Keeping up to Date session (January 2015) slides. Delivered as part of the Durham University Researcher Development Programme.
Additional handouts cover:-
- Using RSS Feeds with Feedly and Feedreader
- Managing Folders and Rules for email alerts in Outlook
- Session demo walkthroughs (Library Catalogue, Discover, Zetoc, Feedshifter, Pipes, Useful Links)
Further Training available at https://www.dur.ac.uk/library/research/training/
6. Using Email Alerts
Think about:
- weekly / monthly / bi-monthly
- separate folders in your mail
account
- how many can you realistically
read / manage
Approx 30 minutes into session
Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
For full details, go to keeping up to date page for researchers www.dur.ac.uk/library/research/keepuptodate/ - where all the links for this part of the session will be held.
DEMO:
For Books:
Catalogue – email alert
Log in to patron record and search for research* and PhD as keywords
Click on ‘Save this search button’ – only shows when you are logged in
Check boxes for ‘Mark for Email’ and click on ‘update list’
You will be emailed about anything that is added and catalogued under those keywords
New items purchased by the library – RSS feed
Subscribe to the new items feed via the links on the keeping up to date page/subject information page
Stock in other libraries – Copac RSS feed - Link to Finding Information session…
Search Copac for information literacy – RSS feed appears next to your search terms at the top of the screen on the results page
RSS feed shows links to items added to Copac in the last 2 weeks. Will be updated every time something new is added.
Publisher sites – new books email
Just mention this is possible and show links on page
No knowledge of RSS feeds required
Organisation is the key – as these methods can provide you with a lot of information! Today is an opportunity to try different methods – see what works for you.
Both RSS feeds and email alerts allow you to organise results, whether that’s with a familiar folder structure in your email inbox or using tags or favorites.
Some of the resources which we will look at today only offer RSS feeds and some only offer email alerts – however some will offer both.
Can be overwhelming to receive all the alerts (particularly from news feeds which can be updated by the minute) so will need to choose carefully what you would like to be notified about and we’ll look at filters later
Email
If you are offered an email option you can often choose whether to receive the emails periodically (daily, weekly, monthly) – you can check them whenever you can check your emails.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication)
Feeds can be things like news headlines, new postings on a blog, abstracts of new books and journal articles, table of contents of journals/books. Sometimes with links to check for the full text.
Feed readers offer a way for you to view your feeds either via your web browser or online. Browser = You can either save the feeds like you save your favourites – in the web browser. However, viewing them like this, restricts them to that specific PC. Online = There are online feed readers which allow more flexibility – as you can access them anywhere – e.g. Google reader. You can also use tagging and ranking particular to highlight particular items. We are going to look at some of these methods today. We’re going to look at Google Reader but there are other options - Netvibes; Newsgator; Bloglines etc.
You need to make sure you check your email and/or feed reader regularly for updates – your responsibility.
Email
If you are offered an email option you can often choose whether to receive the emails periodically (daily, weekly, monthly) – you can check them whenever you can check your emails.
Feeds can be things like news headlines, new postings on a blog, abstracts of new books and journal articles, table of contents of journals/books. Sometimes with links to check for the full text.
Feed readers / Feed aggregators / RSS Reader offer a way for you to view your feeds either via your web browser or online.
Browser = You can either save the feeds like you save your favourites – in the web browser.
Disadvantage: can only access from the one PC you have saved them to.
Advantage: don’t need to remember any additional log in.
Online = There are online feed readers which allow more flexibility – as you can access them anywhere.e.g. Google reader (deceased June 2013), Feedreader, Feedly,
You can also use tagging and ranking particular to highlight particular items. We are going to look at some of these methods today.
We’re going to look at FeedReader but there are other options – Feedly, Netvibes; Newsgator; Bloglines etc.
You need to make sure you check your email and/or feed reader regularly for updates – your responsibility.
Alternative is to us a Feed reader to store your feeds – means you can access the feeds anywhere - Copy and paste URL to add it to an online reader
- Think about what you are subscribing too – don’t overwhelm yourself
DEMO how to subscribe to a feed using Feedreader
- Feedreader website, show how to register or sign in Pass:2T - Brief tour of page: - Scroll down “all items” first - Starred - Folder structure - Collapsed and Expanded views - Adding a new rss feed you have found
Demo 1
Approx 20 minutes into session
10 minutes hands on time
Deal with any queries
Some people may need to register with Google Reader in this time
Approx 30 minutes into session
Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
For full details, go to keeping up to date page for researchers www.dur.ac.uk/library/research/keepuptodate/ - where all the links for this part of the session will be held.
DEMO:
For Books:
Catalogue – email alert
Log in to patron record and search for research* and PhD as keywords
Click on ‘Save this search button’ – only shows when you are logged in
Check boxes for ‘Mark for Email’ and click on ‘update list’
You will be emailed about anything that is added and catalogued under those keywords
New items purchased by the library – RSS feed
Subscribe to the new items feed via the links on the keeping up to date page/subject information page
Stock in other libraries – Copac RSS feed - Link to Finding Information session…
Search Copac for information literacy – RSS feed appears next to your search terms at the top of the screen on the results page
RSS feed shows links to items added to Copac in the last 2 weeks. Will be updated every time something new is added.
Publisher sites – new books email
Just mention this is possible and show links on page
Demo 1
Hands on – Approx 40 mins into session. Allow 7 minutes hands on time.
Deal with any queries
Pick resources relevant for your research
Approx 47 minutes into session
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
DEMO:
Examples for Journals Articles:
2@teapots
Web of Science – need to log in, then you can email results, save searches, and set up search alerts
Search in databases using as many keywords as you need to refine the search – don’t want to be emailed with too many results
Once you have done the search: e.g.. “cranial trauma” AND medieval OR “Middle Ages” in WoS– go to search history and select save history/create alert (need to be in Web of Science – not available in the whole web of knowledge)
Give the search a name and description
Choose if you want to save the search or be alerted about it by email (once alert is created you can also subscribe to the feed by clicking on the XML button)
Alerts will be sent at whatever time period you specify
If you save searches you can also go back into the database and re-run them / refine them
You can set up citation alerts to individual papers – can help form connections between the papers you are consulting – need to go into item record to create these
Not all databases allow this
Google Scholar – indexes lots of journals, theses, conference papers so may provide too much information. You will need to be specific with your search. - Refer back to Google Scholar session
Log in – will already be logged in via Google Reader – search for “cranial trauma” AND “medieval OR “Middle Ages”
2 options – can click on the ‘Create email alert’ envelope icon OR can set up a citation alert by clicking on the ‘Cited by’ link and then clicking on ‘create email alert’ icon
Demo 1
Hands on – Approx 40 mins into session. Allow 7 minutes hands on time.
Deal with any queries
Pick resources relevant for your research
Approx 1 hour 5 minutes into session
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
DEMO:
For Table of Contents:
Zetoc – British Library’s table of contents service – searches for ToCs of journals and conference proceedings. Receive alerts via email.
Need to log in, even when you’re on campus
Zetoc Alert – email alert for keywords/journal ToCs
Zetoc RSS – rss feed for table of contents of journals (not for keywords)
Alerts expire after 1 year but you get plenty of warning about this
Go to Zetoc Alert > type in email and list name > Add searches:
Keyword search looks for those terms within the titles of all the journal articles in the BL or Author search looks for authors of articles within the journals.
Might need to set up lots of different keyword searches as can’t use synonyms within Zetoc. Don’t just put an author’s surname in as you will get too many results.
Journal search – allows you to keep up to date with the ToCs of key journals in your field – watching brief
Other ToC services are available – e.g. JournalTOCs - http://www.journaltocs.ac.uk/ (can have a look at this in your own time)
Demo 1
Hands on – Approx 40 mins into session. Allow 7 minutes hands on time.
Deal with any queries
Pick resources relevant for your research
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
News and web pages – focus on JISC mail
Password 2M
Mailing Lists (demo)
JISC Mail – could ask colleagues for any useful lists or can search the site for descriptions of lists – demo search: Groups > Advanced Search > Archaeology
‘Subscribers corner’ lists all the lists you have subscribed to
Allows you to monitor the activity in your discipline
Primarily sent as an email but you can also use RSS feeds
Blogs (demo)
Google Blog contains a lot of options – search for University, Research and your specific subject area will retrieve many options. Can also look at the suggestions on the Keeping up to date pages for other academic blogs. Not all will have RSS feeds or email alerts but some do. - University Research Psychology - University Research Human Geography
Web Page Alerts (no need to demo)
Allows you to set up an alert so that you are notified when a page changes. Particularly useful for conferences/presentations which may not be published.
Research news and funding opportunities (no need to demo)
Just mention these alerts
Twitter (discuss)
BIALL twitter account?Twitter search – BMA’s ARMLive event (assisted dying, education and training, public health) - Finch report (Open access – not just link to original report, but active discussion plus links to individuals and organisations responses, criticism etc.)
Approx 1 hr 25 minutes into session.
Demo 1
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
News and web pages – focus on JISC mail
Password 2M
Mailing Lists (demo)
JISC Mail – could ask colleagues for any useful lists or can search the site for descriptions of lists – demo search: Groups > Advanced Search > Archaeology
‘Subscribers corner’ lists all the lists you have subscribed to
Allows you to monitor the activity in your discipline
Primarily sent as an email but you can also use RSS feeds
Blogs (demo)
Google Blog contains a lot of options – search for University, Research and your specific subject area will retrieve many options. Can also look at the suggestions on the Keeping up to date pages for other academic blogs. Not all will have RSS feeds or email alerts but some do. - University Research Psychology - University Research Human Geography
Web Page Alerts (no need to demo)
Allows you to set up an alert so that you are notified when a page changes. Particularly useful for conferences/presentations which may not be published.
Research news and funding opportunities (no need to demo)
Just mention these alerts
Twitter (discuss)
BIALL twitter account?Twitter search – BMA’s ARMLive event (assisted dying, education and training, public health) - Finch report (Open access – not just link to original report, but active discussion plus links to individuals and organisations responses, criticism etc.)
Approx 1 hr 25 minutes into session.
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
News and web pages – focus on JISC mail
Password 2M
Mailing Lists (demo)
JISC Mail – could ask colleagues for any useful lists or can search the site for descriptions of lists – demo search: Groups > Advanced Search > Archaeology
‘Subscribers corner’ lists all the lists you have subscribed to
Allows you to monitor the activity in your discipline
Primarily sent as an email but you can also use RSS feeds
Blogs (demo)
Google Blog contains a lot of options – search for University, Research and your specific subject area will retrieve many options. Can also look at the suggestions on the Keeping up to date pages for other academic blogs. Not all will have RSS feeds or email alerts but some do. - University Research Psychology - University Research Human Geography
Web Page Alerts (no need to demo)
Allows you to set up an alert so that you are notified when a page changes. Particularly useful for conferences/presentations which may not be published.
Research news and funding opportunities (no need to demo)
Just mention these alerts
Twitter (discuss)
BIALL twitter account?Twitter search – BMA’s ARMLive event (assisted dying, education and training, public health) - Finch report (Open access – not just link to original report, but active discussion plus links to individuals and organisations responses, criticism etc.)
Approx 1 hr 25 minutes into session.
Demo 1
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
News and web pages – focus on JISC mail
Password 2M
Mailing Lists (demo)
JISC Mail – could ask colleagues for any useful lists or can search the site for descriptions of lists – demo search: Groups > Advanced Search > Archaeology
‘Subscribers corner’ lists all the lists you have subscribed to
Allows you to monitor the activity in your discipline
Primarily sent as an email but you can also use RSS feeds
Blogs (demo)
Google Blog contains a lot of options – search for University, Research and your specific subject area will retrieve many options. Can also look at the suggestions on the Keeping up to date pages for other academic blogs. Not all will have RSS feeds or email alerts but some do. - University Research Psychology - University Research Human Geography
Web Page Alerts (no need to demo)
Allows you to set up an alert so that you are notified when a page changes. Particularly useful for conferences/presentations which may not be published.
Research news and funding opportunities (no need to demo)
Just mention these alerts
Twitter (discuss)
BIALL twitter account?Twitter search – BMA’s ARMLive event (assisted dying, education and training, public health) - Finch report (Open access – not just link to original report, but active discussion plus links to individuals and organisations responses, criticism etc.)
Approx 1 hr 25 minutes into session.
James notes – new slide
As well as using Twitter to identify fellow researchers, keep track of academic or professional discussions, can also use to share information related to discussion or from conferences you are unable to attend.
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
News and web pages – focus on JISC mail
Password 2M
Mailing Lists (demo)
JISC Mail – could ask colleagues for any useful lists or can search the site for descriptions of lists – demo search: Groups > Advanced Search > Archaeology
‘Subscribers corner’ lists all the lists you have subscribed to
Allows you to monitor the activity in your discipline
Primarily sent as an email but you can also use RSS feeds
Blogs (demo)
Google Blog contains a lot of options – search for University, Research and your specific subject area will retrieve many options. Can also look at the suggestions on the Keeping up to date pages for other academic blogs. Not all will have RSS feeds or email alerts but some do. - University Research Psychology - University Research Human Geography
Web Page Alerts (no need to demo)
Allows you to set up an alert so that you are notified when a page changes. Particularly useful for conferences/presentations which may not be published.
Research news and funding opportunities (no need to demo)
Just mention these alerts
Twitter (discuss)
BIALL twitter account?Twitter search – BMA’s ARMLive event (assisted dying, education and training, public health) - Finch report (Open access – not just link to original report, but active discussion plus links to individuals and organisations responses, criticism etc.)
Approx 1 hr 25 minutes into session.
Continuing Part 2 - What can you keep up to date with?
News and web pages – focus on JISC mail
Password 2M
Mailing Lists (demo)
JISC Mail – could ask colleagues for any useful lists or can search the site for descriptions of lists – demo search: Groups > Advanced Search > Archaeology
‘Subscribers corner’ lists all the lists you have subscribed to
Allows you to monitor the activity in your discipline
Primarily sent as an email but you can also use RSS feeds
Blogs (demo)
Google Blog contains a lot of options – search for University, Research and your specific subject area will retrieve many options. Can also look at the suggestions on the Keeping up to date pages for other academic blogs. Not all will have RSS feeds or email alerts but some do. - University Research Psychology - University Research Human Geography
Web Page Alerts (no need to demo)
Allows you to set up an alert so that you are notified when a page changes. Particularly useful for conferences/presentations which may not be published.
Research news and funding opportunities (no need to demo)
Just mention these alerts
Twitter (discuss)
BIALL twitter account?Twitter search – BMA’s ARMLive event (assisted dying, education and training, public health) - Finch report (Open access – not just link to original report, but active discussion plus links to individuals and organisations responses, criticism etc.)
Approx 1 hr 25 minutes into session.
Allow 5-10 mins hands on time. Have a look at JISC Mail or another area of interest.
Approx 1 hr 35 mins into session
Approx 1hr 35 minutes into session.
Filtering a feed. RSS feeds are great but quite addictive and you’ll soon find that you have lots of unread feeds unless you are very selective about what you subscribe to. Filters are one way to make sure that you just get the information you need.
Feedsifter
basic as you can easily filter a feed work by creating a new feed that you can subscribe to – means you can still receive the original but also have a cut down version.
Have to use Firefox to filter Zetoc RSS feeds as it doesn’t work in Internet Explorer for Zetoc (e.g. Zetoc Journal feeds can come as RSS feeds)
Make sure it’s the FEED URL you type in
Multiple keywords per one search are comma separated (AND operator) on the same line – no space after the comma
Can expand a search by using words on different lines (OR operator)
DEMO one of the news feeds searched earlier – i.e. Durham library or BBC
filter using a couple of keywords on each line – will bring back more results – use one word on each line
filter using two words on the same line(s) - to bring back less results - use a comma to separate words (no space after the comma)
Mention Pipes (Yahoo) but don’t demo - more info on the handout:
looks more daunting but ok to use and very flexible. Can be more sophisticated with your filter than with Feedsifter.
you can bring together lots of feeds, sort them, filter them by author or descriptor and then create a new RSS feed from that to read in your usual reader.
Demo 1
Approx 1hr 45mins into session.
Allow 10 minutes hands on time.
Hand out feedback forms during this activity