Research it Information Research Skills for Electronic Engineering

Research it! Information Research Skills for Electronic Engineering and Computer Science Students

S&E Teaching & Learning Support Team library-sande@qmul. ac. uk James Soderman – Faculty Liaison Librarian for Science and Engineering Jack Gain – Information Assistant 2

Session Outline This session will cover: § Information skills and the research process § Sources and search tools – Library Discovery, databases, Google Scholar, Google § Citation management tools § Other useful libraries § Getting further help 3

Five main components of information research skills 5. Managing information 1. Planning ahead 2. Knowing where to look 4. Keep up to date 3. Evaluating Information 4

1 - Planning Ahead Searching for information is easy. Finding a manageable number of high-quality, relevant results can be more difficult. We support the process of planning a search to ensure that you get the best results for your work and highlight techniques you can use to refine your searches. 5

2 - Knowing Where to Look There are so many places to search for information to include in your academic work, it can often be difficult to know where to start. To enable you to make an informed choice when selecting where to search for information, we explore Library Discovery, subject databases, Google Scholar and Google highlighting their strengths and weaknesses. 6

3 -Evaluating Information WHO WHAT • Who wrote the text you are reading? Can you determine the author's credentials? • What actually is it? Is it a journal article or perhaps a passage from an e-book, or does it come from a company report, a tweet or a newspaper article? WHY • Why was this text written? Consider the motives of the author – are they trying to persuade, to demonstrate or prove something? WHEN • When was it written? It is not always the case that the most recently published information is the best so think carefully about this. RELEVANCE • Relevant to your own work? 7

4 - Keeping Up to Date Keeping up to date with developments in your field can be a daunting task, particularly with the increasing use of social media as a tool for disseminating information. 8

5 - Managing Information How do you keep track of the information sources you find during your research? Citation management software helps researchers organise their work effectively and saves time with the ongoing task of referencing a wide range of diverse information sources. Citation management software will also be very helpful if you have to change your referencing style during the research process, or when submitting your work for publication or assessment. 9

What do you think the library should/could help you with? 10

Information Skills for Researchers It is important that you are confident in: Keeping up to date with the latest research Carrying out a literature review Developing your search techniques Evaluating information Carrying out a literature search Managing information Accessing full-text content 11

“There is really no ‘one stop shop’ in which to find the law” CLINCH, P. 2010. Legal research : a practitioner's handbook, London, Wildy, Simmonds & Hill, p 29. 12

Library Discovery Tool: Google Scholar: - Textbooks and other books (both online and print) - Academic journal articles - Trade journal articles - Newspapers Where to look? Subject Databases: Google: - Academic journal articles - Trade journal articles - Statistical data, market information, financial information - Trade organisations & journals - New cutting edge research (from blogs, vlogs, tweets etc. ) -Some conference proceedings 13

Library Discovery Good for: • A starting point for research • Finding online and printed books and journal articles Be aware of: • • May not search all available databases and journals When faced with a large number of results, it can be tempting to refine them to items available online only. You can miss out on a lot of relevant resources by doing this. 14

Subject Database Good for: • • • Finding high-quality peer-reviewed material. Finding high-quality statistics and financial information. Carrying out a comprehensive literature search for material on your topic. Be aware of : • Can be complex tools and may need practice to get the most out of them. • There a lot of databases available, and not all of them will be useful to you. Before you start, make sure you look at your Subject Guide to see which ones are most relevant to your own work. 15

Google Scholar Good for: • • A starting point for research. Providing an alternative to Library Discovery and Subject databases. Be aware of: • • • Limited coverage Limited quality control – Google's definition of scholarly material may differ from your supervisors'. You'll need to analyse the source for yourself to decide if it is scholarly or popular. Google Scholar mainly covers journal articles, so it doesn't retrieve other types of information such as news items or statistics. 16

Google Good for: • • • Company/organisation websites Basic facts Government information Be aware of: • • • Non-existent quality control. Uses opaque retrieval algorithm – The way that Google ranks results does not necessary correspond to the most authoritative sources. A lot of the information you'll find will be of a commercial nature, as Google's main incomes from advertising. 17

What other tools do you use?

The Library Website http: //www. library. qmul. ac. uk/ Self Service Subject Guides Library Discovery tool Printing and photocopying Databases and e-resources Research skills 19

Subject Guides Use the Subject Guides Link from the Library Homepage to find your subject 20

Subject Guides for Electric Engineering and Computer Science Specialist databases listed on the Subject Guides pages for Electrical Engineering and Computer Science: http: //www. library. qmul. ac. uk/subject/electronicengineering-and-computer-science/04 Bookmark this page for easy access Links to key resources for Electrical Engineering and Computer Science information, including: – Academic journal databases – Websites – Trade publications – Standards – Patents – Other Libraries 21

Some Key Databases The full-text of every article published by the Association for Computing Machinery. AES E-Library has the full-text of Audio Engineering Society publications (1950 -). Full-text collection of all journals and conference proceedings published by the IEEE and IET since 1988, as well as current IEEE standards and Wiley-IEEE e-books. Multi-disciplinary database containing the citations and abstracts of peer-reviewed literature. This database lists the number of times a work has been cited in other works and provides direct links to the abstracts of citing works. 22

Things to consider when evaluating journals and articles: The citation databases, Web of Science and Scopus index peer-reviewed articles and provide citation information and journal impact scores Individual journal titles and databases have information on their websites about the Editorial Board and editorial and peer review policies of the title, and citations and bibliometrics. Evaluating journals and articles 23

What does impact mean to you? 24

Metrics Altmetrics 25

Altmetrics is NOT an alternative to traditional metrics 26

Attention Quality Impact 27

Altmetric Bookmarklet September 2015 http: //www. library. qmul. ac. uk 28

Useful guide to metrics (from Newcastle University) http: //libguides. ncl. ac. uk/impact/wheretopublish 29

Library Services on QMplus 30

QM-accredited Research Skills Courses on QMplus 31

RDF Information Skills Course on QMplus 32

Reference Management • Collect and organize references • Import references and related PDFs directly from databases • Insert citations and bibliographies into Word documents 33

- Online and Appversion - Large number of citation styles NOV 2015 - To get the full product on your personal computer you need to pay - Not compatible with Linux http: //www. library. qmul. ac. uk 34

- Possible to collaborate with other people - Social networking - Iphone/Ipad interface - Limited free storage space - Desktop application does not sync automatically with the online version. 35

- Iphone/Ipad - Limited free interface storage space - Simple Firefox plugin - Makes it easier to reference website 36

Which one do you use? 37

Referencing your Sources – Find it! Use it! Reference it! on QMplus 38

Using Other Libraries British Library: Wide range of print and online information. www. bl. uk/ IET Library and Archives: The Institution of Engineering & Technology (IET) Library specialises in electrical, electronic, control and manufacturing engineering, telecommunications, computing and IT related material, including the British Computer Society collection. IET and associate organisation members can borrow from the Library, non-members can use the Library for reference purposes. Sconul Access: You can register to use libraries that are part of this scheme. www. sconul. ac. uk/sconul-access 39

Research Reading Room Second Floor, South Reading Room of the Mile End Library. Calm, comfortable environment within the quietest part of the Library for research postgraduates and staff to work. Accessible seven days a week during Library opening hours by touching in using your Queen Mary ID card. 40

Repository & Research Information Team Helping researchers record and share their research output Elements – research information system Records your research output, grants awarded and other professional activities. Allows deposit of your research to the institutional repository. Details of publications are exported and listed on departmental pages or the Research Publications page: http: //www. researchpublications. qmul. ac. uk/publications/ Queen Mary Research Online (QMRO) – the institutional repository QMRO is an open access institutional repository of research output, containing full content images, text and audio files pertaining to research undertaken at Queen Mary University of London. All theses awarded by Queen Mary are made open access in QMRO. https: //qmro. qmul. ac. uk/ scholarlycommunications@qumul. ac. uk

Repository & Research Information Team Helping researchers record and share their research output Open Access Publishing We provide support for all researchers looking to publish open access, either via self archiving routes and help navigate funder and publisher policies on open access publishing. Supporting payment of open access publishing fees from our awarded block grants. Licensing and Copyright Providing advice on understanding licensing and copyright agreements, and how to retain your rights Understanding Research Metrics View and understand your research metrics; such as citation and other bibliometrics We hold drop-ins, workshops and presentations all year round scholarlycommunications@qumul. ac. uk 42

Help and Advice General questions (e. g. find a specific item in the library, borrowing, opening hours) Visit the Library Welcome Desk, or contact us here: http: //www. library. qmul. ac. uk/contact-us Research help Help with finding information on your topic: library-sande@qmul. ac. uk Queries about Open Access Queen Mary Research Online and Pub. Lists: scholarlycommunications@qmul. ac. uk