Water Abstracts

The National Science Foundation supported a study of the feasibility of setting up an abstracting and indexing service for the literature of Soil and Water at Colorado State University at Fort Collins. During the course of the study, it was found that the field of Soil was adequately covered by journals and abstracting services. In the field of Water, the investigation revealed that there would be little significant duplication with other abstracting services and that the duplication occurring could be readily handled by exchange agreements by those abstracting services covering aspects of water problems. The study revealed further that there was a strong likelihood of developing sponsors, subscribers and financial support for such a service. A new proposal has been submitted to the National Science Foundation for the issuance of a Pilot Abstracts Journal covering the Water field. The purpose of the pilot issue is to prepare, distribute and evaluate a sample publication of a proposed abstracting and indexing service covering the entire Water field as it relates to plants, soils and other aspects of human activity and natural resources. It would cover the field internationally. Specific objectives are: 1 To determine the most suitable organizational structure for such an abstracting service; 2 To prepare, publish and distribute the pilot issue to workers within the Water field and potential clientele; 3 To evaluate the pilot issue in terms of problems of the proposed service's usefulness, desirability, ultimate budget and cost; abstract or translator and editorial and other staffing; operational matters like exchanges with other abstracting services; sponsorship, subscribers and advertisers. The pilot issue would be mailed to approximately 1500 potential subscribers for evaluation. Their evaluation would determine the usefulness and desirability of the proposed Water Abstracting and Indexing Service. It would offer concrete data on the indicated problem. The proposed service would publish not only an abstracts journal but would explore the feasibility of a microcard or microfiche which would have on one side an abstract in print readable to the eye and on the other side the complete article in microform in the language desired by the user. A discussion of the methodology of the preliminary study will be emphasized.