Hi folks,

Are you aware of Ron Stewart's comprehensive evaluation of library
databases-both in terms of accessibility and usability? If not, you may
want to check out his (preliminary) article entitled "Accessibility of
Online Databases. A Usability Study of Research Databases" at
<http://tap.oregonstate.edu/ahg/>. To the best of my knowledge, Ron's
study is currently the most comprehensive and most up-to-date study of
its kind. It covers 37 different index/database vendors. The study was
conducted between August and November of 2002.

Ron's findings allow us not only to make better procurement decisions;
they also enable us to ask vendors very specific questions. (For
example: "In a recent study, your interface was found to have problems
with x, y, z. What have you done to fix these?")

Axel

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Axel
Library
University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point