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| Issue 2 Home | Editorial | Features | Regular Columns | News & Events | Misc. | ||
By Pete Cliff - October 2000
A third edition of The Student's Guide to the Internet has just hit the shops [1]. The guide, written specifically for university and college students, fully updates and expands on the previous edition. UKOLN's Pete Cliff reviews.
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The Student's Guide to the Internet has been around since 1996 and has received (judging by the quotations on the frontispiece) critical acclaim since its inception. Now in its third edition, does it still stand up to the test of an increasingly Net savvy student audience? We shall see.
There are three
things that make this book unique amongst the muddle of Internet
literature. It has a British bias, is targeted specifically at
students, and is realistic. This doesn't mean that Web sites are
restricted to UK domains, though many of the recommendations are,
but rather that the sites are selected with UK students in mind.
Further, the book does not glorify the Web, but rather recognises
it as a potential source of information. This is a refreshing
angle to take.
The book begins, sensibly enough, with an introduction to the Internet, including a background, and what it might mean to the studious. The style is clear and precise, perhaps a little dry, and pitched at the right level for those with an interest in simply using the Internet as an academic resource.
The book continues with an overview of Internet technologies like e-mail, Usenet, telnet, FTP, etc. and is again pitched at an intelligent, but non-technical audience.
The largest portion of the book is taken up listing and describing a number of URLs from academic subscription services such as those at MIMAS [2] and EDINA [3], freely available 'commercial sites', like newspapers, to Subject Gateways and subject based resource guides. Links are not limited to traditional 'text based' services though, and the book emphasises the multimedia aspect of the Web with sections on image archives and sounds.
Many of the URLs are listed by 'type' rather than subject. For instance the EDINA services are listed alphabetically. While this generalist approach can make clear the diverse nature of Internet resources, it can sometimes make it hard to locate the URLs pertinent to a particular research area.
The final chapters consist of an essential discussion on search engine techniques, a taste of HTML, some recommendations on how to cite online resources, and some pointers of where to go next.
Interspersing URLs with text can be confusing and interrupt the flow of the otherwise interesting discussion. Perhaps this book would be better in two parts: The discursive prose followed by a separate URL catalogue?
The Student's Guide to the Internet manages to squeeze a broad coverage in its one hundred plus pages but in doing so perhaps covers too much. The chapter on self publication with HTML omits the basics of the structure of a HTML document, ignoring fundamentals like the <HTML> and <HEAD> tags. Other sections, like those on essential net skills, stop short of technical detail. That said, wherever the book stops there is always a relevant and useful URL if the reader wishes to know more.
We began by asking if The Student's Guide to the Internet could cut it in a Net savvy world and I am pleased to say it probably does. It may be that it lacks the technical detail for some, but by avoiding being overly technical while keeping at an intelligent level, it gets the balance just right. It works well as a springboard into the world of the Internet.
Just remember, not everything you read out there is worth including in an essay...
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Pete
Cliff
Systems Developer, The Resource Discovery Network
UKOLN
University of Bath
BATH
BA2 7AY
United Kingdom
Phone: +44 1225 323218
p.d.cliff@ukoln.ac.uk
<http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/>
Pete Cliff is employed as Resource Discovery Network
Systems Developer at UKOLN
(the
UK Office for Library and Information Networking).
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For citation purposes:
Cliff, P. "Book Review: The Student's Guide to the Internet", Cultivate Interactive, issue
2, 16 October 2000
URL: <http://www.cultivate-int.org/issue2/review/>
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