ScienceDirect Embraces New Web Applications With Latest Release

Elsevier, a leading publisher of scientific, technical and medical (STM) information, is including several new features on its ScienceDirect platform from April onwards to further enhance the customer’s experience.

“In our latest release, we’re implementing some new functionality that is modeled on popular second generation Internet-based services,” explains Joep Verheggen, Director, ScienceDirect. “Customer’s will benefit from features that reduce the need for searching, provide another support medium, improve the ease and speed of cross referencing, and, overall, further improve their productivity.”

The latest additions build on the August 2006 ScienceDirect Redesign, which transformed the platform and brought users the STM information they want, faster. The highlights include:

-Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds
-Cited By in Scopus
-Live Chat
-Inward linking simplification
RSS feeds will be available on ScienceDirect for search results, citations and new articles, as well as more than 300 pre-selected topics. RSS feeds alert users immediately when ScienceDirect has new content of interest to them.

Access to a wealth of citation information is made possible with Cited By in Scopus, which links to specific citations in Scopus – the largest abstract and citation database of research literature and quality Web sources. Cited By in Scopus, which is included on the ScienceDirect article pages, also features a real-time citation count. A Scopus license is not necessary to view the citations for a given article but a ScienceDirect subscription is required.

Communication with the ScienceDirect e-Helpdesk will be enabled through Live Chat, which is an online, real-time instant messaging technical support service available 24 hours a day, Monday to Friday. Live Chat will be rolled out in phases following an initial trial period with selected customers.

ScienceDirect increased its support of the OpenURL standard by upgrading from version 0.1 to 1.0. This change enables new partners to build links more easily and with more flexibility.

Later this year, 4,000 e-books will be added to ScienceDirect. Covering a wide range of scientific disciplines, including those published under the renowned Pergamon and Academic Press imprints, these additional titles will be fully integrated with the existing books and journals on the platform. Over 50 books will be added each month following the 2007 launch. This new content is in addition to the reference works, handbooks and book series already available on ScienceDirect.