Printed books and the WWW

Abstract

This contribution reports on an ongoing investigation and evaluation of freely available tools on the Internet and WWW to discover information about printed books or to find copies of a particular book for sale. Introduction: Various information needs exist related to books. The Internet and WWW provide many services to discover information. Problem statements / aims: Which information services are available free of charge for all users via the Internet and the WWW, which allow us to find information concerning various aspects of a particular printed book title? Furthermore, how well do these perform? Methodology: Information services that are relevant in the framework of this investigation have been identified. Their features and mechanisms have been compared. Some systems that looked promising have been evaluated in more detail by searching for information concerning particular, individual book titles, simulating normal usage. Results / findings: Internet services to find information about books can be categorized as dealing 1. with only one collection, 2. with more than one collection in a single, based on a single, merged database, 3. federated search services that exploit some of the other services simultaneously in one search action. The federated search systems offer in general the highest coverage. Therefore these are investigated in more detail. Conclusion / value: This investigation clarifies the state of the art of the usefulness of book search systems on the Internet and WWW for librarians as well as other users.