In the summer of 1995, the Editor of the Project began constructing a searchable database of the Internet Resources included in the Project. There were two reasons for this:
The database was complete over a year ago, but the Editor did not have the time to determine how to use the database to produce the kind of marked-up text required by the search engine that had kindly been supplied by the Open Text Corporation. As a result, the database and the html files have been maintained in parallel for a considerable time with no benefit to the user.
I am now pleased to be able to announce that a preliminary version of the search engine is now available. This is in large part thanks to the intervention of Bill Oldfield (Networked Information Research Associate, University of Waterloo Library) who solved the problem of creating the required marked-up file, and also gave considerable assistance in modifying the parameters of the search engine
We are continuing to refine some aspects of the simple search option, but this is nearly finished. The compound search option, however, requires much work before it offers the kind of flexilibilty and power that we want. Work on the compound search option may not be complete for many months.
The Editor has chosen to make both search options available at this time, since they represent an major improvement in functionality over the WAIS index to the webpages in the Scholarly Societies Project.
Jim Parrott
The Editor
Scholarly Societies Project
Sending Email to the Scholarly Societies Project
