EffectiveSearching On Google using sophisticated

EffectiveSearching on Google

1. Effective Searching

2. Should We Just Use Google?
Many of us jump immediately onto Google or
Google Scholar
We’ll find somehelpful hits
But we may have to spend hours weeding
through the hits
Google is not exhaustive so we potentially
miss a great deal of research
So what’s the alternative?

3. The Alternative
Targetyour research
I can help you ensure that you’re finding the
majorityof what is available on your topic
How?
Let’s begin with the University Libraries
website: http://search.library.cmu.edu

4. Click on Articles & Databasesand then click on Databases A-Z

5. Choosing the Best Tools
The Libraries have hundreds of databases
with a significant amount of research not
found in Google and Google Scholar
If trying to be exhaustive in your research,
then for computer science topics, search:
ACM Digital Library
IEEE Xplore
INSPEC
Web of Science

6. Why Not Just One Tool?
We should search all four of those databases
rather than just one
None of them covers everythingthat’s
published (just like Google)
They have someoverlap
But we need to search allof them to ensure
we don’t miss any important research

7. Web of Science Searching
Let’s experiment with Web of Science (WoS)
to see how we can target our research
Important: when performing a search in any
database, experiment using a variety of
synonyms
Sometimes we’re not always quite sure what
those synonyms may be

8. Sample Search
Let’s search on: keystroke dynamics
Sometimes we’re searching on a topic that
uses various words to describe it
So to target our research, try to pin down the
various words and phrases to use
The next slide is an example hit
I highlighted in red synonyms we should use

10. Honing Our Search
So let’s redo our search using some of those
synonyms
I’ve highlighted how to correctly link the
words in our search

11. Refining Our Search
On the left side, WoS provides a wide variety
of ways to refine our results
Under Document Types, we see that the
most hits are Articles and Proceedings
Papers (from conferences)
But what it we only want a review, we could
choose that option

12. Refining Our Search
We see which authorsand what sources,
i.e., journals, conferences, and book series
have published the moston this topic
These are all ways to refine our search to
better target what precisely we need

13. Additional Tools
On the rightside of the window, near the bottom are two
important tools to help us find moreresearch
References: the bibliography the author listed at the end of
their article
Alwayslook at these references because they will lead you to
more hits on this topic
Look at the bibliographies in thosearticles as well
This process is called Footnote Chasing
Related Records may also help connect
you to additional research

14. Reverse Citations
One of the most powerful tools of WoS is its
ability to show us how frequently an article
has been cited by others
On the right side we see the quantity of
citations, as well as the individual articles
titles
We can click on any of them to go directly to
those citations

16. New Visual Tool
WoS is offering a fascinating new tool that is
still in beta
It shows us visually a citation map, i.e., a trail
of who has cited whom on this topic
You can view citations going forwards and
backwards
It’s an extremely powerful tool that we’re just
beginning to learn how to use fully

18. Here’s an example of a 1-generation citation map for an article

19. Move Onto Other Resources
All of what we’ve covered here are tools
available in Web of Science
I encourageyou to search the other
databases mentioned earlier
You need to ensure you do not miss anything
of importance in your research

20. For Additional Help
Remember that at any time, feel free to
contact me for additional help:
Missy Harvey
Computer Science Librarian
Email: [email protected]
Blog: http://cslibrarian.net/
Website: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~missy/