Well, we recently put a quick search box on the library homepage (i.e. keyword only, with no other initial other options), and slightly obscured the link to the main catalogue options for left-anchored searches, and although there was an increase in keyword searching, left anchored title searching still trumped in our statistics, so now there's a possibility of switching the default on the main library page to left anchored title search instead...
..so left-anchored searching is alive, indexing is afoot... The unilateral preference amongst actual users of the all singing, all dancing keyword search may well be the biggest myth of the modern library..... Martin Kelleher Bibliographic Services/Electronic Resources Librarian University of Liverpool -----Original Message----- From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [mailto:rd...@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca] On Behalf Of J. McRee Elrod Sent: 04 February 2010 15:51 To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Filing order (Was: Google ...) Bernhard Eversberg said: >Karen Coyle said in that meeting: >"... the team tried to figure out when alphabetical sorting was really >required, and the answer turned out to be 'never'." > >Does that mean alphabetical index displays of names, titles, subjects >etc. can safely be considered dead? Experimenting with filing order in a card catalogue established that inverse date order of cards behind subject guide cards produced patron satisfaction, and spread circulation across the alphabet (as opposed to authors A-M circulating more heavily than N-Z). But author and title OPAC browse lists (replicating card catalogue alphabetical filing) assists patrons to find known items where their spelling is a tad off. __ __ J. McRee (Mac) Elrod (m...@slc.bc.ca) {__ | / Special Libraries Cataloguing HTTP://www.slc.bc.ca/ ___} |__ \__________________________________________________________
