It's all in the WebPaths, baby...

"From blogdex to Veen to del.icio.us to this wonderful search plug-in for IE – mahvelous!" [jenett.radio]

Give me a moment to think of a word to write other than "WOW!"

Click on the last link in Joe's post if you are a Windows + Internet Explorer user and you like searching library catalogs. While there are several pre-configured search engines available at the site, the Searchy plug-in turns out to be another pipeline into online catalogs that sits completely outside the library world. Like LibraryLookup, anyone can configure the plug-in to work with any OPAC that allows the appropriate type of search strings, and the site even provides a Plug-in Generator.

For example, I played around with SWAN's keyword search and created a registry plug-in that allows me to type searches directly into the address bar in IE. After installing it, I can now type "sk celtic music" and the results of the search in SWAN load in the browser window. In fact, I just tested "sk pirates of the caribbean" and after a few clicks I'm now the 47th hold for the DVD!

I can also configure similar searches for title, author, subject, etc. ("st" for title, "sa" for author, "ss" for subject). I think the keyword plug-in should be visible to you on the Searchy page if you scroll down to "SWAN" - give it a whirl! The installation instructions really are as simple as they sound. (Do note that this installs into the Windows registry, though, so play at your own risk.)

SWAN runs Innovative Interfaces software, so I know III catalogs will work with this. We'll have to test others. I'm no Windows expert (not even close), but theoretically a library should be able to make plug-ins pre-configured for its catalog available from its own web site, right?

Very cool!

Great Free Legal Resources in Washington State

"I got an E-mail from David Goodson, who pointed out the following after reading a recent post here:

"I too am an attorney and your blog about internet legal research caught my eye - particularly your reference to state law research. ...what I really want to tell you about is that here in WA you can send an email query to a the state law librarian in Olympia and they will send you back an answer. I had [a] case where I needed legislative history for a law I was challenging. I spent hours and hours looking for it the conventional way without much luck so I sent them an email and within ten minutes I had a response with copies of everything I needed. and best of all it was free."

Now that sounds like a good system, and hopefully it will be the norm for other states in the coming years. [Ernie the Attorney]

The lesson here is to think about contacting a librarian when you find yourself spending too much time researching something, whether it's for work or personal knowledge! The minute you feel the first hint of frustration, contact a librarian! (The Illinois Compiled Statutes and more have been available online for some time now, too.) Illinois residents can Ask the Illinois State Library questions via email or telephone. A statewide online chat service should be up and running later this year, but of course you can always start with your local public library, as well.

Unfortunately, it looks like someone has removed the Illinois State Library from the list of Illinois State Agencies. This is shameful. If state governments continue burying library resources on their sites and cutting funding for them altogether, the bigger shame will be that the type of service Ernie highlights won't even be available, let alone the norm. You need to let your legislators know that you value library services at every level - local, state, and federal. These things matter.