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Book Keeping Found Things Found  The Study and Practice of Personal Information Management

Download or read book Keeping Found Things Found The Study and Practice of Personal Information Management written by William Jones and published by Morgan Kaufmann. This book was released on 2010-07-27 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Keeping Found Things Found: The Study and Practice of Personal Information Management is the first comprehensive book on new 'favorite child' of R&D at Microsoft and elsewhere, personal information management (PIM). It provides a comprehensive overview of PIM as both a study and a practice of the activities people do, and need to be doing, so that information can work for them in their daily lives. It explores what good and better PIM looks like, and how to measure improvements. It presents key questions to consider when evaluating any new PIM informational tools or systems. This book is designed for R&D professionals in HCI, data mining and data management, information retrieval, and related areas, plus developers of tools and software that include PIM solutions. Focuses exclusively on one of the most interesting and challenging problems in today's world Explores what good and better PIM looks like, and how to measure improvements Presents key questions to consider when evaluating any new PIM informational tools or systems

Book Personal Information Management

Download or read book Personal Information Management written by William P. Jones and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 2011-07-01 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an ideal world, everyone would always have the right information, in the right form, with the right context, right when they needed it. Unfortunately, we do not live in an ideal world. This book looks at how people in the real world currently manage to store and process the massive amounts of information that overload their senses and their systems, and discusses how tools can help bring these real information interactions closer to the ideal. Personal information management (PIM) is the study and practice of the activities people perform to acquire, organize, maintain, and retrieve information for everyday use. PIM is a growing area of interest as we all strive for better use of our limited personal resources of time, money, and energy, as well as greater workplace efficiency and productivity. Personal information is currently fragmented across electronic documents, email messages, paper documents, digital photographs, music, videos, instant messages, and so on. Each form of information is organized and used to complete different tasks and to fulfill disparate roles and responsibilities in an individual’s life. Existing PIM tools are partly responsible for this fragmentation. They can also be part of the solution that brings information together again. A major contribution of this book is its integrative treatment of PIM-related research. The book grows out of a workshop on PIM sponsored by the National Science Foundation, held in Seattle, Washington, in 2006. Scholars from major universities and researchers from companies such as Microsoft Research, Google, and IBM offer approaches to conceptual problems of information management. In doing so, they provide a framework for thinking about PIM as an area for future research and innovation.

Book The Science of Managing Our Digital Stuff

Download or read book The Science of Managing Our Digital Stuff written by Ofer Bergman and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2016-11-04 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why we organize our personal digital data the way we do and how design of new PIM systems can help us manage our information more efficiently. Each of us has an ever-growing collection of personal digital data: documents, photographs, PowerPoint presentations, videos, music, emails and texts sent and received. To access any of this, we have to find it. The ease (or difficulty) of finding something depends on how we organize our digital stuff. In this book, personal information management (PIM) experts Ofer Bergman and Steve Whittaker explain why we organize our personal digital data the way we do and how the design of new PIM systems can help us manage our collections more efficiently. Bergman and Whittaker report that many of us use hierarchical folders for our personal digital organizing. Critics of this method point out that information is hidden from sight in folders that are often within other folders so that we have to remember the exact location of information to access it. Because of this, information scientists suggest other methods: search, more flexible than navigating folders; tags, which allow multiple categorizations; and group information management. Yet Bergman and Whittaker have found in their pioneering PIM research that these other methods that work best for public information management don't work as well for personal information management. Bergman and Whittaker describe personal information collection as curation: we preserve and organize this data to ensure our future access to it. Unlike other information management fields, in PIM the same user organizes and retrieves the information. After explaining the cognitive and psychological reasons that so many prefer folders, Bergman and Whittaker propose the user-subjective approach to PIM, which does not replace folder hierarchies but exploits these unique characteristics of PIM.

Book The Future of Personal Information Management  Part I

Download or read book The Future of Personal Information Management Part I written by William Jones and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-06-01 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We are well into a second age of digital information. Our information is moving from the desktop to the laptop to the "palmtop" and up into an amorphous cloud on the Web. How can one manage both the challenges and opportunities of this new world of digital information? What does the future hold? This book provides an important update on the rapidly expanding field of personal information management (PIM). Part I (Always and Forever) introduces the essentials of PIM. Information is personal for many reasons. It's the information on our hard drives we couldn't bear to lose. It's the information about us that we don't want to share. It's the distracting information demanding our attention even as we try to do something else. It's the information we don't know about but need to. Through PIM, we control personal information. We integrate information into our lives in useful ways. We make it "ours." With basics established, Part I proceeds to explore a critical interplay between personal information "always" at hand through mobile devices and "forever" on the Web. How does information stay "ours" in such a world? Part II (Building Places of Our Own for Digital Information) will be available in the Summer of 2012, and will consist of the following chapters: Chapter 5. Technologies to eliminate PIM?: We have seen astonishing advances in the technologies of information management -- in particular, to aid in the storing, structuring and searching of information. These technologies will certainly change the way we do PIM; will they eliminate the need for PIM altogether? Chapter 6. GIM and the social fabric of PIM: We don't (and shouldn't) manage our information in isolation. Group information management (GIM) -- especially the kind practiced more informally in households and smaller project teams -- goes hand in glove with good PIM. Chapter 7. PIM by design: Methodologies, principles, questions and considerations as we seek to understand PIM better and to build PIM into our tools, techniques and training. Chapter 8. To each of us, our own.: Just as we must each be a student of our own practice of PIM, we must also be a designer of this practice. This concluding chapter looks at tips, traps and tradeoffs as we work to build a practice of PIM and "places" of our own for personal information. Table of Contents: A New Age of Information / The Basics of PIM / Our Information, Always at Hand / Our Information, Forever on the Web

Book Building a Better World with our Information

Download or read book Building a Better World with our Information written by William Jones and published by Morgan & Claypool Publishers. This book was released on 2015-08-01 with total page 205 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Personal Information Management (PIM) is the art of getting things done in our lives through information. How do we - can we better - manage our information at home, at school, at work, at play and “@large” in a global community? How do we use information not only to know but also to represent, communicate and effect useful change in the world around us? In the study of PIM, does the search for practical methods with practical impact lead to methods that are "massive open on-line"? Can the ancient practice of storytelling help us better to weave our fragmented information together? In the practice of PIM, how can our information best serve as "near knowledge" - close at hand and, through our information tools, serving in practical ways to extend the knowledge that's "in the head"? If attempts to multitask lead to ineffective, even dangerous, instances of task switching and divided attention, can better PIM help us to realize, instead, opportunities for "multi-goaling" where the same time and effort accomplishes not just one but several goals? These and other questions are addressed in this third and final book to conclude the series on "The Future of Personal Information Management". Part 1, "Our Information, Always and Forever", covered the fundamentals of PIM and then explored the seismic shift, already well underway, towards a world where our information is always at hand (thanks to our devices) and "forever" on the web. Part 2, "Transforming Technologies to Manage Our Information", provided a more focused look at technologies for managing information. The opening chapter discussed "natural interface" technologies of input/output to free us from keyboard, screen and mouse. Successive chapters then explored technologies to save, search and structure our information. A concluding chapter introduced the possibility that we may see dramatic reductions in the "clerical tax" we pay as we work with our information. Now in Part 3, "Building a Better World with Our Information", focus shifts to the practical present and to the near future. Part 3 is in three chapters: • Group information management and the social fabric in PIM. How do we preserve and promote our PIM practices as we interact with others at home, at work, at play and in wider, even global, communities? (Chapter 10). • Designing for PIM in the development of tools and in the selection of teachable (learnable) "better practices" of PIM. (Chapter 11). • To each of us, our own concludes with an exploration of the ways each of us, individually, can develop better practices for the management of our information in service of the lives we wish to live and towards a better world we all must share. (Chapter 12).

Book Transforming Technologies to Manage Our Information

Download or read book Transforming Technologies to Manage Our Information written by William Jones and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-05-31 with total page 155 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With its theme, "Our Information, Always and Forever," Part I of this book covers the basics of personal information management (PIM) including six essential activities of PIM and six (different) ways in which information can be personal to us. Part I then goes on to explore key issues that arise in the "great migration" of our information onto the Web and into a myriad of mobile devices. Part 2 provides a more focused look at technologies for managing information that promise to profoundly alter our practices of PIM and, through these practices, the way we lead our lives. Part 2 is in five chapters: - Chapter 5. Technologies of Input and Output. Technologies in support of gesture, touch, voice, and even eye movements combine to support a more natural user interface (NUI). Technologies of output include glasses and "watch" watches. Output will also increasingly be animated with options to "zoom". - Chapter 6. Technologies to Save Our Information. We can opt for "life logs" to record our experiences with increasing fidelity. What will we use these logs for? And what isn’t recorded that should be? - Chapter 7. Technologies to Search Our Information. The potential for personalized search is enormous and mostly yet to be realized. Persistent searches, situated in our information landscape, will allow us to maintain a diversity of projects and areas of interest without a need to continually switch from one to another to handle incoming information. - Chapter 8. Technologies to Structure Our Information. Structure is key if we are to keep, find, and make effective use of our information. But how best to structure? And how best to share structured information between the applications we use, with other people, and also with ourselves over time? What lessons can we draw from the failures and successes in web-based efforts to share structure? - Chapter 9. PIM Transformed and Transforming: Stories from the Past, Present and Future. Part 2 concludes with a comparison between Licklider’s world of information in 1957 and our own world of information today. And then we consider what the world of information is likely to look like in 2057. Licklider estimated that he spent 85% of his "thinking time" in activities that were clerical and mechanical and might (someday) be delegated to the computer. What percentage of our own time is spent with the clerical and mechanical? What about in 2057?

Book Data Management for Researchers

Download or read book Data Management for Researchers written by Kristin Briney and published by Pelagic Publishing Ltd. This book was released on 2015-09-01 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comprehensive guide to everything scientists need to know about data management, this book is essential for researchers who need to learn how to organize, document and take care of their own data. Researchers in all disciplines are faced with the challenge of managing the growing amounts of digital data that are the foundation of their research. Kristin Briney offers practical advice and clearly explains policies and principles, in an accessible and in-depth text that will allow researchers to understand and achieve the goal of better research data management. Data Management for Researchers includes sections on: * The data problem – an introduction to the growing importance and challenges of using digital data in research. Covers both the inherent problems with managing digital information, as well as how the research landscape is changing to give more value to research datasets and code. * The data lifecycle – a framework for data’s place within the research process and how data’s role is changing. Greater emphasis on data sharing and data reuse will not only change the way we conduct research but also how we manage research data. * Planning for data management – covers the many aspects of data management and how to put them together in a data management plan. This section also includes sample data management plans. * Documenting your data – an often overlooked part of the data management process, but one that is critical to good management; data without documentation are frequently unusable. * Organizing your data – explains how to keep your data in order using organizational systems and file naming conventions. This section also covers using a database to organize and analyze content. * Improving data analysis – covers managing information through the analysis process. This section starts by comparing the management of raw and analyzed data and then describes ways to make analysis easier, such as spreadsheet best practices. It also examines practices for research code, including version control systems. * Managing secure and private data – many researchers are dealing with data that require extra security. This section outlines what data falls into this category and some of the policies that apply, before addressing the best practices for keeping data secure. * Short-term storage – deals with the practical matters of storage and backup and covers the many options available. This section also goes through the best practices to insure that data are not lost. * Preserving and archiving your data – digital data can have a long life if properly cared for. This section covers managing data in the long term including choosing good file formats and media, as well as determining who will manage the data after the end of the project. * Sharing/publishing your data – addresses how to make data sharing across research groups easier, as well as how and why to publicly share data. This section covers intellectual property and licenses for datasets, before ending with the altmetrics that measure the impact of publicly shared data. * Reusing data – as more data are shared, it becomes possible to use outside data in your research. This chapter discusses strategies for finding datasets and lays out how to cite data once you have found it. This book is designed for active scientific researchers but it is useful for anyone who wants to get more from their data: academics, educators, professionals or anyone who teaches data management, sharing and preservation. "An excellent practical treatise on the art and practice of data management, this book is essential to any researcher, regardless of subject or discipline." —Robert Buntrock, Chemical Information Bulletin

Book Ask a Manager

Download or read book Ask a Manager written by Alison Green and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2018-05-01 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the creator of the popular website Ask a Manager and New York’s work-advice columnist comes a witty, practical guide to 200 difficult professional conversations—featuring all-new advice! There’s a reason Alison Green has been called “the Dear Abby of the work world.” Ten years as a workplace-advice columnist have taught her that people avoid awkward conversations in the office because they simply don’t know what to say. Thankfully, Green does—and in this incredibly helpful book, she tackles the tough discussions you may need to have during your career. You’ll learn what to say when • coworkers push their work on you—then take credit for it • you accidentally trash-talk someone in an email then hit “reply all” • you’re being micromanaged—or not being managed at all • you catch a colleague in a lie • your boss seems unhappy with your work • your cubemate’s loud speakerphone is making you homicidal • you got drunk at the holiday party Praise for Ask a Manager “A must-read for anyone who works . . . [Alison Green’s] advice boils down to the idea that you should be professional (even when others are not) and that communicating in a straightforward manner with candor and kindness will get you far, no matter where you work.”—Booklist (starred review) “The author’s friendly, warm, no-nonsense writing is a pleasure to read, and her advice can be widely applied to relationships in all areas of readers’ lives. Ideal for anyone new to the job market or new to management, or anyone hoping to improve their work experience.”—Library Journal (starred review) “I am a huge fan of Alison Green’s Ask a Manager column. This book is even better. It teaches us how to deal with many of the most vexing big and little problems in our workplaces—and to do so with grace, confidence, and a sense of humor.”—Robert Sutton, Stanford professor and author of The No Asshole Rule and The Asshole Survival Guide “Ask a Manager is the ultimate playbook for navigating the traditional workforce in a diplomatic but firm way.”—Erin Lowry, author of Broke Millennial: Stop Scraping By and Get Your Financial Life Together

Book The Future of Personal Information Management  Part 1

Download or read book The Future of Personal Information Management Part 1 written by William Jones and published by Morgan & Claypool Publishers. This book was released on 2012-03-01 with total page 127 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We are well into a second age of digital information. Our information is moving from the desktop to the laptop to the "palmtop" and up into an amorphous cloud on the Web. How can one manage both the challenges and opportunities of this new world of digital information? What does the future hold? This book provides an important update on the rapidly expanding field of personal information management (PIM). Part I (Always and Forever) introduces the essentials of PIM. Information is personal for many reasons. It's the information on our hard drives we couldn't bear to lose. It's the information about us that we don't want to share. It's the distracting information demanding our attention even as we try to do something else. It's the information we don't know about but need to. Through PIM, we control personal information. We integrate information into our lives in useful ways. We make it "ours." With basics established, Part I proceeds to explore a critical interplay between personal information "always" at hand through mobile devices and "forever" on the Web. How does information stay "ours" in such a world?

Book Human Interface and the Management of Information

Download or read book Human Interface and the Management of Information written by Sakae Yamamoto and published by Springer. This book was released on 2013-07-03 with total page 713 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The three-volume set LNCS 8016, 8017, and 8018 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, HCII 2013, held in Las Vegas, NV, USA in July 2013. The total of 1666 papers and 303 posters presented at the HCII 2013 conferences was carefully reviewed and selected from 5210 submissions. These papers address the latest research and development efforts and highlight the human aspects of design and use of computing systems. The papers accepted for presentation thoroughly cover the entire field of human-computer Interaction, addressing major advances in knowledge and effective use of computers in a variety of application areas. This volume contains papers in the thematic area of human interface and the management of Information, addressing the following major topics: interacting with information, information searching, browsing and structuring, design and development methods and tools for interactive systems and services, personalized information and interaction, cognitive and emotional aspects of interacting with information.

Book Worldwide Commonalities and Challenges in Information Literacy Research and Practice

Download or read book Worldwide Commonalities and Challenges in Information Literacy Research and Practice written by Serap Kurbanoglu and published by Springer. This book was released on 2013-12-13 with total page 686 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the European Conference on Information Literacy, ECIL 2013, held in Istanbul Turkey, in October 2013. The 73 revised full papers presented together with two keynotes, 9 invited papers and four doctoral papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 236 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on overview and research; policies and strategies; theoretical framework; related concepts; citizenship and digital divide; disadvantaged groups; information literacy for the workplace and daily life; information literacy in Europe; different approaches to information literacy; teaching and learning information literacy; information literacy instruction; assessment of information literacy; information literacy and K-12; information literacy and higher education; information literacy skills of LIS students; librarians, libraries and ethics.

Book Personal Knowledge Management

Download or read book Personal Knowledge Management written by David J. Pauleen and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2016-05-13 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Individuals need to survive and grow in changing and sometimes turbulent organizational environments, while organizations and societies want individuals to have the knowledge, skills and abilities that will enable them to prosper and thrive. Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) is a means of coping with complex environmental changes and developments: it is a form of sophisticated career and life management. Personal Knowledge Management is an evolving concept that focuses on the importance of individual growth and learning as much as on the technology and management processes traditionally associated with organizational knowledge management. This book looks at the emergence of PKM from a multi-disciplinary perspective, and its contributors reflect the diverse fields of study that touch upon it. Relatively little research or major conceptual development has so far been focused on PKM, but already significant questions are being asked, such as 'is there an inherent conflict between personal and organizational knowledge management and how best do we harmonize individual and organizational goals?' This book will inform, stimulate and challenge every reader. By delving both deeply and broadly into its subject, the distinguished authors help all those concerned with 'knowledge work' and 'knowledge workers' to see how PKM supports and affects individuals, organizations and society as a whole; to better understand the concepts involved and to benefit from relevant research in this important area.

Book The Progress Principle

Download or read book The Progress Principle written by Teresa Amabile and published by Harvard Business Press. This book was released on 2011-07-19 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What really sets the best managers above the rest? It’s their power to build a cadre of employees who have great inner work lives—consistently positive emotions; strong motivation; and favorable perceptions of the organization, their work, and their colleagues. The worst managers undermine inner work life, often unwittingly. As Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer explain in The Progress Principle, seemingly mundane workday events can make or break employees’ inner work lives. But it’s forward momentum in meaningful work—progress—that creates the best inner work lives. Through rigorous analysis of nearly 12,000 diary entries provided by 238 employees in 7 companies, the authors explain how managers can foster progress and enhance inner work life every day. The book shows how to remove obstacles to progress, including meaningless tasks and toxic relationships. It also explains how to activate two forces that enable progress: (1) catalysts—events that directly facilitate project work, such as clear goals and autonomy—and (2) nourishers—interpersonal events that uplift workers, including encouragement and demonstrations of respect and collegiality. Brimming with honest examples from the companies studied, The Progress Principle equips aspiring and seasoned leaders alike with the insights they need to maximize their people’s performance.

Book Human Interface and the Management of Information  Information and Knowledge Design

Download or read book Human Interface and the Management of Information Information and Knowledge Design written by Sakae Yamamoto and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-07-20 with total page 693 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The two-volume set LNCS 9172 and 9173 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Human Interface and the Management of Information thematic track, held as part of the 17th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, HCII 2015, held in Los Angeles, CA, USA, in August 2015, jointly with 15 other thematically similar conferences. The total of 1462 papers and 246 posters presented at the HCII 2015 conferences were carefully reviewed and selected from 4843 submissions. These papers address the latest research and development efforts and highlight the human aspects of design and use of computing systems. The papers accepted for presentation thoroughly cover the entire field of human-computer interaction, addressing major advances in knowledge and effective use of computers in a variety of application areas. This volume contains papers addressing the following major topics: information visualization; information presentation; knowledge management; haptic, tactile and multimodal interaction; service design and management; user studies.

Book Human Interface and the Management of Information  Information and Knowledge Design and Evaluation

Download or read book Human Interface and the Management of Information Information and Knowledge Design and Evaluation written by Sakae Yamamoto and published by Springer. This book was released on 2014-06-07 with total page 695 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The two-volume set LNCS 8521 and 8522 constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Human Interface and the Management of Information thematic track, held as part of the 16th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, HCII 2014, held in Heraklion, Greece, in June 2014, jointly with 13 other thematically similar conferences. The total of 1476 papers and 220 posters presented at the HCII 2014 conferences were carefully reviewed and selected from 4766 submissions. These papers address the latest research and development efforts and highlight the human aspects of design and use of computing systems. The papers accepted for presentation thoroughly cover the entire field of human-computer interaction, addressing major advances in knowledge and effective use of computers in a variety of application areas. This volume contains papers addressing the following major topics: visualization methods and techniques; multimodal interaction; knowledge management; information search and retrieval; supporting collaboration; design and evaluation methods and studies.

Book Information Issues for Older Americans

Download or read book Information Issues for Older Americans written by William Aspray and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2022-02-09 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are more than 50 million people age 65 or older in the United States, and over the decade 2010-2019 this was the fastest growing age sector in the United States – growing by 34% during that period. (US Census Bureau) As people age, they face a number of new challenges and opportunities, ranging from the shift from salary to Social Security and retirement funds, increasing issues with health, and opportunities for extended relaxation and second careers. While seniors bring a lifetime of experience and honed skills, they face a number of new situations that involved learning new information and new ways of doing things. Information Issues for Older Americans brings together faculty from the leading Information Schools to examine information needs, behavior, and policy related to older Americans. These scholars use a variety of lenses to understand the information issues that older Americans face in their everyday lives. These lenses include information literacy from both the consumer and provider sides; information behavior to understand search strategies, evaluation of information quality and relevance, sources used, questions raised, and how these change over time; the information ecologies in which an individual lives in his or her private and professional worlds; privacy issues that arise in everyday life; information and communication technologies (ICTs), including the skills of users with these technologies, the expected and unexpected uses of these technologies, and the technology’s positive and negative impacts; how ICTs can be used to augment human intelligence and physical skills (human-computer interaction and design); how ICTs, together with traditional information institutions such as libraries and museums and social clubs, have been used to build stronger communities (community informatics). This book is a contribution to the academic literatures on information studies and aging, but it is also intended to be generally readable and be accessible to the educated public and professionals who serve older Americans such as librarians, health care workers, and workers at community centers. While there is a growing literature on health informatics for the elderly, and occasional journal articles on various other topics about information and the elderly, this is the first comprehensive book on the various information aspects of the everyday activities and concerns of older Americans.

Book Library and Information Science Research in Asia Oceania  Theory and Practice

Download or read book Library and Information Science Research in Asia Oceania Theory and Practice written by Du, Jia Tina and published by IGI Global. This book was released on 2014-02-28 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Historically, the major Library and Information Science (LIS) research-producing centers of the world have largely been the universities and information institutions of North America, the United Kingdom, and Europe. This is changing with the growth of Asian economies, universities, and information industries. Library and Information Science Research in Asia-Oceania: Theory and Practice presents evolving and emerging research and development in the field of library and information science (LIS) in diverse countries in Asia-Oceania as the region continues to develop. This book is intended as a useful resource for LIS researchers, scholars, students, professionals, and practitioners, and is an appropriate text for courses in LIS. In addition, anyone interested in understanding the LIS field in the region will find this book a fascinating and enlightening read.