www.onguardonline.gov/articles/0014-tips-using-public-wi-fi-networks

Many of the others sites that appeared in the results were disclaimers or how-to-access specific government localities various public access wi-fi networks. There was one sponsored ad at the top of the results.

"Public Access" (open OR wireless) (network OR wifi OR wi-fi) site:.edu

I went with result #7 of 93,500, which is a pdf handout from University of AZ. It provided wireless security information, which I would consider relevant reading for anyone researching the topic and is available for public access. The document was not dated but contained, what I know to be current references and terminology and the .edu domain lend it credence as well. Then I magically deleted the beyond the .edu domain and hit the jackpot. More related information than I could possible surf through and amazing credentials available for the contributors and faculty. I would use this site for reference.

http://www.security.arizona.edu/files/wirelesshandout.pdf

Very similar in nature to the .gov domain results is the type of information most of these .edu sites contained, specific to particular institutions or their policies and FAQs.

"Public Access" (open OR wireless) (network OR wifi OR wi-fi) site:.org

I went with result #NA of 542,000 and ended up changing my search terms by adding personal security at the beginning. The original search was only returning private policies. This was closer to the mark, on page two, result 10 (after 4 ads total) I found a useful potential source. This actual link is to a guest blog on the site, but I started poking around just before scrapping link, I was quite surprised by their mission statement, board members, and (org) sponsors. There were far too many to list, but included almost every name you would recognize in the industry and this lends credibility to the site and their distributed information as an industry sponsored .org. The information was also current and provided links to multiple additional resources.

http://www.staysafeonline.org/blog/guest-blog-making-public-wifi-safe

"Public Access" (open OR wireless) (network OR wifi OR wi-fi) site:.com

I went with result #NA of 4,999,000; yeah, not going to look through 5,000,000 commercially sponsored websites, got it covered for now with the other four domain types.

"Public Access" (open OR wireless) (network OR wifi OR wi-fi) site:.net

I went with result # of 2 of 119,000 & found great information, which was in fact quite interesting and a slightly different angle than I had previously considered (personal security risks), as this covered site covered liability issues from a business perspective (this site belongs to a PA law firm) in the form of a client (or potential client) newsletter. Even considering that this is a corporate (for profit) website and that they are licensed for a specific state(s), they provide ample references and citations of/to current federal laws and all information was free of charge and without solicitation of personal information. This particular article was from a 2007 issue however, the site was itself was current. There was also contact information and lots of additional resources and links. I would verify the laws cited were still current before including in research, but definitely a great resource.

http://www.mbm-law.net/newsletter-articles/wi-fi-hotspots-and-liability-concerns/1229/

            The first site I went to was completely commercial and was a FAQ section html. Many of the other sites appeared to be forums or html disclosure statements for individual entities or businesses (these could provide useful in some aspects). There was one sponsored ad at the bottom of the results.

            I feel that by the time I completed this exercise, all of the results I mentioned could be helpful in some manner, however specific to which type of domain returned the most relevant results off my search terms and needs, I would use the .gov, and follow up on the information from the law firm website. Adding a domain type stipulation is a great search tool if, especially if you kind of now what you are looking for, but even if you do not it can provide good ideas too. If the summary on the results seems at all relative, back off everything in the domain name until you get to the highest level (.edu,.gov.com, etc…) and see what the site has to offer. I think a helpful Boolean operator or search field would be “with citations”.

Research Journal Unit 8, Search Tools

For my Meta Search Tool I chose to explore Beaucoup @ www.beaucoup.com , which is described by Southern Oregon University www.hanlib.sou.edu/searchtools/metatool.html as:

Beaucoup is a link to more than categorized 1400 sites. Find sites for Searching, Reference, Literature, Computers, Internet, Media, Education, and more. Also offers geographic specific sites to search for worldwide information.

Beaucoup display a list of fifteen search categories on its landing page, with the last category being “potpourri”. Each main category title is not a clickable link; however, each search category displays a short list of subcategories on the main page, which are clickable links. After choosing your appropriate link, you are taken to landing page full of links for that category as well as a good description of what type of information you will find and where it is pulled from (each link appears to have one specific database it references unlike the Super Search Tool mentioned below). In addition, conveniently placed on the left of the page is a list format of all the main categories from the main page; on the right is a list of “Top Resources”.

They also provide an easy to use Super Search box, however I could not find any information regarding Boolean operators or advanced search techniques (though through exploration they do accept at least some Boolean operators and do not use them by default). They describe the Super Search Tool as:

Super Search box [takes] your input [&] will query multiple engines at once including: Yahoo, About, Infoseek, Lycos, Webcrawler,  AllTheWeb. To get back to the Beaucoup web pages simply click on the graphic at the upper left hand corner or on any of the Beaucoup categories in the index running along the left side of the search returns pages.

They do include Paid or Sponsored Links first in their results when using the Super Search and they do not list the date that the search results were obtained or updated. After your initial search, you are provided links of suggestions of key words or topics, which would appropriately widen or narrow your original search term(s). They do give a total results display as well as the number of pages found, however they do not tell you which search engine(s) your results came from.

My overall opinion of this new Meta Search Tool and its potential uses is that it is a great option for various stages of the research process & I like it. Based on its user interface from the landing page, I would actually use Beaucoup primarily as a Subject Index; secondarily as Meta Search Tool (Super Search), even though this is the list it was on. I found that the subjects that were pre-defined would be great if looking for topic ideas or possibly finding a match to an existing subject and then being directed to some very specific sources. I found the Super Search results to be limited, for example I searched Mars Rover & Mars AND Rover and though different results were returned with each, they numbered ten or less results each.

For my General Search Tool I chose Lycos, which I have heard of but never used before. The link for their landing search page is www.lycos.com .The Southern Oregon University website describes Lycos as:

Lycos offers both a simple and an advanced search mode, which provide access to about 50 million web pages. The simple mode is designed to be a hub for information and includes a subject directory, a search engine, information sites such as headlines, news, weather, stocks, etc.

            In their company overview, Lycos says, “[we are] evolving from a single search engine into a focused network of community and social sites…”There are no advance search options that I could locate; the default results format is from the “web” and additional categories are available to specify , which include “images”, “video”, “news”, “shopping”, and “weather”.  Mars Rover returned over five million results, and Mars AND Rover returned only about one-hundred-fifty-thousand less. The results page is framed with sponsored links.  They do display a thumbnail from the suggested website to left of each result. Results are not dated, however what I found most inconvenient or missing was, the normal Bold Face given to your search terms within the results, which for me made it more difficult to see how or why they were referencing each site based on my search terms. This also made it more difficult to determine if there was a Boolean strategy in place or available.

            In summary, Lycos may be as good as any other general search engine; however, those whom use their email services or other social media services would likely be more inclined to be the ones who use Lycos as their default search engine. With my current knowledge and experience, I would prefer to use Google.com, specifically www.google.com/advanced_search, and specifically because of their available advanced search tools and the fact that I use their social media and email services.

            For my Subject Directory Search I chose to use EDUFRAME, which is described as “A very comprehensive list of sites organized by subject. If you do not find the subject you are searching for, use the Search feature. Slightly more difficult to use than other resources because of the frames…”, by The Southern Oregon University site. It turns out that I did not care for this tool personally; just as they said, difficult because it is presented in frames. However, it did appear to be a wealth of information. It was structured in the form of a traditional hierarchy system, with just lists of text titles. I abandon it at this point because there was now search box available. It might be good if looking for a topic to explore further and is probably easier to use once more familiar with it.

            I continued with my Subject Index Search by checking out Virtual Reference Shelf @ www.loc.gov/rr/askalib/virtualref.html, because based on its description it sounded very interesting and likely to be a great research tool. “The Virtual Reference Shelf is topical list of online resources for research from the Library of Congress” (The Southern Oregon University).            Their home page has many available subjects to choose from along with each having its own subcategories. Best of all, they have a search box, which eventually allows you options within results to easily narrow or widen your search with a plethora of available filters. The result page shows a thumbnail for some results, states format provided (webpage, video, legislation, etc…), you can also print, save, or send/share for findings and, even subscribe to them. Additionally, you can how your results are displayed (both visually & contextually).

            I did not find a link stating how to search, but with Mars Rover as the search, sixteen results were displayed. I then tried Mars AND Rover, the same sixteen results came back. Lastly, I tried Mars OR Rover, and got back 1418 results. This means that AND is an implied Boolean operator through this site, and others can used, such as OR. I found this site would be a great scholarly research tool for finding relevant subjects and links. I will use it in the future.

            Overall, depending on what type of research is being performed (academic or personal), each type of tool has its own benefits, as well as restrictions. For academic research, the Subject Indexes (created by people) would be a great place to look in addition to the search tools through our school library site. I honestly would probably not use Meta Search tools (created by algorithm) on a regular basis, maybe if I were struggling to get results with my General Search Tool (algorithm), Google or whichever, then I would try out a Meta. I will continue to use my General Search Tool (with advance search options or Boolean operators) for both academic research and personal research.

            The IRIS tutorial for Google searching was very helpful, particularly the link www.loc.gov/rr/askalib/virtualref.html , which gives additional Boolean style features for Google searching like the minus sign (-) and the (~) symbol relative to search terms.

Research Journal, Part 7: Finding Articles in Periodical Indexes

This is my magazine article. It is from PC World Magazine, which is a major technology publication that has been popular for years. I found it on my first search with Academic Search Premier using the following search, and on the first try (also used date range of 2010-present):

I was not familiar with the author, Steven Andres, and the article did not give specific references so I performed a Google search on his name, which was not much help. I then performed a Google search for "Steven Andres" AND "pc world", bingo. He is actually Steven Andrés, M.S., from San Diego State University, and comes with too many certifications and credentials to list here, check out his bio,  He has published many, current related articles. This article specifically addresses the type of information I was looking for when performing my search, "How to Stay Safe on Public Wi-Fi" and an explanation of what the associated risks are.

Works Cited

Andrés, Steven. "How to Stay Safe on Public Wi-Fi." PC World 28.7 (2010): 94-96. Academic Search Premier. Web. 7 Nov. 2012.

This is my related newspaper article, by Kate Murphy, published by The New York Times. It took a little more searching to find this one, I used the same Boolean search terms, however used Proquest for search. This included sub-categorizing types of information and 2010-present. I was also looking for a research article at the same time. It also gave me some good additional possible subject terms.

This article is relevant because the topics discussed are specifically from the categories I was searching for. I could not find any other information on the author and she did not relate any sources. However, based on my personal knowledge I would say she has some advanced knowledge on the subject and she has a reputable publisher. This was also a recent article (2011). Additionally there was no apparent bias to the information presented.

Works Cited

Murphy, Kate. "New Hacking Tools Pose Bigger Threats to Wi-Fi Users." New York Times: B.8. Feb 17 2011. Los Angeles Times; National Newspapers Core; New York Times. Web. 7 Nov. 2012 .

This is my related Scholarly Journal Article. Again, I stuck with what worked for my search. This article also showed up quickly. It was located in in the Academic Search Premier. It also presented some great additional, related search terms I had not previously considered.

This article is relevant because like the others, it is specific to what I was searching for. It is has two authors, one of whom is the is "Network, Information and Computer Security Lab (NICS) Head, Javier Lopez, Full Professor (Catedrático) Computer Science Department, University of Malaga (Spain). The other is one of his PHD students, Ruben Rios. If you follow either of their links you will see they have quite impressive credentials (the website is .es  because the country of origin is Spain, but is in English. The article was published less than a year ago.

Works Cited

Rios, R., and J.Lopez. "Analysis of Location Privacy Solutions in Wireless Sensor Networks." IET Communications 5.17 (2011): 2518-2532. Academic Search Premier. Web. 8 Nov. 2012.

Unit 6 More on Search Strategies

I am continuing on last weeks post in which I got a little ahead of things and already completed portion two of this exercise for all three of my own search statements. In this week's post I am listing my five statements, whcih I chose from the provided list. they are as follows:

Will presidential election reform solve the issues with the Electoral College and the popular vote?

• “presidential election” AND  reform  AND “ Electoral College” AND “ popular vote” 

Does television advertising by the pharmaceutical industry have an impact on prescription drug abuse?

• television AND advertis* AND pharmaceutical AND  prescription AND abuse 

What breeds of dogs make good therapy pets?

• breed*  AND  (dog* OR canine*) AND therapy

Is the current lack of sunspot activity affecting global warming?

• “sunspot activity” AND “global warming”

Is a vegetarian diet healthier than a meat-based diet?

• vegetarian AND diet  AND health* AND mea

Unit 5, Research Tools, Narrowing Down a Subject

Choose one book that looks like it could be useful for your topic. Write an entry in your Research Journal, documenting the following:

 Search Term(s) used “privacy concerns” and information and collected and applications and portable and technology and devices

 Citation information for one book: (author, title, city of publication, publisher, publication date) Sylvia Engdahl (book editor), Espionage and intelligence, Detroit, Greenhaven Press, 2012

 Subject Headings (taken from the Subject Field) National security -- Law and legislation -- United States. Electronic surveillance -- Law and legislation -- United States.Espionage -- United States.Intelligence service -- Law and legislation -- United States. 

 Is this a Circulating Book or an E-Book? It is part of a series (current controversies).

 Location and Call Number for the Book - Cannell New Books   KF4850 .E87 2012  

 What clues in the book record lead you to believe that this book is credible, or trustworthy? (Remember the ASAP criteria from IRIS)

The publication is current, includes a long bibliography, the call number is surrounded by reference texts. Related subjects are relevant.

Choose one book in the Summit Catalog that looks like it could be useful for your topic. Write an entry in your Research Journal documenting the following:

 Search Term(s) used “privacy concerns” and technology

 Citation information for one book: (author, title, city of publication, publisher, publication date) Privacy and innovation, Author: Avi Goldfarb; Catherine Tucker; National Bureau of Economic Research.

Publisher: Cambridge, Mass. : National Bureau of Economic Research, ©2011.

 Subject Headings (the field is called “Related Subjects” in Summit) Related Subjects:(2) Privacy, Right of. Technological innovations.

 Location and Call Number for the Book. National Bureau of Economic Research http://papers.nber.org/papers/w17124 or WSU Internet All-WSU ON-LINE  HB1 .W654 no.17124 (Electronic resource)

 What clues in the book record lead you to believe that this book is credible, or trustworthy? Publisher, It is a current working paper.

 How did this search differ from the search in the Cannell Library Book Catalog? This search returned a much larger results list, which was relevant and contained a lot of other possible/related search terms.

In your research journal: Write a paragraph summarizing your experience with IT Pro. Your summary should include a discussion of the fields and search modes you can use to focus your search.

The IT Pro offers multiple search refining tools. Within the general search term you can choose: context, general info (with 5 sub-headings), content and in notes. You can use any/all words, Boolean, or exact phrase. You can restrict the search to specific folders. You can repeat (and use multiples) of the general search field terms within three additional fields, and specify options of  like, before, or after for the copyright year.

Choose one book in Google Books that looks like it could be useful for your topic. Write an entry in your Research Journal documenting the following:

 Search Term(s) used “privacy concerns” and technology

 Citation information for the book: (author, title, city of publication, publisher, publication date) Privacy Protections for Personal Information Online (Google eBook), Gina Stevens, Gina Stevens (au), DIANE Publishing, 2011 - Law - 15 pages

 What clues does Google Books provide that lead you to believe this book is trustworthy? Author is a government official, current, Many references listed, written for the Congressional Research Service.

Summarize this unit.

In your research journal, write a paragraph that summarizes what you took away from this activity. For this unit I learned how use truncation, keyword phrases and a great way to narrow down an idea to a search statement. I was not  previously with Google Books either, even though I have used it before (personal use); I never thought of it as a research tool, but it is actually great in that you can preview much of the text and it provides multiple options for obtaining the material (purchase, library search, etc…)

Truncate words for a successful search Use the *, pet* for pet(s)(ting)etc..

Boolean Operators AND , OR, NOT  

From Idea to Search Statement

What is decisional and constitutional privacy and how does it differ from tort and informational privacy?

“decisional privacy” and “constitutional privacy” and “tort privacy” and "informational privacy"

What are the common “privacy concerns” with and what type of information is and collected by applications when using portable and technology and devices (smartphones, tablets, etc…)?

“"privacy concerns" and information and collected and applications and portable and technology and devices

What are the “privacy concerns” and for an individual using a “public access” and “wireless network”?

“privacy concerns” and “public access” and “wireless network”