.:[*Crazy About Stars*]:.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Reflections (Week 6)

How much do you know about the invisible web (databases)?

Invisible web (databases) consists of information and resources that are "hidden" in the World Wide Web. In another words, these information and resources cannot be found using general search engines due to certain limitations. These resources include articles, abstracts and citations, etc.

An example of an invisible web (database) would be: Complete Planet.

My experience with using databases was a wonderful one.

Databases are more authoritative. Informative details such as the place in which the resource comes from, author, citation, year, abstract of the resource and subject, are provided in the search results. This helps to make the resources more reliable and useful as the full details about the resource are available, compared to search engines, meta search engines or subject directories, which give less details.

The search results are mostly scholarly literature and is thus informative. It provides me with alot of information that definitely does add value to my research. In the text, keywords of my search will also be highlighted. This makes it easier to read and identify whether the resource is relevant to my topic.

Apart from that, i have also learnt something new when using TP's databases to research for resources during EIR lesson.

Using TP's databases, the full-text of articles are given for certain articles. However, for those in which the text is not available, it provides a link to TP's library catalogue such that i would be able to know the location i can get the resource from.

In conclusion, I feel that databases are indeed useful in research purposes, especially since it is detailed and informative, which makes the resources highly reliable as well. Also, resources from databases are also valuable as they cannot be found using search engines, meta search engines or subject directories. Thus, it is effective to use databases for research purposes.

However, I feel that I cannot consider the use of databases to be more effective compared to search engines, meta search or subject directories, because in order to make the most out of the search facilities available on the Internet, databases cannot be used alone. If I were to use only databases for researching resources relating to my topic, I will not be able to benefit as my research will be an ineffective one consisting of resources only from databases alone.

Databases have to be used in combination with search engines, meta search engines and subject directories. This will then lead to a variety of resources from the different search facilities and hence make my research a fruitful one.

Hence, after learning about another new search facility – databases, I would definitely put this to good use by applying it to my Diploma.

I am really glad that I have learnt about databases, because a number of my subjects require me to find news articles and analyse the news articles, such as having to find two news articles for my Microeconomics Portfolio and conducting an economic analysis on the articles.

It is definitely not easy to find the relevant articles just by using search engines.

With databases, I am confident that I will be able to retrieve relevant articles and the articles will also be reliable since databases are authoritative.

Success in EIR! ;

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Reflections (Week 4 & 5)

Search facilities have become an indispensable tool in our daily lives.

Without search facilities, it would be inconvenient to do our research and to gather information in the shortest time possible.

In EIR, i have learnt about three types of search facilities, such as search engines, meta search engines and subject directories.

Out of these three search facilities, search engines are most commonly used.

Search engines are user friendly and we can construct our search terms by using boolean operators so that the results will be more relevant.

An example of a search engine would be: Google.com.

The benefits of using search engines is that it allows me to gain access to various categories of resources, for example, among the search results there will be forums, blogs, news sites, etc.

This is definitely useful as i will be able to benefit from the diversity of views regarding my topic that i can gather by accessing these resources. This not only helps to gives me a balanced view regarding my topic, it also helps to train me to think from different perspectives by understanding the different points of views made by different people.

Apart from that, i will also be able to benefit from the large database that search engines has. A large database increases the likelihood of getting relevant results.

The next search facility would be meta search engines.

Meta search engines are also known as multisearch engines as searches can be conducted at the same time on a number of search engines.

An example of a meta search engine would be: Mamma.com

The benefits of using meta search engines is that it indexes the resources comprehensively, thus, the results might be more relevant and useful.

Also, since search terms are transmitted to several search engines at the same time, it provides quick access to the resources of different search engines by typing through the search box and this brings me the convenience of not having to go into the individual search engines to search for resources relating to my topic. This also allows me to compare results from different search engines at once.

Another search facility that i have learnt would be the subject directory.

Subject directories consist of resources that are human-compiled and are arranged in a hierarchical way.

As such, resources are well-organised in a way that users can select and browse different categories of resources and access the links in the particular category that is relevant.

An example of a subject directory would be : Yahoo! Directory.

The benefits of using a subject directory is that it is human-compiled, the resources are more relevant and precise since humans are able to analyze the relevance and important of the resource before including it in the categories. This helps to filter out irrelevant information from the resources.

Not only that, since the topics are well-organised from general areas to more specific areas, it allows for effective browsing as well.

In general, different search facilities bring about different benefits as they are useful in their own way.

However, the use of search facilities to search for resources related to my topic definitely did help in bringing me convenience as i do not have to go to the library to research for resources.

Besides that, i can also get resources in the fastest time possible by using search facilities and this helps to saves time.

Apart from the different search facilities, i have also learnt how to use site feeds in blogs.

Site feeds are also known as web feeds, and it consists of frequently updated content published by a certain website. It is commonly used for news and blogs and it allows users to track updates on the website.

I feel that site feeds are useful as i can view updated content of websites through site feeds. This helps to reduce the time and effort to check a particular website for the latest updates.

Besides that, it is also easier to view updates through site feeds because there will not be any website layout when viewing through the site feed. This makes things easier because certain websites have messy website layouts and it makes the content of the website difficult to read.

So, would i use site feeds in the future?

Definitely yes. Site feeds provides me with so much convenience, it would be a waste if i do not apply what i have learnt. :)

Success in EIR! ;

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Reflections (Week 3)

Have you noticed that in recent years, there are more and more foreign talents in Singapore?

Indeed, with the government's efforts to attract foreign talents to Singapore, an increasing number of foreign talents have been coming to Singapore, and this issue is one of the most popular topics in Singapore. The views and opinions that different people has pertaining to this issue is never-ending.

Perhaps some of us dislike the idea of having foreign talents in Singapore, as we prefer to have more local talents, while some of us feels that having foreign talents in Singapore is beneficial to the society, as they can exchange ideas with us and that's where we can learn.

Hence, i have chosen this topic for my research: -

Discuss the impact of the influx of foreign talents into Singapore.

During EIR lesson in week 2, my learning journey began as i did practical activity 1 of EIR, in which i have to classify the resources that i have found pertaining to my topic into categories such as discussion forum, blog, WWW site and electronic journal/magazine/news. At the same time, i had to identify the purposes of the resources. The purposes of websites are as mentioned in my previous blog post, such as personal, information, advocacy, business/marketing, news and entertainment.

Then, for EIR lesson during week 3, i have learnt how to create a suitable search strategy for researching the internet.

Researching might seem easy, but it is definitely not easy when you type in the wrong search terms. When you use the wrong search terms, the end result will be a huge list of useless results. Thus, it is extremely important to plan a search strategy and find the right keywords before conducting the search.

In order to translate my research into an effective search query, i had to identify keywords and its variations that are relevant to my topic. This was something new as i usually do not use variation of keywords - perhaps that's the reason why i don't always get my desired results all the time.

Then, after identifying the keywords and its variations, boolean operators are used so as to narrow down my search and this indeed helps in getting more specific and relevant search results. Boolean operators include AND, which means that all the words have to be included in the search. It also includes OR, which can be used to link keywords and its variations, such that if the results do not have the actual keyword, then the variation can take its place. Another boolean operator include AND NOT, which is to exclude undesirable words and make the search more specific.

As such, my search query are as follows:

(impact OR effect) AND (influx OR inflow) AND (foreign talent* OR foreign expat* OR foreign worker*) AND (singapore)

With that, my evaluation of the two search engines (Google and Google Scholar) began.

And indeed, i was impressed by Google's search functions and features, as i realised that Google actually offers so many different search functions, such as offering users the flexibility of choosing results from “the web” or just “Pages from Singapore” alone. Besides that, there is also the advanced search, which can be used so as to define my search even more precisely to get desired results. The advanced search also offers a series of features, such as letting users specifying the language, the type of file format of results, the region to retrieve the resources, and much much more!

After evaluating Google's search facility, the next activity was to participate in a forum by posting a new discussion topic/question relating to my research topic, and i posted it in the Young NTUC forum.

http://www.youngntuc.com.sg/youngntuc/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=2498&start=0&st=0&sk=t&sd=a

I felt that posting this was a brand new experience as i have never posted topics like this in forums before. Everytime i post in the forums, the topics are usually random, and for the purpose of casual conversation. As such, i was pretty anxious as i posted this topic, especially since i do not knowing how others will react or respond to my question.

However, i feel that participating in the forum for the purpose of my research is indeed helpful, because only in the forums, i can then get a diversity of views towards the issue on the influx of foreign talent. For example, if i were to research just from blogs itself, the blogs usually expresses the views of the blog owner towards the issue, and that is only from one person's perspective. A forum, on the other hand, provides the perspectives of many different people. To research on this topic effectively, it is definitely best to get varied views so as to reflect the viewpoints of different people.

Next, a citation must definitely be done so as to give proper acknowledgement to the owners for the resources used. If citations are not used, it would then be plagiarism, which is the act of taking or using another person's work and not acknowledging it. This also brings us to the part on integrity. As such, citation is an important feature in a research work.

Then, a bibliography refers to a list of citation. Apart from acknowledging the source of information, a bibliography also serves to offer readers more options for further reading as they might be interested in my topic and would like to find out more about it. They can then do so by going to the links that are included in my bibliography. Not only that, a bibliography can also be a representation of the research that i have done.

As such, i have learnt alot from Week 3's EIR lesson, such as evaluating search facilities, constructing effective search queries, posting useful questions in discussion forums, as well as creating citations and bibliography and i definitely look forward to the next EIR lesson.

Success in EIR! ;