SEARCH TEXT system

A number of files under the generic tide CAS ONLINE are available on-line on STN International. The system software, MESSENGER, includes chemical substmcture, text, and numeric data searching facHities. Chemical stmctures and Registry Numbers are contained in the CA Registry file. The four ways to search the stmctures are EXA, EAM, SSS, and CSS. 

GORE. The CORE Electronic Chemistry Library is a joint project of Cornell University, OCLC (On-line Computer Library Center), Bell Communications Research (Bellcore), and the American Chemical Society. The CORE database will contain the full text of American Chemical Society Journals from 1980, associated information from Chemical Abstracts Service, and selected reference texts. It will provide machine-readable text that can be searched and displayed, graphical representations of equations and figures, and full-page document images. The project will examine the performance obtained by the use of a traditional printed index as compared with a hypertext system (SUPERBOOK) and a document retrieval system (Pixlook) (6,116). 

Searching of one or more on-line databases is a technique increasingly used ia novelty studies. The use of such databases enables the searcher to combine indexing parameters, including national and international classifications natural language words ia the full text of patents, ia their claims, or ia abstracts suppHed by iaventor and by professional documentation services and indexing systems of various sorts. Because the various patent databases have strengths and weaknesses that complement each other, the use of multiple databases is thus pmdent, and is faciUtated by multifile and cross-file techniques provided by the various on-line hosts. 

A number of methods have been developed to introduce context to on-line databases, enabling searches to be refined to minimized false retrieval. One of the earliest techniques is proximity searching, in which two words are required to be adjacent, or within a limited distance from each other in text. The assignment of roles to chemical substances is a method of precoordinating concepts. A substance can be identified as a reactant, as a product, and in some systems in a number of additional roles. For example, by searching for documents in which formaldehyde is a product, documents in which it is a reactant, or in which it undergoes no reaction, are thus eliminated. 

Full-Text Patent Databases. The LEXPAT database on the LEXIS— NEXIS system, the first commercially available full-text patent file, receives its greatest use from patent attorneys and has been relatively unused by other patent information speciaUsts. This may be attributed to search software that is quite different from the type familiar to information speciaUsts, no matter what their preferred host system. This situation has changed with dialog s release of the PATEULL files followed by STN s USPATEULL, both searchable by familiar Boolean techniques and featuring greater... 

Hazardous materials iransponation regulations on disk. System displays text of regulations by chemical name or number. Also searches by keyword. Updates to regulations are provided on a monthly basis. 

Also databases of scientific literature (such as PUBMED, MEDLINE) provide additional functionality, e.g. they can search for similar articles based on word-usage analysis. Text recognition systems are being developed that automatically extract knowledge about protein function from the abstracts of scientific articles, notably on protein-protein interactions. 

In 1999 CambridgeSoft released a desktop/personal version of an e-notebook, specifically targeted at medicinal chemistry this incorporated reaction drawing and searching, automatic stoichiometry calculations, and simple procedure write-up using plain text. This system was adopted both by individuals, particularly in the academic community, and by small and mediumsized companies as an alternative to building an in-house hybrid system (Fig. 9.2). 

Adobe Acrobat Reader is software that permits users to view, navigate, search, and print Adobe PDF tiles on major computer platforms. The software is free and available from Adobe Systems Web site. Although useful, the Reader does not support all the functionality that OPP s reviewers require. For the pilots, OPP purchased Adobe Acrobat, Version 4.0, to support the review of studies submitted as PDF files. Adobe Acrobat permits review, mark-up, annotation, and extraction of text and tables for editing or other manipulations, in addition to basic viewing, navigation, and printing capabilities. 

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Web Patent Databases. The Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) [72] offers free World Wide Web access, http // www.uspto.gov/main/patents.htm, to a bibliographic patent database that uses the most current patent classification system, this may not match the classification data that appears on the printed patent, and to a full-text patent database that uses the classification data that appear on the printed patent, this may not match the current classification data. The databases start with January 1, 1976, patents. The full text of a patent includes all bibliographical data (e.g., inventor s name, the patent s title, the assignee s name, etc.) and the abstract, full description of the invention, and the claims. All the words in the text of the patent are searchable. If the patent number is known, the patent, regardless of year, can be ordered from the PTO. Automated searching of 1971 to date patents is available at some of the Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries. Prior to 1971 searching can be done at the PTO facilities or at the Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries. Commercial patent search services are also available. 

Other more mathematical techniques, which rely on appropriate computer software and are examples of chemometrics (p. 33), include the generation of one-, two- or three-dimensional window diagrams, computer-directed searches and the use of expert systems (p. 529). A discussion of these is beyond the scope of this text. 

As mentioned earlier, chemical composition and identification information should already have been obtained before the chemical is to be searched. With most information retrieval systems this is a relatively straightforward procedure. Citations on a given subject may be retrieved by entering the desired free text terms as they... 

This introduction to computer hardware and software provides a snapshot of some systems available in late 2006. The brief survey of some online resources should prove useful to students and researchers. Of all the fields one could address in this short text, those of computer hardware, software, and online resources will be the one most quickly outdated. Fortunately, updates are readily available through a search of the World Wide Web. 

In the bioinformatics realm, SRS (Sequence Retrieval System) [2] is a popular system, which uses a centralized collection of data resources primarily in flat text file form and, more recently, handles XML (Extensible Markup Language) files as well. Data resources are treated in a federated manner since each is maintained in its original form. However, SRS contains a large number of cross-references between corresponding fields in various data sources, so that keyword searches can be done across them. SRS thus performs more structured searches across the information than what a simple text search provides (such as web indexes perform, for example). Even though the data model implicit in the cross-reference tables is not very deep, SRS provides a useful way for users to browse and do simple queries across a large number of data sources as well as to integrate results from some computational methods. 

Algorithm development in the areas of computer editing, data base management, sorting, computer-based composition, and text searching have been critical to the overall development of computer-based primary and secondary publications systems and text search services. Results of these developments are illustrated in the computer-based information system used at Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) [ 1]. Lynch [2J describes principles and techniques for the computer-based information services and... 

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