Gopher goes to the Library - Penn Printout, Nov 1993

The University of Pennsylvania's Online Computing Magazine

November 1993 - Volume 10:3

Gopher goes to the Library

By Mark Herzel Colvson

By now even casual Internet watchers have noticed that the Internet Gopher, like Elvis, is showing up everywhere. One year ago Penn had a single gopher; now there are nine and counting. And each individual gopher can connect a user to hundreds of others around the Internet, with new ones appearing every day. Why so many? And why do we need one more from the Library?

How many gophers does it take?

Gopher is a runaway success because it's simple. Even first-time users can access a vast number and variety of resources through easy-to- navigate sets of menus. Gone in large part is the daunting, mysterious alphabet soup of Internet addresses, remote logins, and arcane commands. And would-be gopher creators discover that it's almost as easy to build a gopher as it is to use one.

But success has brought its own problems. "Gopherspace" is now almost as crowded and chaotic as the Internet itself. Within its broad confines, soup recipes and anti-Barney invective mingle with fifteenth- century manuscript catalogs and protein sequencing databases. Now, for many researchers, separating particular grains of wheat from barnfuls of chaff has become a frustrating exercise.

Library Gopher to the rescue

Enter the Library Gopher. Its role, like that of the Library itself, is to get the "good stuff" and organize it well. So you won't find Beach Boys' song lyrics in any Library Gopher menu. You won't find a Periodic Table of the Elements that stops at number 92. (Both have turned up in gophers elsewhere.) What you will find is accurate, up-to- date resources for serious academic inquiry, organized by subject for easy access. Researchers in any discipline can move from conceptually broad menu choices like "Math, Science & Engineering Resources," through subsequently narrower menus, to zero in on a topic of interest.

Some Examples

Interested in political science or public policy? The United States Government is one of the largest publishers of Internet- accessible information in the world. Choose "Government Documents Resources" from the Library Gopher's main menu to access documents like Al Gore's National Performance Review report, the preliminary summary of the Clinton plan for Health Care Reform, or a complete draft of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

More of a humanist? Many research centers around the world now offer electronic editions of their manuscript and rare document catalogs. They're available and searchable under the heading "General Reference Resources" in the Library Gopher. Or search and/or download the Bible, Shakespeare, the Koran, and dozens of other primary and secondary sources in world literatures and religions, available under "Humanities & Social Sciences Resources." Education researcher? The ERIC index to journal articles and documents in education is available under the same menu choice.

Looking for recent math or physics preprints? The Los Alamos Nuclear Lab (LANL) archive, located under "Math, Science & Engineering Resources," lists recent papers on topics ranging from algebraic geometry to high energy physics. Health and life science researchers can access current cancer research through CancerNet from the National Institute of Health. Look for it in the "Biomedical Resources" menu.

The number of archives, databases, and documents available is much larger than we can list here. And in many disciplines, electronic journals are emerging as well--current, peer-reviewed, scholarly in content, and fully accessible through the Library Gopher. Whatever your area of interest we encourage you to experiment and explore.

Gopher is well-connected

The Library Gopher also connects users to other library resources. It can take you not only to Franklin/PennData and LOLA (the Biddle Law School Library catalog) quickly and easily but to non-Penn libraries as well. If Van Pelt doesn't have the book you need on shelf, use the Library Gopher to check Drexel, Temple, Swarthmore and other local library catalogs. Or for more specialized information, search the Library of Congress or any of more than 500 other catalogs worldwide. Faculty and graduate students can also connect to EUREKA, an electronic catalog of more than 20 million books, journal, music and other materials (requires an account number, available from the Van Pelt Library reference desk).

Library catalogs and many other resources in gopherspace are often presented with little explanation. So with most connections the Library Gopher provides an "About" file, which at a minimum tells where the resource is, who maintains it, and where to get help. Frequently it also includes a more detailed description of the resource and/or searching tips.

Keep those cards and letters coming!

The Library Gopher is a growing pup. Expect to see new features and improvements regularly. But if it is to reach it's full potential, your help is essential. If you know of an academic Internet resource that you can't find in the Library Gopher; if you discover a resource that has gone out of date; or if you just have comments, suggestions, or, yes, even compliments, please pass them on to a librarian at any reference desk. You may also contact the Library gophernauts directly by sending e-mail to libreference@a1.relay.upenn.edu or by calling the Van Pelt Library reference desk at 898-7555.

And yes if you really want, we'll even help you find the Gopher with the Beach Boys' lyrics.

MARK HERZEL COLVSON is a Reference Librarian for the Van Pelt Library.

Sidebar 1: Library Gopher features

Contains resources of interest to Penn faculty, graduate students, and researchers. Contributions and suggestions from the community are strongly encouraged.
Offers resources in Gopher only where it provides an advantage over other formats. For example, the gopher version of the Periodic Table of the Elements is not offered since superior printed versions are easily available.
Offers resources which have proven to be reliable and well maintained. No "fly-by-nights."
Offers resources for which reliable source information is available. If it says it's from the White House, the Library has made sure it really is from the White House.
Offers resources organized by subject wherever possible.
Offers authoritative source information on most resources, including information on author and/or sponsoring body, Internet address, frequency of updates, e-mail or other address for the online "publisher."

Sidebar 2: Accessing the Library Gopher

The Library Gopher is easy to reach. From the PennNet annex: prompt, enter telnet gopher.library. Enter gopher at the login: prompt.

If you have a gopher client on an Ethernet-connected machine, point your client to gopher.library.upenn.edu.

The Library Gopher is also on the central Penn Gopher, which allows you to easily access all nine gophers currently available at Penn. Just choose "Gopher Servers at Penn" from the main menu. For more information on connecting to the central Penn Gopher, consult the September 1993 Penn Printout article "PennInfo is surfing the Internet with Gopher."