With the advent of the internet and growing popularity of Wikipedia, traditional library reference tools have experienced a decline in use. As a result, many reference publishers began producing electronic books or converting traditional print multi-volume titles to online databases. While this has been a valiant effort, much of the content still goes undiscovered due to limited access from subscription costs, firewalls, passwords, and lack of indexing in search engines.
A new book from IGI Publishing, the first in the Advances in Library and Information Science (ALIS) series, discusses the myriad issues with e-reference discovery in libraries. The 23 chapters explore the topic in academic, public, and school libraries as well as from the publishers perspective. The book is available in print or e formats. E formats offer the ability to purchase individual chapters. The first ALIS newsletter featured the preface and 8 selected chapters from the book. Continue reading E-Discovering Reference