The Distant Librarian

How to Find the RSS Feed URL by Guessing

The Zapier newsletter I just got had a link to this article from last year: How to Find the RSS Feed URL for Almost Any Site. It's got some good tips for sussing out RSS feeds, but I have a couple more.

I ran across two sites recently that should've had RSS feeds, but apparently didn't, at least according to Inoreader, my feed reader of choice. Inoreader usually does a good job of automatically detecting an RSS feed if it exists, but it didn't find one for www.canadianenergycentre.ca^*, which is a WordPress site. Turns out if you simply add /feed to the end of the URL you'll be good to go. That may be true for all WordPress sites - worth a try at least. Not sure why Inoreader didn't find that, and I'm still waiting to hear back from their tech support.

The other site that's crying for a feed is The Far Side! I emailed to ask for one but never heard back, so I built one of my own using Feed43. I'm not posting it here for fear of it being removed, but you can build one yourself, or hit me up privately for the URL :-)

Long Live RSS!

^*This site doesn't get any Google juice from an actual link from me

Witchcraft and OpenRefine

Last September I learned about a fabulous resource called Places of Residence for Accused Witches.

Map of Scots women accused of witchcraft published for first time https://t.co/vOxIlv6g24 ht @ResearchBuzz Fascinating stuff! #GIS #witches #witchcraft #mapping pic.twitter.com/nOWNHiUlw4

(@ppival) September 26, 2019

At that time I didn't realize how much work had been done using OpenRefine, one of my favourite tools, but earlier this week came across a series of videos on the background of the project, and one of them was all about how Emma Carroll (Witchfinder General) used OpenRefine and WikiData in the project. Great stuff, and I love listening to her accent!

Trolling around some of the other pages related to the project, here's a link to a map showing the different methods of torture that were used. Yeesh!

Archives in the news

I've recently become more involved in a project to digitize historical maps held at the U of Calgary, so this article really spoke to me (thanks @achurrell!) Yukon geologists raid the archives to aid ongoing search for gold. And because it seems so often news reports like this don't seem to include a link to the actual resource being reported on, I'm pleased that the CBC did provide a link directly to YCGC Historic Placer Data, which is fascinating to poke around. I wonder whether our (currently small) collection of Oil and Gas maps will be used in the same way, some day?

Also recently crossing my path is a news release talking about the use of an archival collection from the Glenbow Archives, which are now held here at the U of Calgary. The Imperial Oil Files: New Collection Adds to Climate and Energy Research Archives On Science and Denial. And the collection itself: Introduction to the Imperial Oil Archival Document Collection. The U of Calgary has no affiliation with this organization, I'll add. We just hold the archives. I'm curious to know whether these images were captured on the sly, or in an open fashion. It's almost like an analogue version of scraping a website!

Available Reads is like Library Extension lite

I just added the Available Reads browser extension, and really like the feature to sort my Goodreads titles by availability on Overdrive. But for even more information on additional sites (like Amazon), Library Extension still takes the cake. Some screen shots featuring the two extensions: (click to embiggen for details)

Report: Academic Freedom Breached at Thompson Rivers University

I first posted about this issue just over a year ago, A disturbing story on academic freedom and predatory publishing, and now it appears to have reached a conclusion, with the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) releasing a 30-page report on their findings. Report: Academic Freedom Breached at Thompson Rivers University

TL;DR:

(Ottawa – November 19, 2019) An investigation into the suspension of Dr. Derek Pyne by Thompson Rivers University (TRU) has concluded that the administration’s actions breached academic freedom.

But you really should read the whole thing. It's mostly about issues of academic freedom, but, because the catalyst appears to have been research about predatory publishing, there's a little bit of that in there too, including this quote from page 27 of the report:

"In an increasingly complex arena for publishing research, universities and academics grapple with assessing faculty members’ published research for tenure and promotion, and for various institutional benefits, including salary increases and research awards. Academic librarians have long provided their expertise in identifying scholarly resources and are now assisting researchers in identifying which constitute legitimate open access publishing and which do not. There is a clear need for universities to ensure the integrity of their academic decisions for tenure and promotion, in particular, by having policies that differentiate between legitimate and predatory publishing."

For anyone from the UofC reading this, please see this section on predatory journals and conferences in our libguide on Scholarly Communication.

At the time of this posting I couldn't find a response on the TRU website.

 

An RSS feed for the Statistics Canada Infographics page

I got tired of there not being an RSS feed for the Statistics Canada Infographics page, so I made one. You can use it too! https://feed43.com/8203235035481320.xml

Some thoughts on Research and Indigenous Librarianship

A couple of weeks ago I read an excellent article, Research and Indigenous Librarianship in Canada, and I'd like to recommend it to you. I think it's more about understanding the implications of undergoing research with or about Indigenous Peoples than it is about doing so in a library setting, but that's great, because it makes it relevant to all academics, IMHO.

The author, Deborah Lee, does a good job of explaining how Indigenous Peoples have been impacted by traditional academic research methods in the past, and how their expectations for sharing research results, and their reasons for participating in research, may be significantly different than what we're used to in the academy. The single biggest takeaway for me was how important it is for a researcher to seriously consider why they're conducting research on or with Indigenous Peoples. If you're just gunning for publication or tenure, you should look for another subject.

And because I'm always looking for a tech angle, I learned about a new-to-me open source Content Management System called Mukurtu, which is designed to hold information in a way that is considerate of the needs of Indigenous Peoples. Bet you also didn't consider there was even a need for such a thing!

Do read the article - I guarantee you'll learn something from it.

Some Sci-Hub stuff

Sci-Hub popped up a couple of times today, along with a link to a tool I hadn't seen before.

1. Tools to liberate scholarly articles, help sources understand journalism and publish printable online zines. Mentioning the existence to journalists
2. They Know We Know They Know: Does Sci-Hub Affect Library Subscriptions? which in turn led to the
3. Sci-Hub Stats Browser, which is a dated snapshot of just how comprehensive the Sci-Hub database is. This is data supporting the article, Sci-Hub provides access to nearly all scholarly literature.

Wow.