THE CIS NEWS

MARCH 2003 

This issue of The CIS News is coming to you from the CIS E-mail address -- cissupport@nisc.com. Comments, questions, concerns, etc., should be directed to that address.
UPDATES
Several existing CIS databases were updated at the end of February or beginning of March:
CERCLIS:
A new set of PRP records was added to the database. The number of CERCLIS records that now include PRP lists increased from 1,878 to 2,688. The total number of records increased from 44,552 to 44,760, with 11,603 of those in the updated database being "true" CERCLIS records (i.e., not NFRAP records).
CHRIS:
This excellent HAZMAT database from the US Coast Guard was replaced in the course of this update. The prior version of the database dated approximately to 1990. This has now been replaced by CHRIS 2000. This is a PDF-based version of the database: When you retrieve a record in CIS, you'll see a link that you have to click on to display the whole record via Adobe Acrobat (which must be installed on your PC for this to work). There are approximately 1,300 records in the new version of the database, each dealing with one chemical substance, and the records are handsome and extremely well organized.
FINDS:
The number of records in this index to EPA-regulated sites actually declined from 1,153,245 to 1,115,512. This is because we eliminated from the database a large number of
water-system records. These were generally of no value -- they contained very little useful data (indeed, they contained so little data that it was frequently impossible to discover what it was that was being described), and they just served to clutter things up. Consequently, we dropped them.
DOCKET:
This database of EPA enforcement actions now covers 38,000 records. Of these, 5,488 relate to formal court proceedings, and 32,512 relate to EPA administrative proceedings.
HSDB and IRIS:
A small number of new or revised records were added to each of these databases.
NEW DATABASE: NIOSH POCKET GUIDE
The NIOSH Pocket Guide to Chemical Hazards was added to the system in the course of this update. This is an addition to our HAZMAT lineup, and it comes, of course, from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. There are 677 records in the database, each one dealing with one chemical substance. The records cover names/CAS RNs, synonyms, exposure limits, physical and chemical properties (including description), warnings about incompatibilities, references to measurement methods, and information about personal protection and first aid.
To retrieve a record from this set for review, enter NIOSH POCKET GUIDE in the Database File box on the search screen. As with CHRIS (above), this is a PDF-based database: You have to click on the link provided to get through to the complete record (which, as with CHRIS, is very handsome and well organized).
LINKING TO FULL-TEXT PUBLICATIONS AT HIGHWIRE PRESS (R)
In the last issue of this newsletter, we mentioned some links to full-text sources that we were working on. One of these links is to HighWire Press (R), the Internet Imprint of the Stanford University Libraries. HighWire hosts electronic versions of a number of journals cited in various CIS databases. Furthermore, for many of these journals -- particularly their backfiles -- there is no requirement for you to have a subscription arrangement with HighWire -- that is, you (or anybody) can reach the articles available online once we have created the link. (For a list of the journals available via HighWire, visit http://highwire.stanford.edu/lists/freeart.dll.)

Consequently, we have now activated links from CIS user accounts to HighWire. In future, whenever you see a HighWire link in a CIS record, you should be able to click on it and arrive at either the full text of the cited article or an abstract of the article. To see this in action, try the following in CIS:

  • On the Advanced search screen (the one you're on when you first enter CIS), pull down to the Bibliographic Source search box (it's toward the bottom).

  • Enter ENDOCRINE REVIEWS in the search box, and press SEARCH (at the upper right).

The result should be eleven MEDLINE records, each of which has a link to full text at HighWire. Click on the link, and the full text of the cited article will pop up on the screen in front of you.

We're very pleased with the way this is working -- we think it is way cool -- but there are, as usual, things we have to warn you about:

  • If you click on the HighWire link and nothing happens, you may be running a firewall program that prevents your computer from executing a Javascript (which is what the HighWire link is). If this is a problem for you, check with your computer jock. He/she will have to tell you if the firewall can be turned down or off to permit the link to work.

  • The linking mechanism only works in certain CIS databases so far. We'll extend it to other databases in the near future. (If you see the link, you can click on it; where the link isn't implemented, it won't appear.)

  • When you see a live link in a CIS record, make a note of the bibliographic citation before you click on the link. We link directly to individual articles whenever possible, but sometimes you can only get to your article by clicking to the year of publication, then a particular issue, then to your article -- and it's a nuisance to get into this process before realizing you have to go back to get the necessary information.

  • You may sometimes be denied access to an article -- particularly extremely recent articles -- unless you have registered as subscriber with HighWire.

  • While you usually will be carried by a link to a full-text article -- or a method of getting to a full-text article -- there will be cases when you can reach only an abstract or a table of contents. Abstracts are OK, of course, but we will be trying in the near future to eliminate links that lead only to tables of contents, which don't seem useful to us.

Of course, more of this sort of thing is going to be coming in the near future, and we hope it gets simpler and less complicated for everyone. As we proceed, we would very much appreciate hearing from any CIS subscriber about your experience with this. Send an E-mail to cissupport@nisc.com with any comments or observations you may have.

MORE ABOUT FULL-TEXT LINKING
In addition to providing full-text links within CIS to free HighWire publications, NISC can provide full-text links to your electronic journal subscriptions when articles from these
journals are indexed in the various databases available in CIS. There is no charge to you when you have us set something like this up. There are two options to enabling these full-text links that we would be happy to work with you on.

Option 1 - OpenURL Service
If you currently have an OpenURL Service (SFX from ExLibris, LinkFinderPlus from Endeavor, or 1-Cate from Openly Informatics), we can obtain information from you that will permit a user to go from the CIS citation to the OpenURL server. There the user is typically given information about the citation's availability in print in your library. In addition, if you have a subscription to the electronic form of the citation, a link is provided to access the full text.

Option 2 - NISCLink
NISCLink is NISC's full-text linking service. With information about the journals you currently subscribe to electronically, we can enable users to go from citations within CIS to the corresponding full-text articles. Currently we have agreements with the following aggregators and publishers to enable full-text linking from our databases to their journals for subscribing institutions.

EBSCO EJS
JSTOR
HighWire Press
Project MUSE
SwetsWise

If you currently subscribe to journals via the above services or you have an OpenURL service, please contact us at sales@nisc.com or 410-243-0797 (Debbie Durr or Vaughn Vigil) to discuss your full-text linking options.

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