“The first successful database product for microcomputers was dBASE for the CP/M and PC-DOS/MS-DOS operating systems.”
What a revolution it must have felt to have a database function on your DOS! I can still remember the day when our town’s video store (Video Snax, catty corner to the Outlaw Pizza/TCBY
in case you’re a Uniontown native too) and home of the town’s most tech-forward family showed me their newly-installed DOS computer. It had a black screen with orange writing and had a blinking cursor, no images (only capital text), but the lady behind the counter (the business owner’s wife and office manager) was ga-ga telling my techie dad all about the wonders of spreadsheets (they’d save her so much time and ink!) and they both salivated over the Dot Matrix printer—on which later that year a spiffy banner would be printed for my birthday party. Anyway, I digress…I can only imagine the joy overload the woman would have experienced if she could have also had a database with all the movies catalogued for shelf placement, related titles, subject, actors, etc. in addition to that Dot Matrix 
hotness.“In the United Kingdom, legislation protecting the public from unauthorized disclosure of personal information held on databases falls under the Office of the Information Commissioner. United Kingdom based organizations holding personal data in electronic format (databases for example) are required to register with the Data Commissioner.”
It’s more than a little obvious that the British are a sometimes odd bunch, eh?
But this seems a wee bit ridiculous, even for them. Would SCALA (the Student Chapter of the American Library Association, the self-proclaimed greatest club or organization in the Pitt Universe) be required to sit down for afternoon tea with the Data Commissioner simply because they keep a list of their members’ names and emails? Shizzle what a mess! I would presume to call SCALA’s membership list a proper database, but it’s not too terribly loose an interpretation of a relational database I don’t think considering that the roster is searchable and can know as much as graduation date, email address(es), name, specialization, best meeting times, and interests.Introduction to Metadata
The third paragraph got me thinking: is metadata perhaps THE most important library tool? Before computers, can it be said that librarians worked with their mentally-stored and card-catalog-stored metadata to find materials for patrons? Without metadata on the items in a library, we really just have a mass of materials, not anything—information or knowledge or data or otherwise—that we can provide to inquiring minds. Hence, metadata may be even more important than circulation systems or internet access or other library tools and services. Wow, finally a paragraph too serious for a picture… oh wait,
nevermind.PS- Dance, Data, dance! Show the space lady a good time you robotic sexpot you!
Working with Endnote
I can see a hardcore genealogist—or maybe those people at Classmates.com,
(BTW did you know that the nerd girl hooked up with the jock guy and they have 5 kids!?! ROFL!!1!)—getting their own copy of Endnote to suit their research needs as they search across a far-flung variety of databases and sources and such, and as they want to go three and four cross references deep into their research.How much does Endnote cost? I can see it being a good investment for a PhD student who will be doing years of reading and research culminating in a dissertation, but is it cost effective for the average individual user. How do non-research libraries justify buying it when they may as well use free online tools or good old fashioned elbow grease for patrons doing references on library computers?
Dublin Core
Sadly, this won’t come up on my computer. The error message that comes up says that a firewall has timed out. Is anybody else getting this message? I tried at three different times and on two different computers, but still nada. I read Working with Endnote in its stead—I hope that makes up for it. Sorry but this post had to go on!
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2 comments:
I totally think you're right that metadata is probably the most important tool libraries have now. It's insane to think of all the librarians in years past that had to memorize and organize so much information all on their own!
Is metadata perhaps THE most important library tool? Without metadata on the items in a library, we really just have a mass of materials, not anything—information or knowledge or data or otherwise—that we can provide to inquiring minds.
Jacqui,
What an interesting consideration. Now we next generation librarians have computers and web servers to remember everything for us! It's kind of nice that way. Though it seems that our ability to access online databases for reference still depends on our memory of what places are best to find particular information. So our need for memorizing hasn't gone away just yet.
That's what Borg implants are for. :3
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