Search (75 results, page 2 of 4)

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Abstract

Most libraries have long had their own Web sites. The longer a library has had a Web site the more likely it is that the number of pages, and the amount of information within those pages, has grown beyond what users can find simply with the navigation menu. Building a site index is a great way to help seekers find all those bits of data they might otherwise miss.

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Abstract

<META> tags are used to create meta-information, or information about the information in a Web site. There are many types of <META> tags, but those most relevant to indexing are the description and keyword tags. Description tags provide a short summary of the site contents that are often displayed by search engines when they list search results. Keyword tags are used to define words or phrases that someone using a search engine might use to look for relevant sites. <META> tags are of interest to indexers for two reasons. They provide a means of making your indexing business Web site more visible to those searching the Web for indexing services, and they offer indexers a potential new source of work: writing keyword and description tags for Web site developers and companies with Web sites. <META> tag writing makes good use of an indexer's ability to choose relevant key terms, and the closely related skill of abstracting: conveying the essence of a document in a sentence or two.

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Abstract

When the Web was invented, it was touted as a novel nonlinear medium for the written word. No longer would we be constrained by linear presentations! Hyperlinks would allow us to jump haphazardly from page to page, chapter to chapter, idea to idea! Texts would no longer need to run from beginning to end! This is misleading. A printed book is also multidimensional and potentially nonlinear. We can open it to any page, from any other page, for any reason. We can open several books at once. In fact, what makes a book special is its combination of linear structure (the order of the words) and nonlinear physicality (the bound papers). This linear/nonlinear duality is enhanced further by the index, which maps linearly sequenced pages in a nonlinear, informationally ordered structure (architecture). In truth, the online environment is crippled by an absence of linear structure. Imagine selecting a hard cover book, tearing off the covers, ripping pages into small pieces, and throwing them in a box. That box is like a computer file system, and the paper scraps are Web documents. Only one scrap can be retrieved from the box at a time, and it must be replaced before another can be accessed. Page numbers are meaningless. Global context is destroyed. And without page numbers or context, what happens to the index?

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Abstract

Creating an online index for a Web site is not a job for the timid. Those contemplating this form of Web indexing should already be accomplished indexers and should have strong experience in Web page creation. Knowledge of HTML is essential. In fact, depending on the nature of a Web indexing job, you may find that it requires more HTML knowledge than indexing skill. Like embedded indexing, Web site indexing is far more work than traditional indexing: the choice of terms is constrained, and the indexing process itself is slower and more challenging. Entries must be carefully chosen because the editing process can be tedious and time-consuming, sometimes more time-consuming than making the original entries. Hypertext links and anchors must be added, and the index itself must be tested to make sure that links work as intended. Adequate compensation for your project is imperative. Web indexing does have its rewards, though, especially for indexers who are intrigued by the Web and Web page design, for those who like a challenge, and, of course, for those who like to have their work online for all the world to see. This article provides a look at the process of creating a Web index for an online newsletter. It is also applicable to other forms of Web site indexing, and should give the beginning Web site indexer an idea of what to expect on that first job

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Abstract

The explosion in personal computing and in computer technology has brought a wealth of opportunities for indexers. Annually, traditional publishers produce numerous books on computer topics, while software and hardware companies constantly issue new products with manuals that require indexes. Indexers can find work with these high-technology publishers or can subcontract with technical documentation firms or with freelance technical writers. The range of audiences for computer-related documents is wide and varied, as is the range of topics. These documents are not limited to end-user software manuals, but include programming, Internet, and networking topics among others. Hardware companies, in addition to computer manufacturers, are also a good potential source of clients. Many hardware products have a sizeable software component that requires its own set of indexed manuals. There are advantages and disadvantages to working with high-technology companies (and their contractors) vs. working with traditional publishers. It is simply a matter of personal taste which type of client you prefer. I have truly enjoyed working with both.

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Footnote

Rez. in: Knowledge organization 30(2003) no.2, S.115-116 (C. Jacobs): "This collection of articles by indexing practitioners, software designers and vendors is divided into five sections: Dedicated Software, Embedded Software, Online and Web Indexing Software, Database and Image Software, and Voice-activated, Automatic, and Machine-aided Software. This diversity is its strength. Part 1 is introduced by two chapters an choosing dedicated software, highlighting the issues involved and providing tips an evaluating requirements. The second chapter includes a fourteen page chart that analyzes the attributes of Authex Plus, three versions of CINDEX 1.5, MACREX 7, two versions of SKY Index (5.1 and 6.0) and wINDEX. The lasting value in this chart is its utility in making the prospective user aware of the various attributes/capabilities that are possible and that should be considered. The following chapters consist of 16 testimonials for these software packages, completed by a final chapter an specialized/customized software. The point is made that if a particular software function could increase your efficiency, it can probably be created. The chapters in Part 2, Embedded Software, go into a great deal more detail about how the programs work, and are less reviews than illustrations of functionality. Perhaps this is because they are not really stand-alones, but are functions within, or add-ons used with larger word processing or publishing programs. The software considered are Microsoft Word, FrameMaker, PageMaker, IndexTension 3.1.5 that is used with QuarkXPress, and Index Tools Professional and IXgen that are used with FrameMaker. The advantages and disadvantages of embedded indexing are made very clear, but the actual illustrations are difficult to follow if one has not worked at all with embedded software. Nonetheless, the section is valuable as it highlights issues and provides pointers an solutions to embedded indexing problems.
Part 3, Online and Web Indexing Software, opens with a chapter in which the functionalities of HTML/Prep, HTML Indexer, and RoboHELP HTML Edition are compared. The following three chapters look at them individually. This section helps clarify the basic types of non-database web indexing - that used for back-of-the-book style indexes, and that used for online help indexes. The first chapter of Part 4, Database and image software, begins with a good discussion of what database indexing is, but falls to carry through with any listing of general characteristics, problems and attributes that should be considered when choosing database indexing software. It does include the results of an informal survey an the Yahoogroups database indexing site, as well as three short Gase studies an database indexing projects. The survey provides interesting information about freelancing, but it is not very useful if you are trying to gather information about different software. For example, the most common type of software used by those surveyed turns out to be word-processing software. This seems an odd/awkward choice, and it would have been helpful to know how and why the non-specialized software is being used. The survey serves as a snapshot of a particular segment of database indexing practice, but is not helpful if you are thinking about purchasing, adapting, or commissioning software. The three case studies give an idea of the complexity of database indexing and there is a helpful bibliography.
A chapter an image indexing starts with a useful discussion of the elements of bibliographic description needed for visual materials and of the variations in the functioning and naming of functions in different software packaltes. Sample features are discussed in light of four different software systems: MAVIS, Convera Screening Room, CONTENTdm, and Virage speech and pattern recognition programs. The chapter concludes with an overview of what one has to consider when choosing a system. The last chapter in this section is an oddball one an creating a back-ofthe-book index using Microsoft Excel. The author warns: "It is not pretty, and it is not recommended" (p.209). A curiosity, but it should have been included as a counterpoint in the first part, not as part of the database indexing section. The final section begins with an excellent article an voice recognition software (Dragon Naturally Speaking Preferred), followed by a look at "automatic indexing" through a critique of Sonar Bookends Automatic Indexing Generator. The final two chapters deal with Data Harmony's Machine Aided Indexer; one of them refers specifically to a news content indexing system. In terms of scope, this reviewer would have liked to see thesaurus management software included since thesaurus management and the integration of thesauri with database indexing software are common and time-consuming concerns. There are also a few editorial glitches, such as the placement of the oddball article and inconsistent uses of fonts and caps (eg: VIRAGE and Virage), but achieving consistency with this many authors is, indeed, a difficult task. More serious is the fact that the index is inconsistent. It reads as if authors submitted their own keywords which were then harmonized, so that the level of indexing varies by chapter. For example, there is an entry for "controlled vocabulary" (p.265) (singular) with one locator, no cross-references. There is an entry for "thesaurus software" (p.274) with two locators, plus a separate one for "Thesaurus Master" (p.274) with three locators. There are also references to thesauri/ controlled vocabularies/taxonomies that are not mentioned in the index (e.g., the section Thesaurus management an p.204). This is sad. All too often indexing texts have poor indexes, I suppose because we are as prone to having to work under time pressures as the rest of the authors and editors in the world. But a good index that meets basic criteria should be a highlight in any book related to indexing. Overall this is a useful, if uneven, collection of articles written over the past few years. Because of the great variation between articles both in subject and in approach, there is something for everyone. The collection will be interesting to anyone who wants to be aware of how indexing software works and what it can do. I also definitely recommend it for information science teaching collections since the explanations of the software carry implicit in them descriptions of how the indexing process itself is approached. However, the book's utility as a guide to purchasing choices is limited because of the unevenness; the vendor-written articles and testimonials are interesting and can certainly be helpful, but there are not nearly enough objective reviews. This is not a straight listing and comparison of software packaltes, but it deserves wide circulation since it presents an overall picture of the state of indexing software used by freelancers."

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Abstract

Why do you need samples of your indexing work on your Web site? Think about these situations: Scenario 1: You've contacted a potential client who says he has a project ready to be assigned. He requests some samples of your work. You fax them to him right away and call back a few hours later. "Oh," he says, "I didn't get the fax but anyway I already assigned the project. I can keep your name for future reference, though." Scenario 2: Another potential client asks you to send her some samples and if they're satisfactory, she'll put you on the freelance list. You mail them to her, or even FedEx them if you can spend the money. You wait a week and call her back. She does not remember who you are, and has not seen the samples. If she can find them, she says, she will file them for future reference. Scenario 3: You contacted a potential client who has asked to see some samples of your work. As it happens, she has a project ready to go and if your work is acceptable, you can have the job. You can FedEx her some samples, or you can fax them, she says. You think about FedEx and faxing costs, and mail and faxes that never get to her desk, and the risk of losing the assignment if she calls someone else later today, which she almost surely will, and you suggest an alternative. If she has Internet access, she can see a list of the indexes you've completed, and some samples of your indexes instantly. She is impressed that you have the know-how to create a Web site, and agrees to take a look and call you back shortly. You give her your URL and your phone number, and stand by. In five minutes she calls you back, says she is pleased with what she saw, and asks for your address so she can send the job out to you today.

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Footnote

Rez. in: KO 32(2005) no.3, S.135-136 (N. Bridge): "Authors of books have usually lived with their material for years before they embark on the arduous business of writing the book, followed by the revisiting during the editing and publishing processes. The indexers of their books usually have between two and four weeks to absorb the subject of the book. Even with a prior knowledge of the discipline, they are faced with the author's particular "take" on the subject and writing style, including any one of a number of ways of presenting the material. This is multiplied in complexity when the book is a multiauthored work, a collection of essays and papers, comprising several authors' differing views and individual styles. Ideally, the indexer is an expert in the subject matter of the book, perfectly matched to the book; in practice, this almost never happens. Indexers aim at producing an index that is truly reflective of the individual book and its author, a goal that often seems overwhelming when the pile of page proofs arrives with the courier, or electronically through a PDF file, hundreds of pages of closely argued text. As well as the time limit, there can be other restrictions, most commonly having to make the index fit into the number of pages decreed by the publisher, with difficult, even agonizing decisions lying ahead. Consequently, indexers can fall into a number of different traps: getting lost in a welter of detailed overindexing; or, mindful of time and space limits, indexing too broadly and simplistically, bouncing from text heading to heading, topic sentence to topic sentence. Most indexers of academic books I know, including myself, tend to fall into the first category at least with their first few indexes. Especially when the content is personally fascinating, it's easy to lose a rational, analytical approach to the content of a book, and wrest this back only with difficulty during the editing stage with the deadline looming. Do Mi Stauber's title, Facing the Text, is, thus, provocative, because that's what all indexers inevitably have to do. She knows the process: for example, at the start, the "gap between you and those pages that for a moment seems very wide" (p. 1). This sympathetic, personal tone pervades the book: the emphasis is on the personal experiences, feelings, and perceptions of indexers when confronted by the various situations thrown up by indexing; it's "I" and "you" throughout. The chapter subheadings often echo this: my tendency to lose sight of main topics is explained and diagnosed in "Lost Among the Trees" (p. 63-64). The section "Being Stuck" (p. 324-26), describes a number of reasons for this common malady, along with remedies for each, including the "Hammock Method" (p. 46). Stauber has been presenting workshops with the title "Facing the Text" since 1997, and her book reflects a friendly, listening engagement with her audience.
She divides the topics within the text to be indexed into the categories of metatopics, local main topics, and ancillary topics, followed by subheadings. The indexability of individual topics at whatever level, and their wording, absorb other chapters. Linkages among the topics - cross-references and doubleposting - arc tracked in the chapter "Connections and Access." Finally, the mechanics of indexing are contained in "Process" and "Inside an Indexer's Brain" describes her own procedure and feelings as she indexes a book from beginning to end. When I initially faced the text of this book, I felt overwhelmed, even bewildered, by the plethora of terminology, much of it Stauber's own. Further, each chapter is divided into a complex array of headings, subheadings, sub-subheadings, and more. But when I read from beginning to end, all those pieces fell into place. Stauber develops her text logically, explaining each step of the way clearly, distinguishing each detail from others, and frequently linking passages to relevant others. At every stage in the book, she illustrates with copious examples from indexes she or others have compiled. In the case of her own indexes, she describes her thought processes, her initial reactions to what she read, her decisions regarding the use of particular topics and at what level, and of her chosen terminology; and also, and often, how and why she later changed her mind as she got further into the text. This forms a candid and detailed analysis of indexing, step by step, stage by stage, complex and subtle but with a perceptibly firm connecting structure. In short, she's a good writer.
Facing the Text falls into what I call the third wave of books about back-of-the-book indexing. Each of these waves overlaps, but generally the first consists of the general manuals on indexing books (and other media): Booth, Knight, Mulvany, and Wellisch, along with chapter 18 of the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th ed. These set out the fundamental principles, conventions, or rules of indexing in a mostly impersonal, dispassionate tone. The second wave carried manuals on indexing in specific disciplines and genres: biography, medicine, law, psychology, history, genealogy, etc. The third wave, exemplified by Stauber's Facing the Text and Smith and Kells' Inside Indexing, delves into what goes through the mind of the indexer "facing the text" and putting together an index based on it. The tone is personal and subjective, the authors taking the reader through their own perceptions of the stages of indexing a book, the inevitable problems and subsequent decision making, expressed through their own reactions and reasoning. Facing the Text is not a manual where the newcomer to indexing can find immediate answers to specific problems: the first and second waves of books on indexing are designed to provide those. It's a book for the professional indexer or academic author indexing more than one book; its effect is to hone skills and refine working habits, to increase efficiency and effectiveness, to create indexes that make faithful, logical sense of the text. Newcomers, including first-time academic-author indexers, should begin with the last chapter "Inside an Indexer's Brain," then the second-to-last chapter, "Process"; in fact, I would suggest that any reader begin with "Inside an Indexer's Brain," for its introduction to the terminology and the overall look at indexing, from the first to the last page of the text to be indexed. As one would expect, the index to Facing the Text is comprehensive; in fact, exhaustive, and admirably detailed. The personable, conversational tone continues here, with entries such as "Subheadings/creating as you go" and "Notes to yourself." Of course, "Being stuck" is there as is, and also helpfully doubleposted as "Stuckness strategies." Finally, and on a relatively small note, this is a nicely designed book. Not only is it laid out for looks, it's laid out for use. The type is a friendly size, and the complex structure of headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings is rendered immediately intelligible by the well-chosen fonts. My only criticism concerns the tightness of the binding; manuals should lie flat, without having to be anchored on each side with paperweights."