Safari Tech Books Online

The electronic book hasn't quite caught up with the ubiquitous e-journal in terms of popularity or availability and it will be some time before we are reading them in bed or on the bus. However there are plenty of occasions when you need a book right now, when googling is just too random or you want something a bit more structured than what is generally found on a website. Safari Books Online is a collection of 'real books' on computing and related subjects that are just the sort of thing you might want to consult urgently or to browse at your leisure. Topics covered are

Desktop Applications (Including Word, Excel and PowerPoint)

Desktop Publishing

Computer Graphics

Networking

Programming

The full Safari package for Massey consists of 143 titles. It can be accessed from the Databases list on the Library web page or by clicking here.

Massey University Library is purchasing an increasing number of e-books to supplement our print collections. Electronic books are searchable via the Library catalogue - do a keyword search, limiting to Electronic Resources Collection.

Are Journal Citation Reports Distorting Science?

Have you heard about the journal that was responsible for 85% of the citations of its own articles? Or about the practice of encouraging authors to "look at some recent issues of the Journal of ... and add citations to any relevant papers you might find. This helps our authors by drawing attention to their work, and also adds internal integrity to the Journal's themes." As the demand for academics worldwide to not only publish but to place their work in the most prestigious journals the use of ISI's Journal Citation Reports impact factors has become the most widely recognised measure of the standing of scientific journals. In a balanced and thoughtful article in the most recent Chronicle of Higher Education Richard Monastersky looks at the internal forces within academia that have lead to this situation and describes some of the ways in which editors and publishers try to massage their impact factors. He concludes that "scientists have little choice but to accept the system — although competitors are emerging that could alter the situation."

Read the full article here

If you want to understand what JCR impact factors are, how they are used and also what alternatives there are, sign up to this training session run by the Library though the Massey Training and Development Unit

Knowledge Management in Research 2: Publishing for PBRF