My past experiences of casual information searching have often relied on making unconscious decisions; automatically turning to familiar, tried-and-tested web resources for reliable information. Earlier this year I planned a last-minute trip to Edinburgh and, to some extent, I already knew exactly where to find the information I would require for arranging the weekend.
The first step was to organise both accommodation and travel. I have always relied upon Trainline for finding and purchasing cheap train tickets, especially at the last minute. I also used Google Maps to calculate how long the journey would take by car, and how much it would approximately cost in petrol. It turned out that rail would be the cheapest (and fastest) option.
I used TripAdvisor to find a reasonably priced and conveniently located hotel for the weekend, then reserved the room using the hotel's own website (which I probably found through a simple Google search). We had some vague ideas for things to do in the city, but I also consulted WikiTravel for some additional suggestions. I then consulted Last.Fm, a 'scrobbling' music recommendation service, to see if any familiar bands were playing gigs whilst we were there.
My final online resource was Happy Cow, an online directory which I have used to find vegetarian and vegan restaurant suggestions on several occasions before. Although useful, the website suffers from its rather basic design and sometimes outdated information. Regardless of this, I was pleased to find many tempting veggie options in Edinburgh.
Perhaps the most valuable source of information that weekend turned out to be my copy of the Edinburgh Encounter Lonely Planet guide. Sometimes the traditional, physical guide book turns out to be the most reputable and trustworthy source of information when visiting a new place, perhaps moreso than any user contribution based website.
Ben
Showing posts with label Information Universe. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Information Universe. Show all posts
Monday, 8 October 2012
Saturday, 6 October 2012
Thing 5: The New Information Universe ---Chang
Recently I had an experience to find an
authentic Chinese restaurant in Sheffield. Because I never had meal in a
Chinese restaurant of Sheffield before, I had to find some information on the
Internet.
Next, I used Google to find some common evaluation about these restaurants. First of all, I typed the text ‘ ”evaluation” “Chinese restaurant” “Sheffield” ’ into the search box and the results were some PDFS about Chinese restaurants in Sheffield which were not what I wanted. Then I removed the words ‘Chinese’ and ‘Sheffield’, added the word ‘UK’ into the search box and searched again. This time, I found a website called Tripadvisor. After finding out Tripadvisor, I searched Wong Ting Restaurant in its database and there were more than 60 comments written by customers.
Firstly, I posted a question about the good
Chinese restaurants to the internet forum of the Chinese Students and Scholars
Association in Sheffield. Later, someone recommended a restaurant called Wong
Ting to me. But I didn’t know if this restaurant was his personal preference.
So I had to find some common evaluation about this restaurant.
Next, I used Google to find some common evaluation about these restaurants. First of all, I typed the text ‘ ”evaluation” “Chinese restaurant” “Sheffield” ’ into the search box and the results were some PDFS about Chinese restaurants in Sheffield which were not what I wanted. Then I removed the words ‘Chinese’ and ‘Sheffield’, added the word ‘UK’ into the search box and searched again. This time, I found a website called Tripadvisor. After finding out Tripadvisor, I searched Wong Ting Restaurant in its database and there were more than 60 comments written by customers.
Finally, I decided to have dinner in the
Wong Ting Restaurant after reading all the comments. And the foods were delicious.
The Information Universe & me
Good day everyone!
I want to share a couple of examples of my experience with 'the information universe'
Firstly, when I was working as a Graduate Trainee in a library at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU), students would naturally come to library staff for help with various research problems. Most commonly it was simply a case of showing the student(s) how to make best use of the library's physical and electronic resources. The campus where I worked taught healthcare subjects (nursing, phsyiotherapy etc) so it was also important to find the most up-to-date information possible. Let's say in this example I am showing how to research a Nursing question.
The first port of call would be the library's OPAC (Online Public Access Catalogue). Using variations on the search terms, and then where necessary filtering results by site (e.g. searching only at our campus would be more likely to locate relevant books/journals) and by date (if we want only recent material).
Next, if the student then wanted to find journal articles relevant to their subject, I could show them the subject-related databases subscribed to by MMU. One option would be to use 'search it', a service which searches multiple databases at once. This makes a good first choice for some queries, but the search options there are limited, so I could also show them the individual databases - such as ScienceDirect and Internurse. I would give a demonstration of how to use these, especially how to use the search functions effectively.
Secondly, as part of the Graduate Trainee programme at MMU, we had training in Presentation Skills which required us to prepare 2 practice presentations on any topics we liked. Now, I hate to give people incorrect information about anything, so one I had chosen my topic I researched it as best I to make sure everything was factually correct! In these cases though I had to use information freely available online - the subjects were a bit obscure for MMU libraries! I'll focus on just one of them here - a place known as 'Thornton Abbey' in Lincolnshire.
Some people may frown on this, but once I had chosen my subjects, my first action was to look them up in Wikipedia. This was just to get a good starting point for the subject! Next, I checked out the links given in Wikipedia - in this case, to English Heritage and to a local history blogger. Next, some more Google searching led me to other websites (such as the University of Sheffield's own site - turns out the archaeology department were carrying out a dig last year and this year - this was before I knew I wanted to apply to Sheffield myself!). Finally, I wanted to use some pictures in my presentation, and I had to make sure they were usable under copyright law. Wikimedia Commons and Flickr were useful for finding pictures usable under Creative Commons licenses.
Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to point out two fairly different aspects of the information universe! If you want to know more about the Abbey, here's the University of Sheffield Archaeology Department's website for it.
I want to share a couple of examples of my experience with 'the information universe'
Firstly, when I was working as a Graduate Trainee in a library at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU), students would naturally come to library staff for help with various research problems. Most commonly it was simply a case of showing the student(s) how to make best use of the library's physical and electronic resources. The campus where I worked taught healthcare subjects (nursing, phsyiotherapy etc) so it was also important to find the most up-to-date information possible. Let's say in this example I am showing how to research a Nursing question.
The first port of call would be the library's OPAC (Online Public Access Catalogue). Using variations on the search terms, and then where necessary filtering results by site (e.g. searching only at our campus would be more likely to locate relevant books/journals) and by date (if we want only recent material).
Next, if the student then wanted to find journal articles relevant to their subject, I could show them the subject-related databases subscribed to by MMU. One option would be to use 'search it', a service which searches multiple databases at once. This makes a good first choice for some queries, but the search options there are limited, so I could also show them the individual databases - such as ScienceDirect and Internurse. I would give a demonstration of how to use these, especially how to use the search functions effectively.
Secondly, as part of the Graduate Trainee programme at MMU, we had training in Presentation Skills which required us to prepare 2 practice presentations on any topics we liked. Now, I hate to give people incorrect information about anything, so one I had chosen my topic I researched it as best I to make sure everything was factually correct! In these cases though I had to use information freely available online - the subjects were a bit obscure for MMU libraries! I'll focus on just one of them here - a place known as 'Thornton Abbey' in Lincolnshire.
Some people may frown on this, but once I had chosen my subjects, my first action was to look them up in Wikipedia. This was just to get a good starting point for the subject! Next, I checked out the links given in Wikipedia - in this case, to English Heritage and to a local history blogger. Next, some more Google searching led me to other websites (such as the University of Sheffield's own site - turns out the archaeology department were carrying out a dig last year and this year - this was before I knew I wanted to apply to Sheffield myself!). Finally, I wanted to use some pictures in my presentation, and I had to make sure they were usable under copyright law. Wikimedia Commons and Flickr were useful for finding pictures usable under Creative Commons licenses.
Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to point out two fairly different aspects of the information universe! If you want to know more about the Abbey, here's the University of Sheffield Archaeology Department's website for it.
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