Wednesday 19 October 2009

Although there has been considerable interest in using content management software to add content to an intranet, less attention has been paid to information retrieval. The problem is usually that there is an enterprise search requirement across document and records management applications as well as the intranet itself. In addition, search should not be conducted in isolation but as part of an overall 'findability' strategy. This presentation sets out the steps that should be followed to determine intranet and enterprise search requirements as a component of a findability strategy, develop specification and then evaluate, select and implement a search solution. A brief overview of the enterprise search engine market is included.
 

Open Patent Services, a web service launched by the EPO, currently offers access to raw bibliographic, family and legal status data from INPADOC. But more is to come. The presentation focuses on the possible options for providers and users of the service and conceivable consequences for the information community.

The presentation illustrates the present generation of EPO patent retrieval tools. The EPO has recently spent some efforts on establishing the profile of patent information users by means of online surveys and commissioned market research. This information is being fed into the product development cycle. Highlights of the surveys will be presented and likely impact on product development discussed. Case studies will be used to illustrate particular features of the EPO retrieval tools which are publicly available: esp@cenet, European publication server, OPS, CD ROM/DVD, etc.
 

Novo Nordisk Library & Information Centre has established a variety of email alert services and supporting web pages to enhance usage of in-house and out-of-house databases, provide easy subscription to notifications when new articles appear in company core areas, and to decrease a number of simple but labour-intensive library staff activities. The service was established using a combination of Unix bibliographic database software and Perl script on one hand, and relational SQL database and ASP web pages on the other. By re-using existing servers and database set-up, established in-house search interfaces, and in-house search and technology expertise, the transformation was cost effective.

The system is flexible. Some alerts are based on data extracted from in-house databases, others on data from out-of-house databases. Alerts can be sent within the hour of arrival of the data, or collected for a period of time (four hours, daily, weekly, etc). Users can subscribe themselves, or use the archive to see previous sent alerts. Currently the alert services cover around 230 different patents, and news sources alerts. During March 2005 more than 100 new scientific, medical and technical alerts will be added.

The benefits of the system are higher visibility of alerting service, less manual work on email lists etc, more statistical information about our users - and many happy users. Today the alert services are a success. We delivered more than 34,000 alerts to approximately 1,000 different subscribers last year. This presentation describes how we established the alert service, how our users reacted, and what we plan for the future.
 

CambridgeSoft has experience in working with several of the top 10 pharma companies to implement both localised and enterprise-wide Electronic Notebook Systems; deployment of these systems raises many organisational challenges along with which the companies are having to face the challenge of whether to move to fully electronic systems for intellectual property protection. This presentation considers the different viewpoints on this complex subject, and maps out some of the strategies employed by various projects to develop a satisfactory solution.

Traditional models of information dissemination within an organisation are in transition. The days where the information centre was the sole provider of information for the organisation are gone. The role of the information centre and the information professional is however still central to the dissemination and integration of information in the workflow and decision-making processes of an organisation. Recent improvements in technology and standardisation of data formats have evolved working practices. Different possibilities now exist for delivering information to communities, at the time when it can make most impact on an organisation.

This presentation uses two case studies to illustrate how well known international organisations structure essential scientific content to maximise the benefit to both research and development activities across multiple divisions. It describes two strategies implemented by information professionals to deliver the complex requirements of different user groups: i) bespoke in-house information systems internally developed and maintained and populated with internally generated data and externally sourced data feeds, and ii) in-house information systems developed in partnership with external consultants and populated with internally generated data and externally sourced data feeds. The presentation compares the relative merits of implementation and operation, and the relative effectiveness, of each model in delivering knowledge management objectives within an organisation.