cacm online
ACM
Member
News
DOI:10.1145/1409360.1409364
David Roman
Previewing the new
cacm Web site

Searching and Browsing

Readers use Communications’ content—both print and digital—in different ways. Some take their time and leisurely read through articles from top to bottom, while others take a hurried approach, often in search of their personal buzz-words. Studies show that 79% of Web site users skip past carefully constructed prose to scan pages for a specific word, phrase, or image (Jakob Nielsen, Alertbox, Oct. 1, 1997). If they don’t quickly find what they are looking for, they will do a formal search. These habits have significantly impacted the design of the soon-to-be-launched Communications Web site, where we plan to facilitate both types of usage patterns. For those interested primarily in browsing the site for content relevant to their specific technical interests, we are building a robust “Browse by

Subject” capability that will

enable the site to serve up content on specific topics in computing. For those interested in quickly identifying specific objects, both regular and advanced search options will be available utilizing the Endeca and Google search engines.

“Browse by Subject” navigation was refined by early usability tests of Communications’ site. The tests showed

some purposeful readers jumping past headlines to find specific articles. “Browse by Subject” topics do the jumping for them. They give readers a way to figuratively bypass rows of bookshelves to land squarely in front of titles devoted to software, or education, and so forth. (The placeholder topics shown on this screenshot will give way to topics defined through the collaborative effort of IT practitioners, academics, CACM staff, and volunteers.) They provide a way to locate articles before turning to traditional search.

The topics will also help scan recent ACM Digital Library articles, as shown in the purple-bannered Portal widget shown here. “Browse by

Subject” navigation will be so simple in practice as to require little or no explanation.

souvaine aPPointeD to nationaL science BoaRD

Diane l. souvaine, chair of the department of computer science at Tufts university, has been appointed to the National science board. souvaine was nominated by president george W. bush in september and confirmed by the u.s. senate in early october. as one of eight board newcomers, souvaine will serve a six-year term.

The 24-member National science board acts as an independent advisor to the president and congress on national policy issues involving science and engineering research and education. The board is also the oversight and policy-making agency for the National science Foundation.

souvaine’s specialty is computational geometry, which focuses on the design and analysis of algorithms for solving geometric problems.

siGmm a WaRD ralf steinmetz, head of the Multimedia communications lab at the Department of electrical engineering and information Technology at Technical university Darmstadt in germany, is the 2008 winner of the sigMM award for outstanding Technical contributions to Multimedia computing, communications, and applications. steinmetz was recognized for “pioneering work in multimedia communications and the fundamentals of multimedia synchronization.”

acm GeRman chaPteR The german chapter of acM celebrated its 40th anniversary with a symposium on “i T in abundance” at the ibM lab in boeblingen. The chapter includes more than 400 members and has local groups, which meet monthly, in 35 locations across germany. The chapter wants to better communicate with other acM chapters, especially european ones, and increase its membership. For more information, visit www. informatik.org or contact gerhard schimpf at gerhard. [e-mail].