what google scholar can do for you
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What Google Scholar can do for you
Solvej Vorster13th March 2014
Confession, or why I think Google Scholar “can do”
Google Scholar – friend or foe?
"isn't it true that only librarians like to search? Everyone else likes to find".
Tennant, R. (2001) "Digital Libraries- Cross-Database Search: One-Stop Shopping." Library journal. 15 October. http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA170458.html
Outline
1. What is Google Scholar?2. How does Google Scholar work?3. The “Deep Web”4. The pros and cons of Google Scholar5. Using Google Scholar (Google Scholar features)6. Google Books (previously : Google Book Search)
1. What is Google Scholar?1. Free and accessible web search engine for scientific
articles and books2. Indexes scholarly literature across formats and disciplines3. Released in 20044. In 2011 Scholar was removed from the Google main page5. Includes material from
• Google Books• Limited publishers websites and platforms• The general Google index (e.g. Articles from authors
personal websites)• Bibliographies of publications in Google Scholar
(indicated by [CITATION]) • University repositories• Preprint and working archives (e.g. ArXiv, Repec and
NBER)• Patents and USA Courts of law
1. What is Google Scholar?
6. What is excluded? • Journals and ebooks from publishers who do not co-
operate with GS• Journals and some books only available in print• Much of the material found in the “Deep Web”
7. Can be used for Citation Analysis : but beware!
8. Authors can create a profile to establish your citation data and h-index. Again beware: you can only add publications which are already on Google Scholar
2. How does Google Scholar work? : HELP
• http://www.google.com/intl/en/scholar/about.html
• http://scholar.google.co.za/intl/en/scholar/about.html
2. How does Google Scholar work?
Needs affiliation to an institution:
• Automatic when you are on Campus • Off Campus login • Setup in Google Scholar settings
Off campus access to e-resources
3. The “Deep Web”
Deep/Invisible/Hidden Web
http://www.juanico.co.il/main%20frame%20-%20english/issues/information%20systems.htm
http://www.kn.att.com/wired/21stcent/wversus.html
Source: http://www.upworthy.com/
4. The good and bad in Google Scholar
• Free (searching)• Articles in non-peer reviewed journals• Articles from conference proceedings• Also covers chapters in books• Indexes digital repositories• Scholar metrics : top 100 publications • Allows easy access to published articles compared with
other commercial databases (Google-like interface)
4. The good and bad in Google Scholar1. Only searches a fraction of published scholarly data2. Duplication leads to erroneous citation counts3. Doesn’t deal well with structured and tagged scholarly
documents resulting in inaccurate and nonsensical data4. Only 2 sorts (Relevance and Date)5. Coverage is dubious (what is included?)6. Many subscription databases are not included7. No prepublication data (not preprints)8. Not able to refine results9. Relevance ranking heavily relies on the number of citation counts
5. Using Google Scholar
• Navigation of the start page
• Navigation of the results page
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
• My Library• My Citations• Alerts• Metrics• Settings
• Search box options
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar : Scholar Library
5. Using Google Scholar : Scholar Library
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar Metrics
5. Using Google Scholar Metrics
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar Settings
5. Using Google Scholar START PAGE
5. Using Google Scholar Search Box
5. Using Google Scholar Search Box
5. Using Google Scholar Search Box
5. Using Google Scholar
• Navigation of the start page
• Navigation of the results page
5. Using Google Scholar : Search
Operators and wildcards
• “south africa” – exact phrase (use quotation marks / inverted commas)
• Boolean searching including +, -, AND, OR, AND NOT• e.g. “south africa” AND art AND apartheid• e.g. apartheid NOT “south africa”
• DOES NOT support wild card searching for word varieties beginning with a stem e.g. “south*” will not give you “southern”, southwest” etc.
5. Using Google Scholar
Types of results:
Clickable title (info is available on line – either full text or abstract)
[CITATION] means thet there is no online version but you are able to view the papers that cited the work.
[BOOK] with a clickable title – version is online
[BOOK] without a clickable title – version is not online but Google Scholar gives you a “Library Link” to find library with a hard copy
5. Using Google Scholar
• Limiting by date• Sorts : Relevance and Date• Create Alert• Settings and “My Citations” also accessible from Search
page (Down arrow at the top)
• Results:• Cited by• Related articles• Cite• All versions• More …• Cached
Google Books (previously Google Book Search )
“We just feel that this is part of our core mission. There is fantastic information in books. Often when I do a search, what is in a book is miles ahead of what I find on a web site.”
Sergey Brin Quoted in Nunberg, Geoffrey. “Google’s Book Search: A Disaster for Scholars. The Chronicle Review. The Chronicle of Higher Education. 31 Aug. 2009.
Google Books (previously Google Book Search )• Libraries are “partners in crime” • Bad metadata• Automatic indexing of the full text results in errors• Use of BISAC for subject headings : not helpful• Google Play (was Android Market)
• Different views :• Full view• Limited• Snippet• No preview available
• Advanced search• Find in a library• Search within the book• About this book• Google Play (was Android Market)
