Symbols:
 |
This resource was revisited and/or updated within the last four weeks. |
 |
A new resource added to the MathGuide database (usually within the last four weeks).
A list of all new resources in the MathGuide is available. |
| metadata |
The metadata link in the so-called Mini-Templates leads to a more detailed
and fielded description of the resource ("Full Metadata Template"). |
Evaluation:
Fair
Good
Excellent
Structure Map
The structure of the MathGuide is displayed in the following schema.
How to use MathGuide:
(1) Select preferred mode of entry
There are several entry modes to access the contents of MathGuide database.
- A SOURCE TYPE catalog offers a perspective by formal criteria (e.g. to search for databases, research institutes, journals, etc.).
- A SUBJECT catalog provides an overview of resources by the Mathematics Subject Classification.
- A LOCAL SEARCH engine enables users to enter keywords (e.g. creator names, resource titles, keywords, etc.) and launch a search, this comes in a basic and an advanced flavour.
- An INDEX SCAN allows to browse the entries in several registers, thus seeing the actual values present.
Several links to external resources have been incorporated into the MathGuide:
- The GBV OPAC allows browsing the GBV (Mutual Library Consortium, the service of most major libraries of Northern Germany) by the Mathematics Subject Classification MSC.
- Journals provides a list of journals in the area of Mathematics together with an indicator of their availability.
- The "Zentralarchiv für Mathematik-Nachlässe" (ZAMN) hints at the collection of mathematical bequests, comprising over 50 collections from eminent mathematicians, including C.F. Gauss, B. Riemann and F. Klein.
- The Google Co-op search engine is an additional search engine beyond the scope of the MathGuide, using the contents of the MathGuide data base as defining set of the area of interest.
(2) Response of the system: The Mini- Templates
Depending on your preferred entry mode, the system will respond with
different screens. In any case, it will present a list of results.
After selecting an entry from the SOURCE TYPE or SUBJECT
catalog, the results will be presented in the form of the so-called
Mini-Templates with information on title, identifier and evaluation.
The following example shows the Mini-Template for a very interesting
database that provides access to the reviews of Zentralblatt für
Mathematik:
(3) Select the resources which appear promising or interesting
The responses to your query are displayed in a list of Mini-Templates by alphabetical
order. On the basis of this list users can select the resources that seem to be most
promising or interesting. There are two options for further selection:
(3a) More detailed information on each resource
There is more
detailed information on each of the resources indexed in the MathGuide
(specifying additional metadata elements such as creator, publisher,
access information, rights etc.). This information is available in the
so-called full Metadata Template and is accessed via the metadata link
in the lower right of each Mini-Template. This full template is meant
to provide more comprehensive information on a resource without
actually loading it;
its categories
are based on the Dublin Core Metadata Element Set.
(3b) Without a closer look at the metadata
If there is no need for a closer look at more detailed metadata, any
resource is directly accessible by following the hyperlink in the
identifier (URL) field of the Mini-Template.
(4) Access to a resource
No matter whether from the
Mini-Template or from the full Template, any resource can directly be
accessed by activating the hyperlink in the identifier field.
SOURCE TYPE CATALOG
The Source Type Catalog
(English or
German description)
organizes the entries in the MathGuide database according to the formal
classification of the resources ("source types"). There are four main
categories:
- 1. Information Providers/Servers
- Typically, resources in this group do not contain information per se.
Rather, they serve as a gateway or point of entry for further research.
- 2. Factual Reference Works
- This section includes those resources which provide direct factual references.
In contrast to the resources classified under the section above, the user will
be directly lead to specific sources.
- 3. Bibliographic Resources
- In this section, the various bibliographic sources are grouped. In contrast to
the entries in other sections, the user may also be directed to link lists.
- 4. Primary Information Sources
- This group comprises resources which feature primary information.
SUBJECT CATALOG
The Subject Catalog organizes the data in the MathGuide according to the Mathematics Subject Classification (MSC).
The MSC is maintained by the two major review journals in Mathematics, the
"Mathematical Reviews" (MR)
and the
"Zentralblatt für Mathematik und ihre Grenzgebiete" (Zbl).
The present version is MSC 2000, and is under review for major changes.
There is an online version with search option of this classification available.
If you are not already familiar with the Mathematics Subject Classification we recommend that
you take some time to study the structure and contents of the Subject Catalog.
LOCAL SEARCH
The MathGuide is equipped with a local search engine (based on our Avanti server) that searches the database, a simple and an advanced search function are available.
Generally all searches can be truncated with a question mark (?) at
the end. This will find any word starting with the stem before the "?".
The display of the search result can be chosen as:
- Only count of the results
- Title (linked to the full metadata template)
- Title and URL (linked to the full metadata template and the source respectively)
- Mini template (all respective links)
The display can be sorted according to:
- Title (ascending alphabetically)
- Subject Classification (by the respective code)
- Source Type (by the respective code)
- Country (by the respective code)
- Language (by the respective code)
- Source Date (descending by the date of publication of the source, i.e. newest are top)
- SSGFI time stamp (descending by last review of source, i.e. newest are top)
- Evaluation (descending by evaluation stars, i.e. highest are top)
Simple Search
Search in only one category.
- Text
- Text searches for the entered term in all fields containing
text, e.g. author, description, clasification. It does not search in
non-verbal fields like URL, date, evaluation. This search is case-insensitive,
and if you enter several words, they will be concatenated with "AND".
- Title
- Title performs a case-insensitive search in the Title field,
several words will be concatenated with "AND".
- URL
- URL separates the entered address: the server addresses at
every "." and the paths at every "/". These parts are joined with "AND"
and are searched in the URL field So you can enter only parts or pieces of the address.
This search is case-sensitive.
If you enter e.g. "emis" you will find all data sets refering to sites
on the EMIS (European Mathematical Information Service) Server with the
URL http://www.emis.de/.
- Keywords
- Keywords performs a case-sensitive search in the Keyword field, several
words will be regarded as one expression, e.g. "algebraic geometry" will find all
entries with this keyword, while "algebraic?" will find additional entries.
Advanced Search
Combines several search options with Boolean operators and
allows, for instance, for searches for an English language site
containing the keyword "algebraic geometry".
In Advanced Search, the following categories are additionally available:
Codes: Codes are case sensitive and have to be entered according to special tables.
- Language
- Two lowercase letters, according to ISO 639-1,
e.g. en for English, de for German, fr for French.
- Country
- Two capital letters, according to ISO 3166,
e.g. GB for Great Britain (not UK!), DE for Germany, US for the United States of America. Since places in some contries
(.e.g. Canada, Australia or the USA) are sometimes recorded with the respective state or province, you may need to truncate
the search term with a "?", e.g. US?, to find all entries.
- MSC
- The Mathematics Subject Classification used as subject code is
given by a combination of figures and characters. For a precise entry,
see the online version.
- Source Type
- Two to 7 lowercase letters as described in the Source Type Catalog.
INDEX SCAN
The index scan provides an alternative view of the database and an alternative to the free search described above.
Here you can see all entries in some registers of the database in alphabetical order,
you can jump to the desired position by entering the beginning of your search string.
The availabe registers are
- Title words
- All words occuring in the title of the web site (includng alterntive or translated tiles).
- Title
- The full title of the web site, omitting articles at the beginning of the title.
- Keywords
- Keywords or expressions used to describe the source (case-sensitive).
- URL
- The full URL of the source.
- URL parts
- All parts of the URL of the source, using the dot (.) as separator for the server address and the slash (/)
as separator fo the document path.
- Text
- Any word in the description of the source, excluding non-verbal entries like classification notation or URLs.
DATES
There are up to four dates attached to a dataset, two referring to the source and two more referring to the metadata.
Usually dates are given as 8 digits representing the year, month and day (yyyymmdd).
If you use e.g. the truncation 199909?, you can find all dates from September 1999.
If precise dates are not available, six (yyyymm) or four (yyyyy) digits may be used.
- Course of Publication
- This is no actual date, but a verbal description of the frequency of appearance for comtinually issued materials like journals.
Possible entries are e.g.: monthly, bimonthly, quarterly, irregularly.
- Available
- This is the earliest time the source was available (usually on the internet), if this information is available.
- Created
- The day the metadata set was finished and published.
- Modified
- The date of a significant modification of the metadata set, usually in connection with a new inspection of the described website.
For small changes (e.g. corrections of misspellings) this date should not be changed.
ADDITIONAL SOURCES
Some additional sources of interest to mathematicians have been incorporated into the MathGuide.
These are sources independent of the websites described in the MathGuide,
presented usually by accessing some web services or databases provided by third parties.
They are maintained independently from the sources described in the MathGuide proper.
- GBV OPAC
- The entries in the OPAC of the "Gemeinsame Bibliotheks-Verbund"
(GBV) are organized by different classification schemes, among them the "Göttinger Online-Klassifikation (GOK).
The Mathematics section of the GOK is equivalent (mostly) to the MSC,
so the MathGuide can provide a browsing according to the MSC, which is not available in the GBV directly.
- Journals
- Journals in Germany are collected by the "Zeitschriften-Datenbank" (ZDB, Journals Data Base), and
information about the accessibility for individual and institutional users is available through the
"Elektronische Zeitschriftenbibliothek"
(EZB, Electronic Journals Library) provided by the Regensburg University Library.
This information is combined to allow users browsing the mathematical journals by title and display their access modes,
using a street light: green: general access; yellow: restricted access; red: no access.
Users can choose if the want this information displayed for their present IP address or for the
Göttingen University Library (SUB Göttingen).
Note: browsing by title incorporates additional information (e.g. additional or translated titles),
so the resulting list may appear not well sorted.
- Zentralarchiv für Mathematik-Nachlässe
- According to a contract with the "Deutsche Mathematiker Vereinigung" (DMV, Organization of German male Mathematicians)
the SUB Göttingen collects the German mathematical bequests. This collection of over 50 sets is mostly not digitized,
but available for interested parties at the Göttingen Library and through a copy service by special request.
MathGuide provides a list of the available mathematical bequests with links into our database of manuscripts
for further investigation.
- Google Co-op
- Google offers several services for the academic community free of charge and advertisement,
and this makes use of one of them.
This search engine is a regular Google search which incorporates a certain knowledge of the websites described in MathGuide.
Thus hits of mathematical relevance are ranked higher than in a normal Google search result set.
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