Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology [Review]

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	Issues in Science and Technology Librarianship
	Spring 2005

	DOI:10.5062/F4JD4TQ2



      

    Book Reviews
  Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology
       Beverly Ryan 
  Computer Science/Library Science Specialist
   University of California, Santa Barbara 
 ryan@library.ucsb.edu     
    

   Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology / Mehdi Khosrow-Pour,    editor. Hershey, PA.: Idea Group Reference, 2005. 3000+ pp. $1125.00. ISBN    1-59140-553-X   

The Encyclopedia of Information Science and Technology is a five-volume    encyclopedia with over 550 articles. Unlike a traditional encyclopedia with    articles arranged by subject, this is arranged alphabetically by title, including    initial articles "a", "the" and "an". The    result is that the user must sit down with all five volumes to find articles    of interest. The index, which is included in each volume, has serious deficiencies.    For each topic consulted in the index, additional articles were found in the    table of contents that happened to have the pertinent words first in the title.    Some index entries were for words merely mentioned in the article, while the    major concepts were missing from the index. Fortunately, most of these problems    are resolved in the online version by what appears to be a keyword index.   

The encyclopedia offers more than 4,500 technical and managerial terms with    definitions. These terms are listed at the end of each article and appear    to be defined by the author of the article. In the Index of Key Terms a term    could have several entries, for each author who happened to define it.
   The print version includes a list of authors (listed alphabetically by first    name) and their institutional affiliation, and each article has the author(s)    listed, but there is no author index. In the online version it is possible    to do a search by author.
   It is unfortunate that the encyclopedia is so poorly organized and difficult    to use efficiently, as the articles are thoughtful, well written, and informative.    The preface indicates that articles were submitted to a peer review process    and the quality reflects this. Topics range from the very technical (software    engineering, data mining, and database technologies, for example) to social    and ethical concerns of information technology such as end user computing    and the digital divide. One could learn a lot just by browsing the volumes.    
   Articles appear to follow a prescribed format: introduction, background,    main thrust of the article, future trends, conclusion, references, and key    terms. A search in the online version first brings up an abstract with key    terms listed and hyperlinked. The full text of the article is in a PDF file.    
   According to the marketing brochure, the purchase price includes "Free    online access for life of edition with purchase of print copy." There    is no way to tell how long online access will last, which is too bad as it    is by far a better version of the encyclopedia.
   It is difficult to recommend the encyclopedia for purchase during these years    of extremely tight budgets. Although the encyclopedia has interesting and    useful information, I can't help but question how much use it would    get. I do think it would be a good purchase for a library school, largely    because of its broad range of topics relating to information science and technology.
   

   
          

  

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