About European Sources Online
What is ESO?
European Sources Online (ESO) is an online database and information service which provides access to information on the institutions and activities of the European Union, the countries, regions and other international organisations of Europe, and on issues of importance to European researchers, citizens and stakeholders.
What can ESO help me do?
Want to find information on ...
- The Treaty of Lisbon
- Reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)
- The Federal Parliamentary Election in Germany 2009
- Turkey and the European Union
- The economic situation in Iceland after the banking collapse
- The role of NATO in European security
- Implications of the global economic crisis
- Implementation of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID)
- Where does power lie in the EU?
- The activities of EFTA / OSCE / Council of Europe
- Climate change
- Energy security: Increasing reliance on Russia
- Extraordinary rendition
- The role of religion in Europe in the 21st century
- European reaction to the Google Book Search initiative
- ... etc?
ESO is able to help you efficiently and easily find information on these and many other topics.
- Keep up to date with developments in the European Union and the rest of Europe
- Find an expert selection of information on European topics from a very wide range of information sources - offering primary and official sources of information plus commentary, analysis, summaries and news
- Find an up-to-date, structured introduction to each of the EU Institutions and main policy areas with hyperlinks to many further sources of information in ESO’s unique Information Guides
- Find an up-to-date structured list of important websites for information on fifty European countries
- Find articles from one of the most authoritative newspapers for European information - the Financial Times - plus links to many other news sources such as EurActiv, BBC News, Deutsche Welle, Spiegel Online International, France24, NRC Handelsblad, Polskie Radio, ITAR-TASS etc.
What does ESO contain?
ESO provides access to thousands of expertly selected, well known and less well known websites, documents and publications from the EU and other international organisations, national governments, think tanks, stakeholder organisations, working papers etc, full text articles from the Financial Times, plus bibliographic records to key academic textbooks and periodical articles, and a series of unique Information Guides compiled by the ESO Editorial Team.
Guides are available which will give you a clearer idea of the range of sources accessible through ESO. Please contact us if you would like more detailed information about the information sources we include in the service.
Each information source is indexed and a ‘bibliographic record’ created for inclusion in the ESO database. You can retrieve these bibliographic records when you carry out a search in ESO. Most users of ESO search by 'keyword'. You can also search by author, title, subject number and geographic indicator.
Each information source is also categorised by the following ‘source types’ and ‘source origins’, to allow for more precise searching:
Source types
|
Source origins
|
| Background |
EU |
| Key source |
National official source |
| Legislation |
International organisation |
| News source |
Regional / local organisation |
| Periodical article |
Professional / public / political organisation |
| Policy-making document |
Commercial publisher and media |
| Report |
|
| Statistics |
|
| Textbook / Monograph / Reference |
|
| Information Guides / In Focus |
|
The majority of bibliographic records in ESO offer immediate access to the full text of the source indexed, plus additional links to many related sources.
How does ESO work?
European Sources Online has a simple interface which gives users access to all the sources within the service in a single search. Information can be accessed by searching or browsing.
ESO contains the following main features:
Easy Search
You can search by entering the subject that you are looking for information on in the search box on the home page [see Image 1]. By default ESO will search the entire database; however if you wish you can refine or restrict your search to particular types of information (‘source type’ and ‘source origin’ - see above).
Each item of information added to ESO (be it a book, chapter of a book, periodical article, newspaper article, website, report, official document, pamphlet etc) is humanly indexed and a ‘bibliographic record’ is created [see Example]. The ESO database searches for records which match the criteria of your query.
Image 1
Your search will present you with a List of Results [see Image 2]. Each information source found will be listed briefly (title and source type, plus author and/or series details). If there are any Key sources (information sources which are of particular relevance to the subject of your search) they will be highlighted at the top of the list with a pale blue background. All other sources will appear in reverse chronological order (i.e. the information sources published most recently will be listed first).
Image 2
Click on the title of each information source in the List of Results to see the full bibliographic record [see Image 3]. If you want access to the full text of the information source click on the Source URL.
Image 3
Advanced Search
Further search options are available on the Advanced Search page such as author, title, series title, subject terms, geographical indicators and date [see Image 4].
Image 4
Information Guides - Policies and Institutions
From the link on the home page you can browse the unique ESO Information Guides. See Image 5 for an example of the Information Guides on all major policy areas and institutions of the European Union.
Image 5
Each of the Information Guides offers a structured introduction to the subject with hundred of hyperlinks to further sources of information [see Images 6 and 7]. We try to update these Guides on an annual or biennial basis in order to guarantee up-to-date information and no broken links to further information sources.
Image 6
Image 7
Information Guides - Countries
In addition, ESO offers a series of Information Guides to approximately fifty European countries [see Image 8].
Image 8
These offer you links to a structured list of information sources relating to each country [see Image 9].
Image 9
News and Analysis
You can find the latest information added to ESO on particular topics or countries from the News and Analysis page, as well as the latest articles added from the Financial Times [see Image 10]. This page also allows you to link to the What’s New pages of many relevant external websites. In addition we are adding links to relevant blogs. [See also How often is ESO updated?]
Image 10
Email Alert
We hope to offer an Email Alert service from the autumn of 2009. This will be announced in the What’s New section of ESO.
Other features in ESO bibliographic records
ESO: Background Information These hyperlinks take you to related information sources within the ESO database [see Image 11]. These records are ‘related’ in one of two ways:
- The Background Information record provides a comprehensive background to the subject of the current record, or
- The Background Information record is a previously indexed information source which allows you to efficiently trace the history of a development.
Image 11
Open URL Linking From the vast majority of records you have the means to access the full text of the information immediately, either within ESO itself or by a hyperlink to an external website. You can also submit Open URLs from bibliographic records in ESO to link resolvers such as Article Linker or SFX in order to locate full text or physical holdings for many academic journal articles, and increasingly for monographs, for example: CrossRef, OpenURL, MetaLib, XML [see Image 12].
Image 12
Related URLs Additional hyperlinks within a record offer you access to related information sources on the subject of your query [see Image 13].
Image 13
How often is ESO updated?
Content is selected every day by the ESO Editorial Team and bibliographic records are created and added to the service. These are immediately accessible via the Today link on the News and Analysis page. The ESO Information Guides are revised and updated on an annual basis and new ones created when the need arises. [We are currently awaiting a new template for the Country Information Guides and consequently these have not been recently revised].
Who will find ESO useful?
ESO enables you to find all types of information about Europe, from the text of an EU Directive to a booklet for children, from a set of statistics to a newspaper article, from a research report to a website. Consequently, ESO is designed to help a very wide range of users to find information with a European dimension. Key users are citizens, students and researchers, government officials, NGOs, corporate and professional organisations.
Can’t I find all this information for free on the web?
We all use a variety of services and techniques to find information. Undoubtedly general search engines, the EU’s own portal EUROPA, databases such as ECLAS and news services such as EurActiv and EUObserver are all useful. However, ESO goes beyond all those means, offering you a dedicated European information service that through expert selection, a wide range of sources, powerful functionality, added value content and a coverage that goes beyond just the EU, really does offer you something more. No other source allows you to find the same range and breadth of sources focused on Europe.
What are the technical requirements for using ESO?
ESO has been tested using Firefox 2.0.0.5 and Internet Explorer 2.0.6900. Earlier versions and alternative browsers should work, but cannot be guaranteed.
Who do I contact for further information about ESO?
Editorial Enquiries
[including: What does ESO contain; How does it work; Broken links; Suggestions for content / coverage; Errors; Requests for training]
Ian Thomson Tel: +44 (0)29 2087 4262 Email: eso@cardiff.ac.uk
Technical Support
[including: IP access; Password enquiries; Remote access; Usage statistics; Email alert; Accessibility issues]
Email: esowebmaster@cardiff.ac.uk
Subscription Enquiries
[including: General subscription enquiries; Requests for trial subscriptions; Consortia deals; Why you should subscribe]
Ian Thomson Tel: +44 (0)29 2087 4262 Email: eso@cardiff.ac.uk
Please note that subscriptions from United Kingdom HE and FE institutions and JISC Affiliate Members are administered by JISC Collections.
Contact details
Ian Thomson
Executive Editor, European Sources Online
Information Services
Cardiff University
PO Box 430
Cardiff CF24 0DE
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0)29 2087 4262
Email:
eso@cardiff.ac.uk
Further information
Librarians can find further specialist information, including a guide describing the key features of ESO, on the Librarians' Resources page. For subscribers in Wales there is a further short guide highlighting the Wales and Europe section of ESO.
Ian Thomson
ESO Executive Editor
Last revised: October 2009
