Conference Events
Exhibit Area Open
6PM–6:45PM
Welcome Reception
6:45PM–9:00PM
Dinner and Awards Ceremony
Presentation of the ASI's H.W. Wilson Award for Excellence in Indexing and the Hines Award for Service to ASI. The featured speaker is Benjamin Healy.
7AM–8AM
Continental Breakfast
Oregonian Index Conversion Project
The focus of this presentation is the Oregonian Index (1850–1987) conversion project. The presenter will describe how 200,000 entries of the 800,000-entry Oregonian Index were converted for a Web interface, how the interface is being tested, and when the project will go live. The project can serve as a model for a collaborative index search page for statewide or regional public access to newspaper/periodical indexes.
8AM–9AM
Bits and Bytes
The presenter will discuss the various character sets in use by computer operating systems, particularly with respect to special characters. He will demonstrate how to represent them for publication via Word, desktop, and other composition systems.
8AM–9AM
Locating and Evaluating Online Indexing Resources
Locating quality online indexing resources can be difficult. This presentation provides specific methods that indexers can use to locate needed resources in their subject areas. Nora also outlines specific selection and evaluative criteria to use in evaluating the resources found. At the end of the session, participants will be able to quickly locate needed online information that is accurate, complete, and reliable. Handouts will be provided.
8AM–9AM
Microsoft Learning's Next Generation Indexing Process
What if we could have all the benefits of embedded indexing without any of the drawbacks? Microsoft Learning has been working on an answer to this question for the last eight months. In this presentation, we'll share the theory and process we've developed to address the needs of both publishers and indexers. We'll demonstrate how our process will allow indexers to continue using the standalone indexing tools of their choice while still realizing all the advantages of embedded indexing that publishers find so appealing. Join us to hear more about this new approach to the indexing process.
9AM–10AM Morning Refreshment Break
9AM–7PM Exhibit Area Open
9AM–10AM
Poster Sessions
Poster sessions coordinated by Nancy Zibman.
Poster 1—Jeffrey Sowder
- Magazine Content Index at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia
Poster 2—Paul Cullum
- J.G. Ballard's "The Index": Information Retrieval as Autobiography
Poster 3—Carol Roberts
- Financial Planning for Indexers
Poster 4—Dave Ream
- Extracting Native American Plant Names
10AM–11:30AM
Today's Technology
Frances Lennie and Janet Perlman
This presentation is an interactive discussion of how today’s technology affects our industry, client expectations, our work life and work methods, and the "final product." It promises to be a lively session by two presenters who are long-time, experienced indexers with a broad knowledge of the field.
10AM–11:30AM
Indexing Political Science and Public Policy
Deborah Patton, Moderator
Scott Smiley, Sherry Smith, and Enid Zafran, Panelists
The panel will focus first on the "multiple" difficulties: those presented by multiple authors and multiple forms of names (of individuals and government agencies, NGOs, and the like). The discussion's next emphasis will be on dealing with tables, figures, and/or boxes. The general discussion will include opinions and tips on run-in style and its problems, when to use lengthy lists of locators, what types of connectors to use, and precise entries vs. reflective entries. The presentation promises to be entertaining and full of practical information.
10AM–11:30AM
Indexers as Consultants
Community libraries need indexes to local newspapers, but they often lack the funds and staff expertise to prepare the index. The Vashon Island Branch, King County (Washington) Library System, used funding from several local agencies to hire a professional indexer to design a Web-based prototype cumulated index for eight weekly newspapers published on Vashon Island from 1907 to date. The indexer advised library staff on database structure and search interface and trained library staff and volunteers to complete the index. This presentation describes a collaborative model for professional indexers working with non-profits to produce high-quality indexes that would otherwise be unaffordable for the agency.
Noon–1:30PM
Lunch
Keynote Address: "Illumination, text, meta-, role of the indexer in" —Michael Bywater, Consulting Chaos Engineer
Ask an Indexer
Janet Perlman, Anne Leach, and Pilar Wyman
This session is a reprise of an immensely popular panel presentation given at the 2004 conference. It gives attendees the opportunity to ask those questions they’ve always wanted to ask, on either business or technical aspects of indexing. Panelists have more than 50 years of indexing experience among them.
2PM–3PM
A Taxing Business: Embedded Indexing at the IRS
This presentation describes the process of indexing IRS publications. Enid will discuss the workflow and how decisions were made to use extraction, a standardized set of headings, and checking after embedding. Embedded indexes are becoming increasingly common, and attendees will learn techniques that they will be able to apply to similar projects in their own businesses.
3:15PM–4PM
Word Association Testing and Thesaurus Construction
This presentation is targeted to an audience familiar with the principles of thesaurus construction. It examines the use of word association tests to generate user-derived descriptors, descriptor hierarchies, and categories of inter-term relationships. Thirty Library and Information Science practitioners were asked to provide response words for 15 stimulus terms and to describe how the response and stimulus terms are inter-related. The word association test successfully generated a set of user-derived descriptors. Participants identified 20 types of inter-term relationships, the most commonly cited of which are Type, Part, Synonym, Activity, and Tool. Word association tests can be used to examine how users group and inter-relate terms they commonly associate with any given concept.
2:30PM–5:15PM
Business Models/Practices: A Collaborative Discussion
Fred Leise and Alexandra Nickerson
Newcomers to indexing face a myriad of decisions that reach beyond indexing knowledge and skills. Should I incorporate? How do I set up my office? What kinds of financial information do I need to track? What kinds of insurance do I need? Do I need any licenses? What equipment is essential? Two experienced indexers will lead a collaborative discussion of what is important when running an indexing business.
3:30PM–3:45PM
Afternoon Refreshment Break
3:45PM–5:15PM
Breakout Session 11 — To Be Announced
5:15PM–5:45PM
Annual Business Meeting
6PM–7PM
Reception in Exhibit Area
7PM–7:30PM
Chapter Leaders Meeting
Registration
7:30AM–8:30AM
Breakfast and SIGs Informal Meetings
8AM–Noon
Exhibits Open
Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Subject Index
One of the co-authors of Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Subject Index will discuss the ins and outs of publishing this reference book. Denise will describe the intended audience for the work, the publication deadline, the purpose of the book, finding a publisher, and dealing with the problems, choices, and decisions encountered in producing the work.
9:45AM–10: 45AM - Plenary Session 2
Usability Study of Web Indexes at an Academic Institution
Ilana Kingsley
Theories of index usability need to be based on real-world research. This session presents results from a study observing the success rates of users trying to find information on a Website with an index, versus one without an index.
11:00AM–Noon - Plenary Session 3
ASI/SI
Frances Lennie, Seth Maislin, Kay Schlembach
In concert with ASI's growing focus on the indexing world at large, the Society has taken huge strides in developing an educational system. ASI's
for Indexing program, DELFI, is the first ASI-sponsored series of training
directed toward anyone who wants to learn how to index or to become an indexer. This session explores the promise and challenges of this new
, as well as its role within ASI, as we move closer to its launch.
12PM–1:30PM—Lunch
1:30PM–5PM—Exhibit Tear-down