http://www.bl.uk/historyofscience

“The voices, memories and experiences of hundreds of British scientists are being captured by a major new initiative at the British Library. An Oral History of British Science, led by National Life Stories, is the first project of its kind in Britain and will gather 200 audio-visual interviews with the British scientists who have led the world in scientific innovation … [It] will interview both the well-known names of British science as well as lesser-heard and neglected voices such as technicians and women scientists, to ensure their memories are preserved for historians of the future. “ [Source: Peter Scott’s Library Blog, 24-02-10]

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200910/ldselect/ldcomuni/37/3702.htm

“The creative industries are playing a growing part in the British economy. This report [released 14 January 2010] examines two of the most important, film and television—although some of our proposals have implications for other industries like music and videogames. Our aim is to see what practical help we can suggest to enable these two industries to develop further and so benefit employment and overseas earnings as well as adding to our national reputation for excellent and innovative production.” [Source: Docuticker, 21-02-10]

http://www.dart-europe.eu/basic-search.php

“DART-Europe is a partnership of research libraries and library consortia who are working together to improve global access to European research theses … The DART-Europe partners help to provide researchers with a single European Portal for the discovery of Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs), and they participate in advocacy to influence future European e-theses developments. DART-Europe offers partners a European networking forum on ETD issues, and may provide the opportunity to submit collaborative funding applications to achieve DART-Europe’s vision for ETDs.” As of today, the portal provides access to 130315 full-text research theses from 231 Universities sourced from 16 European countries, including a number from the UK.

[Many thanks to Kath Wright, Deputy Library Services Manager, Science & Engineering, All Saints for alerting me to this service.]

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/podcasts/fashion-or-ration.htm

“How did the fashionable woman of the Second World War and post war era manage to remain chic in a climate of rationing? Using sources from The National Archives this talk will consider the fashion industry of the time, and reveal how designers Norman Hartnell and Hardy Amies not only contributed to the war effort, but made a lasting impact on British style.” Published on 18 February.

http://www.nls.uk/maps/

This well-designed site allows you to “access high-resolution zoomable images of over 20,000 maps of Scotland” including a selection of county maps of Scotland, 1580-1928; town plans and views, 1580-1919; 18th-century military maps; and estate maps, 1772-1878. Use the RSS Feed service to be informed of future additions to the collection. Wonderful! Three cheers for the Scots!!

Using the Pubmed connection file allows you to search Pubmed from within the EndNote X2 interface and then transfer records automatically and easily into your EndNote X2 library. To use it:
.Click on Tools within EndNote X2
.Select Online Search
.When invited to Choose a Connection File, scroll down to Pubmed and click on Choose
.A search screen opens. Input your keywords and then click on Search
The resulting bibliographic references will appear in your EndNote X2 library. Simples!

At midnight on 24th Feb, JSTOR’s security certificate expired and until JSTOR renews it, login via Shibboleth is not possible. This means that the service is available only on-campus. Presumably this is not just a problem here at MMU but must be affecting all JSTOR subscribers.

We contacted JSTOR yesterday and their response was as follows: “Thank you for reporting this problem. You are receiving this error because the security certificate for www.jstor.org has expired. We are in the process renewing our certificate and hope to have the new certificate in place shortly. In the meantime our technical team are looking at workaround options to restore your Shibboleth access as soon as possible.
We apologize for any confusion and inconvenience caused”.

No workaround has been suggested so far. We’ll let you know as soon as off-campus access is restored.

Date: 26 March 2010
Venue: University of Leicester

“The Landmap Service in the past year has focused on supporting the use of spatial data by providing online courses and training materials through a new Learning Zone. The Learning Zone provides a range of learning and teaching materials which caters for students/researchers and teachers/lecturers. Currently the Learning Zone has seven courses available covering Image Processing for four leading image processing packages and introductory courses for the use of Modern and Historical Aerial Photography. Furthermore there is advanced courses such as the use of Object Oriented Classification in Definiens. In the forthcoming months a further five courses will be developed covering areas such as 3D Modelling, Radar, LiDAR and Landuse Mapping. This workshop aims to introduce the new Learning Zone facility to academic staff and research support staff with presentations and practical sessions.

Registration opens soon. See the Landmap website for details.” [Source: email from The Landmap Team, Mimas, 25-02-10]

http://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/Military_Law/pdf/LOW-Deskbook.pdf

“Published in January 2010 and … freely available in full text (PDF) on the Library of Congress website, the Deskbook is intended to be used as a teaching tool covering the international and operational law subjects taught to military judge advocates. There are chapters providing an introduction to public international law and looking at the history and framework of the law of war. Other chapters deal with the legal basis for the use of force, means and methods of warfare, war crimes and human rights. There are also chapters dealing with each of the four Geneva Conventions.” [Source: Intute: Law, 05-02-10]

http://www.caxtonclub.org/caxtonian.html

“The intended audience is ‘bibliophiles, those in the books arts and trades, and lovers of reading and the written word’. At December 2009 issues from 2001 to 2009 are freely available for download as PDF files. Articles published in 2009 issues include: a lengthy survey of fine books published on the Great Platte River Road in the U.S.; an eight-page report on a conference about book crime; ‘Medievalism, the Beautiful Book, and the Arts and Crafts Movement’ (June 2009); and ‘Collecting the Poetry of Thomas Hardy’ (April 2009), among others.” [Source: Intute: Creative & Performing Arts, 31-12-09]