Good morning! It is indeed a pleasure to be here. On behalf of the Department of Energy (DOE), I am here to officially introduce the DOE Information Bridge Web site. This system is made available by GPO through the GPO Access Web site.

This is very special day because it is a major step toward fulfilling a long held DOE and GPO vision of bringing to the Federal Depository Library Program and the American public, immediate full-text access to the DOE Report Collection. Today, because DOE and GPO have worked toward a mutual goal, public access to the DOE Information Bridge is a reality. This project reinforces the DOE commitment to comply with the Clinton Administration's objective to move Federal programs and activities into the age of technology and information and it is additionally a giant step forward in providing more electronic dissemination options to the Federal Depository Library Program.

I would like to give you a quick glance into the past to see how we got to the Information Bridge.

The DOE Information Bridge system you will see today is the direct result a longstanding partnership between the Government Printing Office and the Department of Energy. Dating back some 20 years, DOE and GPO have formulated Interagency Agreements to bring DOE research results to the public. These agreements made it possible for the depository library community to select and maintain DOE microfiched report literature which was the most economical format available at the time.

It is estimated that over 100 copies each of over 250,000 DOE research reports were distributed to the depository libraries via these agreements. That's 25 million microfiche reports all around the country! As technologies evolved, public laws changed (and microfiche cabinets filled up). DOE and GPO started to work together to utilize the GPO Access Web site to bring DOE funded research information directly to the public via the Internet. Working with GPO, DOE offered the depository libraries the most economical product that was available.

Now you have electronic full text access for free because GPO and OSTI had the vision, the knowledge and the desire to make it happen. This is an appropriate time to express thanks to two of our new leaders for having the vision and foresight to move this idea forward. Many thanks go to Francis Buckley, the new Superintendent of Documents and to Walter Warnick, Director of DOE's Office of Scientific and Technical Information. Without you we would not be here today. I would additionally like to express my appreciation to the Federal Depository Library Program Staff and the OSTI Management and Project Team lead by Don Altom in Oak Ridge.

Let us take a look at the system's savings and benefits.

Free Internet access to DOE's searchable, massive full-text collection represents a breakthrough in reducing the cost of obtaining information and in expanding public access to the product of DOE's $6 billion annual science and technology research investment. The DOE Information Bridge cost saving benefits have yet to be projected. I do know that it was certainly worth the effort. Depository libraries will not have to catalog, file, maintain storage, retrieve and reproduce DOE reports for their patrons. They can use the Information Bridge.

Formerly, fewer than 300 depository libraries selected DOE Report literature for their libraries. Now all libraries with a computer and GPO Access have DOE Reports collections. Researchers will have immediate access to work of their peers and will be more cognizant of getting their project reports on-line. Students will have at their fingertips all of the DOE resources they need, when they need it. And there are any number of advantages, not the least of which is reduced costs, that I could cite if we had the time. But, let's get on to the real excitement.

We hope you will like what you see when you get on the Bridge. Did you know that you gave us the specifications for this system? GPO told us that you didn't like registration or passwords. GPO told us to create a system for users that would be easily understood and used. We tried to do this. I am pleased to have Lorrie Johnson from the OSTI staff with us today to demonstrate the Bridge. We want you to use the system and go to the "Comments" form and tell the GPO User Support Team what you think about it. Tell others about it and help us make it widely known within your library's user community. Let them know that GPO and DOE created this system for the public. We are excited about the DOE Information Bridge. It was designed for you and the public you serve.

Demonstration of DOE Information Bridge

DOE Information Bridge can be accessed through the Internet at http://www.doe.gov/bridge. The system employs "frames" technology, which allows for increased navigational capabilities through a set of buttons in the left frame while the right frame displays the various search, results, and document display screens. The home page provides product information and background on the database, and provides the opportunity to select the viewer (GIF, TIFF, or PDF) that the user prefers.

Information Bridge offers two search options: Easy and Advanced. The Easy Search provides the quick, simple search that is similar to those of popular Internet search engines, while the Advanced Search screen offers more robust searching capabilities such as fielded and Boolean queries.

Within the Easy Search, the user may choose between three fields for searching. A search of the "OCR Text and Bibliography" field searches the entire bibliographic record plus the associated full text of the document (scanned OCR images). If the user is looking for a known document or a specific author, he/she may use the "Title" or "Author" fields in the Easy Search as appropriate.

Within the Advanced Search, the user may choose to search the following specific fields: OCR Text and Biblio, Bibliographic Only, Title, Author, Identifying Number, Laboratory, Sponsoring Organization, Subject, Keywords, Author Affiliation, Distribution Category, Publication Date, Document Type, and Entry Date. By providing the ability to search specific fields within the bibliographic records, searches can be more precisely defined than with a simple full text search option. In addition to the flexibility offered through fielded searching, users can also employ Boolean operators both between and within fielded searching. To facilitate searching within the Laboratory, Sponsoring Organization, and Subject fields, pick lists of valid values are provided on the screen so that the user may simply select the desired values.

Once a search in DOE Information Bridge has been initiated, the Search Results screen will appear. This screen contains the title, report number, and publication date of the first 50 documents that match the query with the option to view additional groups of 50 as needed. The full text of the documents can be downloaded by clicking on the PDF icon for the desired document. To view additional information about the document or to view it online, the user may click on the highlighted title and the Document Display screen will appear.

The Document Display screen contains the bibliographic information, including the abstract, for the document in the top portion of the screen. The bottom portion contains links to the full text images and these may be viewed online by clicking on the image numbers. Just below the image numbers, another search box appears which may be used to search within a document. After completing a search in this box, the image numbers which contain the search term will be identified by a larger type font. Documents may also be downloaded from this screen, again by clicking on the PDF icon.

DOE Information Bridge provides an online help file to assist users in using the database. Three levels of help are provided - General, Easy and Advanced Searching, and Troubleshooting Tips. The General help describes basic information about searching and covers such topics as adjacency, date searching, and Boolean operators. The Easy and Advanced Searching help gives definitions of each searchable field and examples of how to enter the search terms and phrases. Within this section, there is also a cross-walk of DOE subject categories and GPO subject categories for those users familiar with searching by GPO subject categories. Finally, the Troubleshooting Tips section describes common problems and their solutions.

A Comment form and a What's New page provide the opportunity for communications between the users and the developers of Information Bridge. The Comment form allows users to send questions, problems and suggestions while the What's New page gives the latest information and announcements regarding the system.