“Get a thorough insight into the index, by which the whole book is governed and turned, like fishes by the tail.”  – Jonathan Swift This final installment of our trilogy on Focused Browsing (see our previous posts) advances the position that browsing scholarly indexes to specialized encyclopedias reveals new research pathways. Indexes can lead you down paths you never knew existed. A director of a large research library told me “when librarians get a(read more)

This post is the second in a three-part series that began with Meandering the Stacks in March 2021 and concluded with Things I Learned En Route to Looking Up Other Things in June 2021. - Ed.   “The comparative perspectives provided by multiple specialized encyclopedias provide an assurance of quality that does not attach to Wikipedia articles. Again, this is not to criticize the latter for what they do; it is rather to point out that other important research options for(read more)

This post is the first in a three-part series that continued with Researching at Altitude in April 2021 and concluded with Things I Learned En Route to Looking Up Other Things in June 2021. - Ed.   “Classified bookstacks allow researchers to find through recognition what they don’t know what to ask for…focused browsing provides deep access via recognition in a way that digitized libraries of the very same text do not. ” 1 There’s much to(read more)

Paratext has deployed metadata and links for 883 additional Cambridge University Press reference titles—including the Cambridge Companions—to the Reference Universe service.   Users will receive relevant results from the new CUP title list automatically when they perform a search in Reference Universe.   To ensure your patrons are seeing all your CUP content within the service, please update your holdings information soon through our portal. (read more)

Paratext has added 160 new major reference titles from Edward Elgar, a comparatively new publisher represented within Reference Universe.   Edward Elgar has expanded dramatically in recent years, publishing 400 book and journal titles annually. Their list of 7,000 total titles focuses on business, law, the social sciences, and the emerging disciplines where these fields intersect. The article level metadata for these new titles (listed below) are now integrated into Reference(read more)

IGI Global and Edward Elgar Publishing continue to produce impressive major reference titles within their respective areas of expertise. With 22 new titles from IGI Global and 311 from Edward Elgar, Reference Universe has increased its core introductory content in law, economics, environmental policy, and information technology. These additions bring the total number of IGI Global Major Reference Works in Reference Universe to 506 and 1315 from(read more)

Cambridge University Press is the oldest publishing house in the world (1534) and continues to produce high quality scholarly publications in all research areas. Paratext added 631 additional Major Reference Works, including the famed Cambridge Histories to the vast introductory metadata of Reference Universe: 1975-2018. You can view the full list of the recently added Cambridge University Press titles, here. (read more)

IGI Global is a leading international academic reference publisher in information science, business science, medical information science and engineering science. This week, Paratext added more than 270 additional Major Reference Works, with an emphasis on IGI Global’s contributions to STEM studies, to the vast introductory metadata of Reference Universe: 1975-2017. This new addition of nearly 16,000 article level links to the 273 most(read more)

Cambridge University Press is the oldest publishing house in the world (1534) and continues to produce high quality scholarly publications in all research areas. Paratext added 700 additional Major Reference Works, including the famed Cambridge Histories to the vast introductory metadata of Reference Universe.       (read more)

Elsevier remains one of the world’s leading providers in science, health, and technology discoveries. In conjunction with the efforts of Elsevier, Reference Universe: 1975-2017 aims to provide researchers with the most current, introductory works of today. With that in mind, Paratext has enhanced the Elsevier profile in Reference Universe with an additional 12,000 article level links to 257 new Elsevier major reference titles. The(read more)

Oxford University Press remains at the vanguard of authoritative and creative major reference publishing. As such, it has established a singular profile within Paratext’s Reference Universe, the unified online resource for searching; augmenting; weeding; and utilizing Major Reference Works. This week, Paratext has supplemented the OUP profile with an additional 1.7 million article level links to 263 new Oxford Major Reference titles. 555 reference titles(read more)

Your Major Reference Collection contains unique data. The benefits are for all researchers, but particularly for advanced and graduate students looking to refine theses topics.  In order to expand the value of this more expanded query, Paratext has launched a redesigned Reference Universe with enhanced features, most specifically a See Similar Titles feature, using proximity of Library of Congress Classification to reveal titles otherwise missed.  (read more)

Paratext has launched a newly designed interface for Reference Universe. Along with the redesign, two new enhancements have been deployed: Program Changes  * See Nearby Titles is now a programmed feature accessible at nearly all areas of the search architecture. This feature allows researchers to "Walk the Shelves" of both legacy print content and E-Reference titles, so other relevant content not necessarily returned in their specific search is revealed. * A new Hot Key(read more)

New Inventory and Analysis Tools for your Major Reference Works Many library administrators are being pressed to inventory, relocate and/or weed their collection of Major Reference Works. But these expensive, non-circulating titles present a unique challenge. Where to start? The Reference Universe Collection Analysis module is now online--an extension of Paratext’s Reference Universe Usage Platform. This new module allows you to: Assess the coverage of your e-Reference titles(read more)

IGI Global and Paratext announce that thousands of additional links to nearly 150 IGI Global reference titles are now accessible via Paratext’s Reference Universe service. Reference Universe is the only database that provides both collection-level scope and index-level analysis of major reference works. All of IGI Global’s current works, including encyclopedias, multi-volume book collections, as well as single and two-volume handbooks of research, will now be(read more)

 Paratext announces that thousands of links to nearly 400 Major Reference Works from Cambridge Books Online will be integrated into Paratext’s Reference Universe service. Cambridge University Press’ coverage of all disciplines, at the highest scholarly level, further enhances the mission of Reference Universe, bringing the finest introductory content into the hands of researchers. Read the full press release here. (read more)

SAGE and Paratext are pleased to announce that thousands of additional links to nearly 400 SAGE Reference titles have been integrated into the Reference Universe service These award-winning titles join the nearly 45,000 represented within Reference Universe, the only research database that provides both collection-level scope and index-level analysis of Major Reference Works. Read the full press release here. (read more)

Paratext is proud to announce that thousands of links to nearly 250 Major Reference Works from Elsevier’s ScienceDirect will be integrated into Paratext’s Reference Universe service. Elsevier’s Major Reference Works provide foundational content that gives cross-disciplinary perspective to researchers, librarians, teachers and students worldwide. “Elsevier’s Major Reference Works provide reliable and rigorous foundational content to undergraduate, advanced,(read more)

The way your library users have been doing research has been changing for some time. You see it every day, eBooks are becoming dominant in modern search habits. Reference Universe remains the only collection level discovery resource focused specifically on Major Reference Works.  Enriched metadata for over 10,000 Electronic Reference titles as well as over 30,000 of your library’s legacy print holdings are now online. With new, larger eBook icons incorporated(read more)

Content for new Major Reference titles from Gale, Oxford and Blackwell will soon be added to Reference Universe. This new update adds over 170 new titles–with deep analytics for E-versions as well as their print equivalents.  This includes resources from Gale Virtual Reference Library,Wiley Online Library and Oxford Reference.  Over 45,000 titles are now part of the(read more)

Reference Universe has now expanded to include even more titles from Credo Reference. This most recent update, which brings in 160 additional Credo Reference titles, includes leading publishers such as SAGE UK, Princeton University Press and Elsevier. Credo’s General Reference is a multi-disciplinary database focused on the most popular academic research subjects.  These authoritative reference resources cover history, medical(read more)

Detailed data to over 40 Major Reference Works from Taylor & Francis have just been integrated into Reference Universe. This major enhancement, covering works predominantly in science and technology,  includes links to the E-editions at Taylor & Francis Online, as well as the corresponding data for detailed analysis of the print editions. Taylor & Francis is a leading international academic publisher with a reputation for exceptional scientific(read more)

Over 80 new titles from Oxford University Press and Wiley now join the almost 45,000 reference titles now more accessible through Reference Universe. The most comprehensive resource for greater discovery of authoritative reference works just keeps growing. The new titles now included cover a range of subjects. Current customers will now have greater access to: Encyclopedia of Dead Sea Scrolls, Oxford University Press Encyclopedia of Drug Metabolism and(read more)

Reference Universe customers subscribing to the Wiley Online Library will now find 82 new titles from this invaluable resource included in Reference Universe. The Wiley Online Library brings many of the quality resources Wiley-Blackwell has long been known for into an easy to use online platform. The award-winning reference content included in the Wiley Online Library covers life, health, social and physical sciences, and the humanities. As one of the(read more)

Paratext is pleased to announce that detailed metadata from Grove Art Online and Grove Music Online from Oxford University Press are now integrated into Reference Universe. Many current Reference Universe libraries tell us that these titles are among the most heavily used within their library. Their inclusion within Reference Universe ensures increased accessibility to some of the most authoritative articles on art and music available. Grove Art(read more)

The Reference Universe Administrative Module is now available!  In response to our most common request from users, the Administrative Module will greatly simplify the update process in Reference Universe. Reference Universe users can now: Immediately make additions/deletions to your Reference Universe profile as new titles are added to or weeded from your collection Keep up to date on reference titles your library may not yet have Easily(read more)

Paratext is pleased to announce that all of the reference works from the Sharpe Online Referencecollection have been added to the nearly 50,000 scholarly subject encyclopedias and other scholarly reference titles accessible via the Reference Universe service. Sharpe Online Reference (SOLR) includes the titles that make up the U.S. and Global History and Culture collections. SOLR brings together award-wining subject coverage, the convenience and flexibility(read more)