The Hutchinson Chronology of World History is updated through 2008 and includes detailed chronologies from as far back as 15 Billion BC. Check out the chronology that was just added for 2008 here.
The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather guide includes thousands of entries on everything from aardvark to Zoroastrianism, as well as hundreds of images, audio clips and animated videos. It’s a valuable resource for anyone looking for background or explanatory information on a topic. Ever wonder how crude oil becomes a usable consumer product? Check out this video.
Credo Reference has a Corporate Advisory Board made up of a number of interesting and talented individuals, some of whom are from the library and publishing world, and others who are not. We think that these varied perspectives help make our company stronger and more relevant. Recently, Credo’s President, John Dove, conducted some interviews with our Board members. The first was with Erin McKean.
Erin McKean likes to call herself a Dictionary Evangelist. She was most recently Chief Consulting Editor for American Dictionaries at Oxford University Press, and was the editor in chief of the New Oxford American Dictionary, 2e, and now is CEO of Wordnik, an online corpus-based dictionary for word lovers worldwide. She is the editor of VERBATIM: The Language Quarterly and the author of Weird and Wonderful Words, More Weird and Wonderful Words, Totally Weird and Wonderful Words, and That’s Amore (also about words). Previously, she was the editorial manager for the Thorndike-Barnhart Dictionaries at ScottForesman, a Pearson company. She has served on the board of the Dictionary Society of North America and on the editorial board for its journal, Dictionaries, as well as on the editorial board for the journal of the American Dialect Society, American Speech. She also serves on the advisory board of the Wikimedia Foundation.
John: What about Credo has captured your attention?
Erin: Credo is doing great work in helping to reduce the friction associated with doing reference-based research, by making more resources, from more publishers, available in more ways to more people than ever before.
John: How does the work and mission of Credo Reference intersect with your world?
Erin: Credo is helping researchers be more informed users of individual reference sources — when you see linked and related results it’s easier to be aware that different sources have different methodologies, emphases, and, sometimes, even biases. It’s more important than ever to be a critical consumer of information, and Credo makes it easier to learn this important skill.
Since I’m working to get readers to be more critical consumers of lexical information, I’m very interested in how Credo encourages critical comparisons without discouraging users!
John: What are one or two “classics” that you think should be on the Credo team’s recommended reading list?
John: What are you up to these days that you’d like the Credo community to know about?
Erin: I’m working on a new startup project — Wordnik.com. Our goal is to show as much information as we can find about every word in the English language (it will take us a while). “Information” can be anything from example sentences and dictionary definitions to images from Flickr, “tweets” from Twitter, and user-contributed tags. We’ve just gotten underway, and it’s very exciting!
Many thanks to Erin for being a member of our Advisory Board, and for answering our questions!
Behind the Scenes is a regular feature of the Credo Reference Blog. Each post describes an aspect of our content, service or development process not normally seen by our customers.
In a typical week, credoreference.com is visited by thousands of users searching for information, viewing entries, looking at images, saving citations, and exploring information using our Concept Map. This happens at the same time that meta search systems like Webfeat are requesting result sets and sites such as the UK’s National Health Service are pulling information in XML format for use on their web site.
While our users are browsing, we are often adding new content, updating existing content or even updating system software. Occasionally, we even upgrade or replace servers. Many sites schedule downtime to perform updates like these. We’ve made it part of our standard practice to run our site continuously.
So how do we do that? It’s really pretty simple.
The most important technique we use is to run many complete copies of our service. Each copy runs on a separate server. When a user connects, they are assigned to one of the servers. From that point on in their session, all of the searches, entries they view and other activities are handled by their assigned server. This assignment process is handled by a load balancer, a special device that monitors all of our servers and assigns new users to the one that is least loaded.
A block diagram of the Credo Service. A load balancer assigns new users to least loaded server
This architecture makes it easy to do updates without any downtime. We start by disconnecting the first server from the load balancer. Any users are immediately reassigned to the least loaded of the remaining servers. We then update the disconnected server. Once updated, we reconnect it. It will then begin to share the overall load as newly connecting users get assigned to it. We then repeat the process with the second, third and remaining servers. This is all done with an automated script so timing details and other possible types of errors are avoided.
While the update is occurring, some of our users will see the pre-update version of our service and some the post-update. It’s even possible for someone to see the pre and post update versions in a single session. The most frequent change is new title additions, so if you’re ever using Credo and a new title appears, you’ve probably experienced an update firsthand.
Besides updating the content and software, this architecture makes it easy to update the hardware. At one point, we actually did a major upgrade, replacing all servers with no downtime. We just replaced them one at a time.
All of this would be for nought if the servers themselves got disconnected, damaged or cut off from the Internet. To ensure that doesn’t happen, all of our servers are in a secure facility managed by Rackspace, a US based company with facilities around the world. Their centers are staffed 24 hours a day and have redundant power, air conditioning, fire suppression, backup power and fiber data lines that enter at separate points, so short of a really major disaster they’ll keep running.
One of the new reference works added to the Credo Reference database is “The Human Body Book”. All the answers to this brainteaser can be found in this fascinating book about the human body - and what can go wrong with it.
1. What is the more common name for the illness known as avian flu?
2. Pneumonia affects which part of the body?
3. The cerebellum is the second largest part of which organ in the body?
4. What is the name for the clear, domed front of the eyeball?
5. The average human skeleton has how many bones: 106, 206 or 306?
6. There are four types of human teeth. Name three of them.
7. In humans, is the sense of taste much more sensitive than smell or is the sense of smell much more sensitive than taste?
8. Is “trachea” another name for the stomach, the spine or the windpipe?
9. Describing an infection, what does “AIDS” stand for?
A recent Zogby International Poll (find the news story about it here) states that “The Internet is by far the most popular source of information and the preferred choice for news ahead of television, newspapers and radio”. It also reveals that only 10 percent of those polled would consider social websites as important sources for news, and an even smaller 4% would use Twitter for timely, topical information.
I wonder how different the results would have been had that poll been conducted today? My Twitter followers, most of whom are libraries or librarians, have been buzzing with information about the political situation in Iran - just a quick glance at the trending topics, which currently include “Tehran” and “#Iranelection”, indicates the prevalence of this topic right now. Reports in the mainstream media indicate that people in Iran are using Twitter to organize protests, and to share information with the rest of the world about what is really going on. More and more people, it seems, are turning to real-time news to get an understanding of the situation.
Where does Credo fit into this increasingly fast-paced world of news and information? Obviously as a reference resource, we don’t have the up to the minute information that a site like Twitter would have. But we do have the ability to provide someone with an awful lot of knowledgeable, credible background information that can help better inform your understanding of current events. For example - a Search in Credo for “Iran” turns up some great entries, including the one from the CIA World Fact Book, which has a lot of valuable information about Iran’s system of government. It is hard to be well informed about a current event when you can’t place it in context - Reference materials, and other resources, can help you do that.
The lead singer is often the most notable member of a rock or pop band. See if you can identify these lead singers with various groups.
1. Who was lead singer with the Supremes until she began a solo career in early 1970?
2. Roger Daltrey is the lead singer of which group?
3. Michael Hutchence was the lead singer of which group until his death in 1997?
4. Which US hip-hop group has had vocalists named Kim Hill and Fergie?
5. Who was lead singer of Black Sabbath until leaving it in 1978 to pursue a solo career?
6. Who was the lead singer and principal songwriter of Roxy Music?
7. Chrissie Hynde is the lead singer of which group?
8. Which Northern Irish rock singer and songwriter first came to attention as the lead singer with the Irish band Them?
9. In 1972, which female singer formed a band called Rufus: “a white soul band with a black singer”?
10. Chuck D was the lead singer with which rap group?
Find the answers here.
Image “The Witches’ Sabbath, c. 1819-23″, By Francisso Jose de Goya y Lucientes. Find out more about this image on Credo Reference.
Credo Reference facilitates access to its online reference content Enhancements help remote users access Credo through their library
Boston and Oxford, June 10, 2009 – It’s now easier to access Credo Reference remotely. As a result of significant enhancements to the remote user login process, it’s much easier for users to find libraries to which they belong and that subscribe to Credo’s award-winning online reference library.
The new login process aids remote users in discovering a library through which they can access Credo Reference’s online collection of over three million cross-searchable entries from over 400 key titles and 63 publishers. Credo’s library discovery page provides three ways for users to locate their library:
• Based on the geo-location of a user’s IP address, the discovery page displays links to libraries closest to the user.
• For users who may not be physically close to their library, the discovery page allows them to select a library using country, region and city dropdown menus.
• Users who are travelling can also search for their library by name.
After selecting a library, remote users are taken directly to their library’s customizable login page. Once logged in, they’re just a click away from Credo Reference’s guided navigation, visualization tools and all the other key features for which Credo is known. To simplify subsequent visits, Credo Reference will remember which library a user selects.
“Users arrive at Credo through many different avenues besides their library’s computers or library’s web site: from the web, a link that’s been emailed to them, a citation on another web site, or a variety of other ways,” commented Mike Sweet, Credo CEO. “We continually work to make the Credo Reference experience the smoothest, most user-friendly research process possible. This enhancement will greatly help users who arrive at Credo through diverse avenues, find their library web site and start using Credo.”
May was quite the international month for Credo Reference as our geographically diverse employees traveled to various conferences around the world.
Anne Kail, our Oxford-based Sales Manager, recently attended the Scottish Libraries Conference.
Inverclyde librarians Sean McNamara, Rebecca McKellar and Alana MacMillan at the Credo Stand
Credo sponsored places for Sean and Rebecca, as well as the CILIPS competition winner, Annette Ramsden from University of Aberdeen, to attend the Scottish Libraries Annual Conference. When asked for his thoughts about Credo, Sean had this to say: “there is so much information coming from a variety of sources and too much of it is unreliable. In a society that strives to be Information literate a source like Credo stands out due to its quality and its variety of titles and publishers. The service is user friendly with excellent cross referencing and a concise format making it ideal for library users to use independently or for library staff to access on library user’s behalf. Superb value for money!”
Anne also attended the Wales Libraries Conference, in Llandrindod Wells. Patricia Perkins, from Swansea Libraries, was the winner of a £25 Marks & Spencers voucher and says “thank you for showing me around your brilliant site.”
Jenny Walker attended a “Speed Dating” event sponsored by SANLiC and held in Pretoria, South Africa. This event allowed librarians to visit with many different vendors, each for a short period of time. The format seemed to please both attendees and vendors allowing for many productive conversations to take place over the course of the day.
Jenny Walker (center) speaking with Librarians at the SANLic Speed Dating event
Lisa Hill and Heather Blaine attended the Canadian Library Association 2009 annual meeting in Montreal, Quebec. The conference presented a great opportunity to speak with current subscribers about new content and platform enhancements, meet librarians interested in learning more about Credo and to sample a local delicacy, Poutine.
Some of the delicious poutine that Heather and Lisa enjoyed!
Wondering where to find us next? See our list of forthcoming events here.
This week: That’s Life! One of the new reference works added to the Credo Reference database is the Penguin Dictionary of Biology. All the answers to this brainteaser can be found in it. Try the quiz: you may know more about this subject than you think. After all, biology is the science of life!
1. Which scientist was born in 1809, went on a momentous voyage on HMS Beagle, and wrote “On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection”?
2. Which addictive alkaloid is found in cigarettes, snuff, chewing tobacco and some gums?
3. Bile is a fluid produced by which part of the body?
4. Which continent produces more than 90% of the world rice crop?
5. In a tooth, what is the name for the substance beneath the enamel which occupies the bulk of the tooth volume?
6. What is the meaning of the word “unicellular”?
7. What phrase was introduced in 1872 by the British air pollution inspector, Robert Angus Smith, when he discovered that rain falling around Manchester contained sulphuric acid?
8. Ascorbic acid is another name for which vitamin?
9. Which important alkaloid, extracted from the bark of Cinchona species, is used in the treatment of malaria?
10. What is the name of the flap on the wall of the pharynx against which the glottis pushes during swallowing, preventing food, etc., from entering the trachea?
Image: “Aspidophorus Chiloensis and Agriopus Hispidus, plate 7 from ‘The Zoology of the Voyage of H.M.S Beagle, 1832-36′”, by Charles Darwin. Find out more information about this image on Credo Reference.
We’ve recently updated a few of our titles on Credo Reference, both from Helicon - Lightbox Publishing. Those titles are The Hutchinson Chronology of World History and The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather guide.
