EEVL Update

EEVL is the Hub for engineering, mathematics and computing. It is a free service, and is funded by JISC through the Resource Discovery Network (RDN).

Service News

Logo graphic for links to EEVL

A small graphic featuring the EEVL eye is now available for those sites who wish to place a link to EEVL. The graphic is shown in the main heading above and can be copied from the EEVL web site [1].

Free Book Promotion

EEVL's £5,000 worth of free engineering books promotion, which was mentioned in the last issue of Ariadne [2], closed at the end of April. It was a resounding success, and we would like to thank all those who helped to distribute fliers and emails. The response was rather overwhelming as there were over 4760 valid entries. These came from 3145 unique email addresses, with 908 people from the .ac.uk domain entering (the largest number of entries came from Nottingham Trent University). Winners have been chosen randomly by the sponsoring publishers (Kluwer, Academic Press, Springer and Palgrave). For those who entered but did not win a free book, we understand that some of the publishers involved will be offering the selected titles at a discounted price.

Affiliate Programme

An affiliate program involves offering a product or a service of another company on a web site, normally by adding a simple banner with a link to the other company site. The affiliate then receives commission from the company for sales or leads. In theory, the affiliate can benefit not only from commission, but also from increased site traffic, credibility from partnership with other organisations, and added content.

Just how relevant are affiliate programs to services such as EEVL? To tell the truth, we have no idea! The best way to find out if these things work is to try them, and this is what EEVL is doing. An arrangement has been made with Justengineers.net [3], a popular recruitment agency which provides access to job searches, career advice, email alerts and newsletters. For a trial period, a Justengineers graphic and link has been placed on about 10 EEVL pages (for example, the Manufacturing Engineering browse page [4]), and for every person who clicks on this graphic and subsequently registers with Justengineers, the Hub will receive a small fee. This affiliate scheme will be carefully monitored, and if it proves popular, it will be retained. Of course, our involvement in this affiliate scheme does not imply any special endorsement by EEVL of Justengineers.

Industry News Hot Link

The Hot Link has been completely updated [ 5]. As well as many more links to sources of industry news, this page now includes links to a number of Moreover news feeds [6] giving today's news headlines for important engineering disciplines. Now that so many newspapers and periodicals are available online, and with the capabilities of modern search technology, the potential of news clipping services has really been transformed. By visiting EEVL's Engineering Industry News page, you can now get the latest news headlines for technology policy, the aerospace and defence industry, the construction sector, transport industries, robotics, telecoms, the engineering industry in general, and several more subjects and sectors.

New Engineering Images Hot Link

Regular users of EEVL mayhave noticed a new Hot Link to Engineering Images [ 7] . This link provides access to those resources included in EEVL's catalogue of engineering resources which have been identified as containing significant collections of images.

Database

The EEVL technical officer, Geir Granum, is working on a MySQL database, which will replace the bespoke database currently powering the EEVL catalogue of engineering resources. As the EEVL service will, from September 2001, cover mathematics, computing and engineering, it is essential that the new catalogue should allow searching within specific sections of the catalogue as well as across the three subject areas. The new service will be launched on September 12th, at a champagne reception in the Museum of Scotland, alongside the ALT-C conference being held in the University of Edinburgh [8].

Virtual Training Suite launch

The biggest news, by far, in this issue is the launch of the RDN Virtual Training Suite [ 9]. EEVL co-ordinated the development of seven of these tutorials: Civil Engineering, Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering, Health and Safety Engineering, Materials Engineering, Mathematics, Mechanical Engineering, and Petroleum Engineering, which have been added to the Internet Aviator tutorial developed last year [10]. Michael Breaks, University Librarian and Director of EEVL, launched the VTS at a reception in Edinburgh University. Champagne (or an approximation) and a buffet lunch were enjoyed by around 40 people. Guests included four tutorial authors, subject librarians from Scottish and North of England universities, and representatives from the Scottish-based Learning and Teaching Network Centres (LTSN), the Scottish Further Education Unit, a Regional Support Centre, EDINA, the Edinburgh College of Art and the Centre for Digital Library Research. Many thanks to ILRT for the development and management of this project.

References

1. The EEVL logo can be downloaded from http://www.eevl.ac.uk/images/eevlb.gif
2. Shoestring marketing: examples from EEVL, Roddy MacLeod and Lesa Ng, Ariadne 27, http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue27/eevl/
3. Justengineers.net at http://www.affiliatewindow.com/cgi-bin-local/a.pl?justengi&5934
4. Manufacturing Engineering browse page at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/manuf_eng.html
5. Engineering Industry News Hot Link at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/newsfeed.htm
6. Moreover news feeds at http://w.moreover.com/
7. Hot Link to Engineering Images at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/cgi-bin/cross/new-search.pl?page=1&query=engineering+images&submit=Search&phrase=on&glocat=frk&resourcetype=ALL+RESOURCES
8. ALT-C conference being held in the University of Edinburgh http://www.ed.ac.uk/altc2001/
9. Virtual Training Suite at http://www.vts.rdn.ac.uk/
   A new Ariadne 'At the Event' Article is available at http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue28/vts/
10. EEVL Tutorials:
    Civil Engineering at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/civil/
    Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/elec/
    Health and Safety Engineering at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/healthandsafety/
    Materials Engineering at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/materials/
    Mathematics at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/maths/
    Mechanical Engineering at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/mechanical/
    Petroleum Engineering at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/petroleum/
    Internet Aviator at http://www.eevl.ac.uk/vts/aviator/

Author Details

Roddy MacLeod
EEVL Manager
Heriot-Watt University Library
Edinburgh
EH14 4AS

Email: R.A.MacLeod@hw.ac.uk
Web site: http://www.hw.ac.uk/libwww/libram/roddy.html

Linda Kerr
EEVL Coordinator
Heriot-Watt University Library
Edinburgh
EH14 4AS

Email: L.Kerr@hw.ac.uk