Information Services and Networks Questions and Answers

Answer: D

The review-type products are (ii) Trend Reports and (iv) State of the Art Report.

Review-type information services digest and evaluate the literature of a subject. A trend report surveys developments in a field over a period, and a state-of-the-art report sums up the current level of knowledge or technology on a topic. Both synthesise many primary documents into an evaluated account.

Current awareness services and newspaper clippings are alerting services: they announce or reproduce new items quickly without reviewing or evaluating them, so codes including (i) or (iii) are wrong.

Answer: C

The alerting services are (i) CAS, (ii) SDI and (iv) Electronic Clipping Services.

Alerting services keep users informed of new information as it appears. Current awareness service announces recent additions to the literature; selective dissemination of information sends each user items matching a personal interest profile; and electronic clipping services pick out and forward relevant news items.

Document delivery supplies copies of documents a user has asked for. It responds to a request rather than alerting the user to something new, so codes including (iii) are wrong.

Answer: D

Both (A) and (B) are true.

A current awareness service is a system for the rapid announcement of newly published or newly acquired documents and information, so that users keep up to date; statement (A) describes it correctly.

Selective dissemination of information, introduced by H.P. Luhn in 1958, is generally described as a personalised form of current awareness service: it matches new items against each user's interest profile and alerts that user to the latest publications in his field. So statement (B) is accepted as true as well.

Answer: A

(A) is false but (B) is true.

Studies of Indian libraries have repeatedly found that their use of social networking for services and outreach is limited and uneven, so the claim that they make optimum use of it is not borne out.

Social networking platforms, by contrast, do play a wide role in disseminating information: libraries and other organisations use them to announce new resources, events and services and to reach users quickly. So (B) is true and the other codes are wrong.

Answer: B

(A) is true but (B) is false.

Fact-finding (ready reference) sources such as handbooks, dictionaries, directories, yearbooks and encyclopaedias are designed for quick answers to specific factual questions, so statement (A) is true.

A comprehensive literature search needs bibliographic sources: indexes, abstracting services, bibliographies and databases that lead to the whole body of literature on a subject. Fact-finding sources give isolated facts and cannot support an exhaustive search, so statement (B) is false.

Answer: C

The correct matching is (a)-(iii), (b)-(iv), (c)-(i), (d)-(ii).

• Information about best books is readers' advisory service.
• Guidance on using a citation manual is user education.
• Providing printouts of articles is a support service.
• A list of URLs on a subject is a webliography.

The other codes mismatch at least two pairs, for example calling a list of URLs readers' advisory.

Answer: A

The correct matching is (a)-(iv), (b)-(i), (c)-(ii), (d)-(iii).

• CAPS (Contents, Abstracts and Photocopy Service) is a document service of NISCAIR, India.
• WorldShare is OCLC's platform for library management and resource sharing.
• DOCLINE is the US National Library of Medicine's interlibrary loan system.
• BLDSS is the British Library Document Supply Service.

The other codes misplace these well-known services, for example giving DOCLINE to the British Library.

Answer: A

The key's matching is (a)-(iii), (b)-(i), (c)-(iv), (d)-(ii).

• User education is part of reference service, helping users learn to use the library and its sources.
• Information repackaging produces digests and similar condensed products.
• Translation is a support service that makes documents in foreign languages usable.
• Indexing is a bibliographic service that gives access to documents by subject.

The other codes pair translation with digests or indexing with reference service, which does not follow the standard grouping.

Answer: C

The order is (i) (ii) (iii) (iv): INIS, AGRIS, NISSAT, Patent Information System.

• INIS, the International Nuclear Information System of the IAEA, began operating in 1970.
• AGRIS, the FAO's agricultural information system, followed in 1974-75.
• NISSAT, India's National Information System for Science and Technology, was set up in 1977.
• The Patent Information System at Nagpur was established in 1980.

Codes starting with NISSAT or the Patent Information System put the Indian systems before the international ones that preceded them.

Answer: A

Both (A) and (R) are true.

INFLIBNET (Information and Library Network) Centre, Gandhinagar, hosts Shodhganga, the national repository of Indian electronic theses and dissertations, set up after the UGC's 2009 regulations required universities to deposit theses there.

INFLIBNET is an autonomous Inter-University Centre of the University Grants Commission, so the reason is also true. The key asks only whether both are true, so the other codes are wrong.