This collection is part of the Irish Newspaper Archive (to which we already have access). It comprises 115 Irish radical and political newspapers, journals, pamphlets and bulletins, covering one of the most turbulent periods in Irish history, from the Home Rule debates of the 1880s to the eve of the Second World War.
The publications feature mostly opinion and editorial, rather than news, so they offer rare insights into Irish political and labour history during this period, and include regional and national titles representing a range of causes.
You can access the trial via this link to the Irish Newspaper Archive: once you have logged in, you should see a link to the Radical Archive in the top right of your screen.
Radical Archive link
You can browse the publications by title and date, or search the archive in various ways: for example, combining keywords and dates. You can also limit your search to retrieve pictures or adverts only.
Screenshot from the archive
The trial ends on May 31st 2022. To help us evaluate it, please email us your feedback, or leave a reply on this blog post.
Knovel is a technical reference database that provides access to core engineering handbooks and tools. It allows students, researchers and professionals to take material and property data, and to analyse it quickly and intuitively.
Our previous blog gives a general overview of Knovel’s main features and content, describing how it empowers engineers by offering a trustworthy source of information and data. But there is so much more you can do with Knovel using the interactive and visualization analysis tools. Alongside their data and technical information the tools let you manipulate and extrapolate data from within your browser and export it into your work in whatever format is most appropriate for your requirements. These tools allow you to interact more with the materials data within Knovel, so the data becomes much more discoverable and useful for your studies and research.
Creating a free, personal Knovel account allows you to save the work you do with these tools too. You can also save searches, graphs, tables and more, picking up right where you left off if you need to take a break.
What are the interactive tools?
There are several powerful tools that allow you to interact directly with the huge sets of data and properties in Knovel. Carrying out a simple search of material properties will give the option to select interactive tables or graphs. This video from Knovel gives an overview of the interactive tools available.
Interactive Tables
The tables within Knovel can be overwhelmingly huge in scope, needing filtering to start to work the data into something useful. The interactive table tool allows you to filter and sort columns of large datasets, as you would a spreadsheet, but within your browser. You can hide, move, and lock columns, and quickly go from a broad search looking at the property of a material, for example steel, to a table you can adjust and save or export for inclusion in your work.
An example interactive table
Graph digitizer
Knovel includes a wealth of crucial engineering handbooks and has digitised the graphs in these titles. This allows you to extract and export data from digitized curves, enabling you to open any graphs in a separate view where you can extract data points, adjusting the parameters to get the information you are interested in. You can define points on the curve by clicking directly on the line, or by using the navigation panel to specify exact points, and you can define the axis with the other axis adjusting automatically. You can then add points, curves, or elongation data, and manipulate as needed before saving or exporting in a format suited to your output.
An example digitized graph
Equation plotter
With so many example equations in Knovel the plotter function lets you visualise parametric equations and then manipulate them in several ways, such as plotting curves from the equation. When you run a search for material properties and choose a table, then selecting the equation icon will open the plotted equation for you to work with. You can then add points to particular values, change units, and work the data.
Knovel equation plotter
Interactive equations
Knovel includes vast collections of example equations for application in engineering. You can navigate all disciplines by specialty, browse the full collection, or filter by equations in the general search.
The interactive equation tool is browser-based calculation software. It can help you get the solutions to problems faster, by letting you work with the online equation as you would in your own workbook. The equation worksheet functions as a space to explore and relate data back to your own work. You can also create worksheets for searches, combining text with images and plots. Watch the video from Knovel below for more information on interactive equations.
Unit converter
This is a simple tool, but especially useful as it is integrated throughout Knovel to help you work with the data. It draws on a range of units, properties, and scientific notations systems. Easy to access and to use, it will help make sure you are working to the correct equivalents.
Knovel unit converter
Steam calculators
Presented as a series of 8 calculators, this recent addition allows fine control of a full range of thermodynamic variables, under a variety of conditions, for results determining steam table data. With support for ranges of temperature, pressure, and quality, it lets you work out the required conditions for achieving the quality of steam needed. Watch this video from Knovel to learn more about Steam Calculators.
More information
You can get further help with Knovel on the Knovel LibGuide. You’ll also find links to Knovel, and additional support within the Library’s Subject Guides for all Engineering, Science and Computing disciplines.
Contact your Liaison Librarian for any further questions around getting the most from Knovel, and for other ways we can help support you in your studies.
The Passport Euromonitor database is a key resource for international market research data. We have just upgraded our subscription to Passport Pro which gives researchers to additional market surveys covering a wide range of topics:
The database gives researchers access to consumer lifestyle reports, future demographics, country profiles, updates on consumer and industry trends, company information, market sizes and economic indicators. Passport covers more than 200 countries and regions, with a global outlook.
Thomson Reuters have recently announced the introduction of UK Dockets in Westlaw UK, included in our academic subscription.
A docket is a record of litigation events as a case goes through the courts, starting when a claim is filed through to judgment.
You can access UK Dockets from the Cases menu. This brand-new content set containing over 230,000 litigation events will make it easier for you to receive daily updates of new cases filed in the High Court — all in one place.
With UK Dockets on Westlaw, you can easily:
create daily alerts on new cases, specific courts or parties, and other events
track individual cases and be alerted to any changes
access every step of the case journey from a claim being filed to judgment and through to the appeals process
Having access to UK Dockets on Westlaw can provide you with confidence around never missing a case event.
Access Westlaw Edge UK and UK Dockets via our Subject Guide.
If you have any feedback on the service, please contact libraryhelp@ncl.ac.uk or leave your comments below.
You might have been given an academic article to read by a module leader or found one on a reading list but what happens if you need to locate some for yourself.
On our subject guide we have a whole list of core journal platforms and databases but which ones are best if you’ve got a topic and you’re just looking for academic articles related to it.
Don’t panic, we’ve created this short video to highlight which resources to use (Avery and Art and Architecture Archive in case you’re wondering). If you want to search more widely within Social Sciences journals then you might want to consider a more generic database like Proquest.
Have you met BoB? Box of Broadcasts is a fantastic resource for all subject areas: an archive of over two million radio and television broadcasts from over 75 free-to-air channels, including all BBC channels, ITV and Channel 4, plus some international channels. New programmes are added to BoB as they are broadcast each day.
We know it’s a very popular resource, but are you getting the best out of it? Here are some quick tips for newbies and experienced users alike!
Smarter searching
BoB is a huge database, so searching by keyword may retrieve a lot of irrelevant results, especially as the default search looks for your keyword in all programme transcripts (i.e. every word spoken in a programme). Click on the Search options link just under the search bar to see various ways of making your search more precise, including searching in the programme titles only, or limiting by date. This help video gives more detail:
Playlists and clips
You can create your own playlists: really helpful if you’re researching for an assignment, or preparing to teach a module. You can also search public playlists curated by other BoB users around the UK: just select Public playlists underneath the search bar, or explore this showcase of playlists for more inspiration.
The Library has lots of great collections and resources, so when it comes to finding wider reading for your topic or beginning research for your assignment or dissertation it might all seem a bit overwhelming. Library Search can be a great place to start looking for information but there are many other resources you might want to try. To help you get the best out of our resources we’ve put together this list of some of the most useful online databases and collections for Classics and Ancient History.
Let’s dive in!
Scopus
Scopus is a large, interdisciplinary database of peer-reviewed literature, providing an index of articles, book chapters, conference papers and trade publications.
One of the main advantages of using Scopus is that it provides a lot of useful information about the articles it indexes. This includes full reference lists for articles and cited reference searching, so you can navigate forward and backward through the literature to uncover all the information relevant to your research. You can also set up citation alerts, so you can be informed of new, relevant material automatically.
Scopus tutorial: How to expand your search results
Scopus includes other smart tools that can help you track and visualise the research in your area, including author and affiliation searching, visual analysis of search results, a journal analyser, and author identifier tools. You’ll find tutorials and advice on using these features in the Scopus support centre and on their YouTube Channel.
JSTOR
JSTOR provides access to full-text materials including scholarly journals, books and book chapters in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. It has basic and advanced search options that allow you to search by topic keyword, author, subject area, title or publisher.
Take a look at our Get more out of JSTOR blog post to find tips for advanced searching on this database.
Encyclopedia of Ancient History
The Encyclopedia of Ancient History is a reference work containing a comprehensive collection of 21st century scholarship on the ancient Mediterranean world. Entries span the bronze age through to 10th century Byzantium and extend to all Mediterranean civilisations including the Near East and Egypt. Materials include articles, images and maps of the ancient world. Our video guide below demonstrates how to browse and search for information using the Encyclopedia:
Video Guide to finding information on the Encyclopedia of Ancient History
l’Année philologique (Aph)
l’Année philologique is a bibliographic database, indexing journal articles and book chapters about the classical world, going back to 1924. It’s an excellent resource for researching topics related to Greek and Latin literature and linguistics, Greek and Roman history, art, archaeology, philosophy, religion and more. Our video guide below demonstrates how to find information on l’Année philologique:
Video guide to finding information on l’Année philologique
Loeb Classical Library Online
Containing over 520 volumes of Latin and Greek poetry, drama, oratory, history, philosophy and more, the Loeb Classical Library is a key resource for those studying the ancient Greek and Roman world. The side-by-side layout of the ancient text and English translation makes the literature accessible to readers and can be especially helpful to those new to the study of ancient Greek or Latin. While the online Library presents tools that allow readers to explore the texts at various levels, via browsing, searching, annotating, and sharing content.
You can find out more about key features by reading our Loeb Online blog post or take a quick visual tour of the digital Library via the Loeb Classical Library website.
Literature Online (LION)
Literature Online (LION) is a database containing full-text works of poetry, prose and drama from the 8th century to the present day, written in English. These are supported by full text journals and reference material to help contextualise primary works and authors. LION enables you to research international literature of all genres, and has good coverage in linguistics, philosophy and classics.
Screenshot of the Literature Online homepage
LION’s basic search allows you to look for criticism, primary texts, authors, reference works, dissertations, audio and video, and book reviews. You can search all of these information types at once with the All button selected, or focus on a particular section by choosing the appropriate button.
Brill’s Jacoby Online comprises five separate works, based on the original multi-volume work by the German classicist, Felix Jacoby (1876-1959). The ‘Jacoby’ was a critical edition of over 800 Greek historians whose works had been lost, but were preserved incompletely in fragments. It includes expert critical commentaries on the texts and fragments, together with brief biographies of all the historians.
You can browseeach of the five component works by historian name, historian number or publication date, and can searchfor words or phrases, or historians. You can search any of the five component works individually, or across all of them at once. Greek original texts and translations are included, and you can search in English or Ancient Greek. More detailed help is available on the database.
Box of Broadcasts (BoB)
Box of Broadcasts allows you to access TV and radio broadcasts from over 65 channels, including most of the UK’s Freeview network, all BBC TV and radio content from 2007, and several foreign language channels. It’s a great resource for finding documentaries or critical opinions.
You can view archived programmes, create clips and playlists, and see transcripts to help with citation and translation. You can also search other users’ public playlists to see curated lists around topics similar to your own. There are lots of helpful tutorial videos on the BoB website.
Unfortunately, Box of Broadcasts is not available outside the UK.
Classics and Ancient History Subject Guide
This list was just a taster of all the great resources available for your subject area, to access these and to find out more visit your Subject Guide and explore the journals, databases and subject specific resources we’ve curated for Classics and Ancient History students.
Knovel provides a searchable database of handbooks, data sets and reference sources in engineering (chemical, civil, electrical, mechanical, materials and biotechnology), chemistry and biochemistry, earth and environmental sciences among other areas. You can search within a particular work, or across the entire Knovel collection. Searching can be done by keyword or by numeric data ranges.
Knovel has a data search feature that allows you to find materials that meet specific parameters including physical, mechanical and thermal properties. Tools within Knovel include interactive charts, graphs, spreadsheets, and equation plotters.
You have access to:
Technical reference resources from 150+ publishers including AIChE/CCPS, NACE and more.
65M+ data points including material and chemical property data
Check out Knovel’s Support Centre that highlights news and FAQ’s. You can also get access to many video tutorials, including a very handy overview to help you get started with Knovel.
There is also a downloadable Quick Start Guide and a LibGuide, so you should always be able to find any help you may need.
If you are wondering how to find Knovel, you can either search for it in Library Search or you can find it in all of the Engineering, Sciences and Computing Subject Guides under both the ‘Books and eBook’ AND the ‘Journals and Database’ (eJournal Collections) tabs.
If you have any questions regarding Knovel, please contact your Liaison Librarian.
Westlaw is one of our highly-valued legal databases and can be accessed via our Law Subject Guide and Library Search, logging in with your Newcastle University Campus ID & password. One of the lesser-used aspects of Westlaw is its Books collection.
Westlaw Books gives access to invaluable titles such as the White Book and Archbold, alongside comprehensive and authoritative coverage of common law through titles from the Common Law Library series (e.g. Chitty on Contracts, and Benjamin’s Sale of Goods).
Until the end of November 2021, we also have access to the academically-based books available in the Sweet & Maxwell Academic Collection to support your studies. These include Duxbury’s Contract Law (Textbook Series), Winfield & Jolowicz on Tort, Treitel on the Law of Contract, and Elliott & Wood’s Cases and Materials on Criminal Law (the latter being written and edited by former academics of Newcastle Law School).
To access this content, log into Westlaw and click on Westlaw Books in the menu at the top of the page.
You can browse through the 350+ titles included in the Library’s subscription plan, but if you know the book you are looking for, search by a title keyword, e.g. criminal.
If you want to browse those student-focused books which are currently on trial, use the filters on the left-hand side of the screen. Scroll down and select ‘Sweet & Maxwell Academic’ in the Publisher/Series filter section.
This short Thomson Reuters video (1:56 mins) gives tips on using Westlaw Books effectively in locating bibliographic information (essential for referencing these titles in your work), searching the materials using keywords, saving your favourite titles for repeated use, and how to email, print, download, save into a Westlaw folder or simply view the material on the screen (in reading-mode too).
If you’re not a fan of videos and want a handy guide to download or print, then this Westlaw Books PDF will help.
If you have any comments or questions about Westlaw Books, or any other library resource, please contact libraryhelp@ncl.ac.uk or leave your comments here.