ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 4 5 2 / C&RL News ■ June 1998 I n t e r n e t R e v i e w s Sara Am ato, e d ito r B io g ra p h ic a l D ic tio n a ry . Access: http / / www.s9.com/biography This Web site contains brief information on about 24,000 people in all fields, from ancient times to the present. (For compari­ son, the printed M e rria m -W eb ster’s N ew B io g r a p h ic a l D ic tio n a r y contains about 30,000 entries and does not include living people.) The entries on this site include name, dates, and a short description of each person’s claim to fame. Data is compiled by Eric Tentarelli, the site owner, from hundreds of published news and biographical sources. The best feature of this site is that it can be searched not just by name but by key­ word to find awards, dates, discoveries and inventions, literary works, movies, nation­ alities, nicknames, professions, pseudonyms, theatrical roles, and other terms. The other major advantage of this site is its advanced search capabilities. Since there are pitfalls in searching for proper names in any database, it is always important to follow the protocol of the data­ base you are using. The help screens and search examples on this Web site are excel­ lent. Also helpful is a “Spelling Wizard,” which finds the closest match to a name entered with an approximate spelling. It is possible to stump the Wizard with very poor spell­ ing, but usually it finds the name that you need. As with names, searching for dates can be tricky in any database. This site offers a useful wildcard feature to facilitate search­ ing for decades or centuries in addition to exact dates of birth and death. The advanced search feature allows boolean searching, phrase searching, and truncation. Dates can be combined with keywords, for example, “US & Nobel” will bring up a list of American winners of Nobel prizes; “painter & 18 & French” will find 19th-cen­ tury French painters. There is a quirk in the advanced searching: if you use “and” instead of the ampersand, you will get some results, but not complete results. Another disadvantage is that the site will not display more than 20 results, although you can work around this by repeating your topic search and making your way through the alphabet. The site includes a handy annotated list of links to biography-related Web sites for astronauts, Nobel prize winners, obituaries, political figures, Pulitzer Prize winners, sci­ entists, and more; there is also a list of ideas for using Biographical Dictionary in the class­ room, as well as a multiple-choice biogra­ phy quiz, which gives immediate feedback on your answers, right or wrong. Advertis­ ing on the site includes links to Barnes and Noble on each biographical entry page. It should be noted that searching on this site can be slow, sometimes bringing up the mes­ sage, “excessive load on server . . . try again later.” With good reason, this is a popular data­ base and probably gets a lot of use by stu­ dents of all ages.— Susan E. Clark, Univer­ sity o f the Pacific; sclark@uop.edu B io g ra p h y . Access: http://w w w .biography, com. Produced by the A&E Television Network, this Web site claims new and expanded cov­ erage of more than 20,000 people in all fields. The data on the site is primarily from the Cambridge Encyclopedia Database and the Cambridge Dictionary o f Am erican Biogra- phy. Biography has a flashier design than the Biographical Dictionary, but has much less sophisticated searching. There are plenty of shopping opportunities for books and vid­ eos. As in the Biographical Dictionary, ubiq­ uitous links are provided to Barnes and Noble. The advantage of Biography is that the entries are more detailed than those in Biographical Dictionary. Sara A m a to is a u to m a te d system s lib r a r ia n a t C e n tra l W a sh in g to n University;sam ato@ tahom a.cw u.edu http://www.s9.com/biography mailto:sclark@uop.edu http://www.biography cwu.edu C&RL News ■ June 1 9 9 8 / 4 5 3 Searching is by name only; the database is not searchable by other characteristics as is the Biographical Dictionary. One very help­ ful feature, which is not available on the other site, is an alphabetical listing of all of the names in the database. The ability to browse the com plete list of entries is valuable. Entries are longer than those in the Bio­ graphical Dictionary, ranging up to about 200 words. Many entries contain links to relevant Web sites. O ne problem with this database is that there are num erous duplicate entries; for example, there are two separate entries for Arthur Ashe, one of which does not indi­ cate his death in 1993. There are many other duplicates. O ther features of this site are: an exten­ sive list of links to biography-related discus­ sion groups on topics such as athletes, books and authors, cops and criminals, movies and television, politicians, and more; a collection of one-m inute online videos of various ce­ lebrities; a multiple choice biography quiz; and a biography anagram game (no fair us­ ing the Internet anagram unscram bler to solve this!). Each of these free biography databases has advantages and disadvantages. Neither site has as much detail as an encyclopedia, but both are well worth bookm arking for ready reference.— Susan E. Clark, University o f the Pacific; sclark@uop.edu Institute fo r Puerto Rican Policy's IPRNet. Access: h ttp ://w w w .iprnet.org/IPR /. There are a growing num ber of Web sites that present various aspects of the U.S. Latino experience, but few authoritative sites that focus on issues pertaining to Puerto Ricans, particularly those living in the United States. IPRNet, the Web site of New York City’s In­ stitute of Puerto Rican Policy, is the happy exception to that trend. The Institute of Puerto Rican Policy was established in 1982 as a nonprofit and non­ partisan policy center, w hose research and publications have long tracked Puerto Rican and Latino demographics, voting behavior, poverty, political representation, health sta­ tus, and other social issues. In developing IPRNet, the Institute has effectively expanded its outreach by moving many of its services, newsletters, research publications, resources, and statistical datanotes to the Internet. IPRNet makes available full-text feature ar­ ticles from the newsletter “Critica” (whose edi­ torial advisory board includes well-known scholars, such as Gabriel Haslip-Viera, Juan Flores, and Kal Wagenheim), samples of sta­ tistical data documenting Puerto Rican dem o­ graphics and opinions, and downloadable files of data and questionnaires from surveys, such as the Latino National Political Survey. IPRNet also includes cultural information, bibliogra­ phies, links elsewhere, a fun quiz on Puerto Rican history, and instructions on how to sub­ scribe to its e-mail discussion list— IPR Forum. IPRNet does not focus exclusively on Puerto Ricans living in the United States. There is also a massive directory of Puerto Rican associations in the United States and Puerto Rico, and a Puerto Rico Datasite that has com piled socio-econom ic data on 78 Puerto Rican regions regarding population, language use, hom e ownership, literacy, and unemployment rates. Elsewhere, Puerto Rico is ranked on selected indicators (such as high school graduation rate, households receiv­ ing public assistance, and ability to speak English) and com pared with the strongest and weakest of the United States. Puerto Ricans comprise the second larg­ est group of Latinos living in the United States. This Web site will be valuable for aca­ demic libraries and researchers interested in political science and policy studies, as well as the areas of Latino studies and broader ethnic studies; public libraries serving Puerto Rican and Latino populations will also be in­ terested in bookm arking this site.— Susan A. Vega G a rc ia , Io w a S ta te U niversity; savega@iastate.edu mailto:sclark@uop.edu http://www.iprnet.org/IPR/ mailto:savega@iastate.edu