Proceedings of the International Conference on Scientific Information Two Volumes (1959) / Chapter Skim
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Recent Trends in Scientific Documentation in South Asia: Problems of Speed and Coverage
Recent Trends in Scientific Documentation in South Asia: Problems of Speed and Coverage
Pages 589-604
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From page 589... ...
of the tables of contents of scientific periodicals; discusses the present trend in indexing national or regional scientific papers; and suggests systematic listing of contents of scientific publications at the national level and dissemination of these lists at an international level. The increased effort in scientific research has resulted in a large increase in the volume of scientific publications: periodicals, special project reports, dissertations, etc.
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The number of scientific papers reported in some of the English language abstracting journals in 1945 and 1956 is shown in Table 1.
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Similarly, the proportion of foreign language papers covered in different abstracting journals varies. The use of different languages adds to the di£tculties in prompt reporting of scientific literature.
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February 1956 June 1956 4 4149 English " March 1956 June 1956 3 2620 English " December 1956 April 1957 4 Group 3c 3436 English (British) March 1956 May 1956 2 2605 English " January 1956 April 1956 3 2607 English " November 1955 April 1956 5 a Average delay, 6 months.
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National Documentation Centres The second important development cluring the post-war period has been the organisation of national documentation centres in various countries. It will not be out of place here to make a brief reference to the abstracting or indexing publications oftwo national documentation centres: Centre de Documentation
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From page 594... ...
Vnesco associated documentation cenfres A number of other countries also have set up national documentation centres to meet their own requirements for documentation services. Unesco has providecl technical assistance to a number of countries to establish national or regional scientific documentation centres such as: the Centro del Documentacion Cientifica y Tecnica, Mexico; the ~ugoslovenski Centar za TeDnicku i Naucnu Dokumentaciju, Belgrade; the Indian National Scientific Documentation Centre, New Delhi; the Scientific and Technical Documentation Division of the National Research Centre of Egypt, Cairo; and the Pakistan National Scientific Documentation Centre of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, Karachi.
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aspect of the work of these national documentation centres, namely active documentation, is the more important one for the present study. Keeping scientists informed of the latest developments in their special fields of study may be achieved by various means, ranging from the simple circulation of periodicals to the compilation and publication of exhaustive or selective classified lists, with or without abstracts.
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From page 596... ...
Such lists are primarily not very suitable for exhaustive retrospective searching, and therefore these lists are not usually provided with annual indexes. Experiments at Insdoc The information needs of a fast developing scientific and industrial organisation in India led us at Insdoc to give considerable thought to the problem of speed in dissemination of information on scientific publications.
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, specially in relation to articles on medicine. He was collecting recent references on a medical subject and checked the entries in Insdoc List along with those in specialist journals such as the Current List of Medical Literature, Excerpta Medica, British Abstracts of Medical Sciences, and Abstracts of World Medicine.
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From page 598... ...
National listing of scientific publications As mentioned earlier, the national documentation centres have oriented their publication programme to suit the immediate interests of the country or the region they serve. In view of the many difficulties attendant on comprehensive coverage of literature in the abstracting journals, a happy development has been the attempt to index the scientific literature published by the country or the region.
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From page 599... ...
Suggestions The systematic collection of world-wide scientific literature by the organisations which are publishing abstracts, and the subsequent operations of indexing, translation, classification, etc., on a comprehensive basis would in itself be a commendable proposal, but will be beyond the resources of these organisations in the near foreseeable future. Such a plan would, in any case, not eliminate the problem of delays caused by the surface transport of printed matter through the normal postal channels.
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From page 600... ...
They may organise the indexing of the national scientific [Literature by using mechanical aids and copy periodically, say twice a month, on microfilm, the tables of contents ofthe periodicals published in their countries. Having access to a science library or libraries which receive ad the national periodicals and possess microfilming equipment, it shouIct not be beyond the resources of such national centres to arrange this work at a very nominal additional expenditure.
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would overcome the very long and trying delay arising from the surface transport of scientific literature through the normal postal channels.
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as a separate. Articles published in Latin American countries are indexed with an asterisk mark so as to draw immediate attention to these publications.
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$ 1.50 $ 4.25 $ 46.00 $ 190.00 Per journal /year /per copy $ 0.5 $ 1.90 ACKNOWLEGEMENT Acknowleclgement is made to the Photographic Section of Insdoc for a trial microfilm of table of contents, with and without authors' abstracts, for estimating the cost involved.
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