Earth Science World notes that it is “the place to explore your interests in the earth sciences”. This information came from Earth Science World's parent organization, the American Geological Institute (AGI). Earth Science World is composed of several different databases, including ImageBank, Interactive Geological Time Scale, Earth Data, Careers, Book Center, Earth Science Week, and the game Virtual Oilwell.
ImageBank is a collection of photographs about different aspects of earth science (e.g. scenes from earthquakes, volcanic activity, erosion, etc). These images are arranged by topic and at the current time, seem to be mostly American and Canadian in origin. The Interactive Geological Time Scale is just what it says it is – a scale of time that can be adjusted according to the needs of the user. Need to see a time scale of geologic time just from the Cretaceous period forward? Or how about a time scale that shows every period up to the Triassic? All the user has to do is set up the delimiters stating which time periods are of interest and click on Select Time and the Interactive Scale conforms to the user's needs.
Earth Data allows a user to pick a weather station from anywhere in the USA, select a start and end date, and what kind of weather data they are looking for. The system then generates a printable report giving the weather station's name, country, state, elevation (in meters) latitude, longitude, and start and end dates for the search. Careers in the geosciences gives those who are interested in pursuing a career in this branch of learning valuable information on the discipline/field. Resources that can be found on this file include a careers brochure, careers video, classified advertisements, a guide to geosciences departments, professional ethics guidelines, a guide to careers in the geosciences and employers, statistics relating to careers in the geosciences, a list of frequently asked questions, geoscientist profiles, articles spotlighting geosciences in general, careers in the geosciences, geosciences‐related industries and geoscientists. Book Center features books that are of interest to geoscientists and are related to the earth sciences. This page is a joint effort of Amazon.com and AGI, and the site provides links to Amazon's site so that users can purchase the books featured if they wish. Below the Featured by AGI section, users can select from various earth science categories to find books on their related subject.
Earth Science Week lets users know about AGI's outreach efforts through its annual Celebrate Earth Science Week programme. Along the left hand side of the page, it has various links with information for the media, planners, students and teachers, as well as information about what Earth Science Week is all about, this year's theme, and where to order materials so users can participate. In the middle of the page are announcements related to the current year's programme and information on how to get their free newsletter. The right hand side of the page provides links to information about Earth Science Week contests, images and logos that can be used, and an Earth Science Week information kit. The most unusual link on the page is the Games link. It leads to an interactive game Virtual Oilwell (Voilwell) that is billed as an interactive game to “discover the exploration for oil”. The idea behind the game is to teach users what is involved when searching for oil. Besides requiring JAVA in order to work properly, Voilwell is slow to load on low‐end personal computers. But when played on computers with the proper speed and memory requirements (the computer I used had an Intel Pentium III CPU, 1.13 GHz, 256 Mb RAM), Voilwell can be a challenging, educational and fun game.
Currency of all data provided through Earth Science World varies depending on the section of the web site being accessed. At least three different ways to get to the various resources listed on the homepage are provided. Users can click on any of the links listed immediately below the pictures to the desired link. Immediately below these are separate sections that give brief information about each resource. The pictures and/or icons found in each of these sections are linked directly to the actual resources. Immediately below this, is a set of alphabetical links to information about the American Geological Institute.
Earth Science World has three resources that would qualify as searchable databases with search engines – Imagebank, Search Images and Earth Data.
Imagebank, as mentioned above, is a collection of US and Canadian photograph images illustrating various aspects of earth science. Users can browse or search the images using the links that are to left on the Imagebank page. There are also links that can be used to submit photographs; learn about copyright restrictions concerning the photograph images; information for teachers; a link for providing feedback and receiving help using the resource; a link telling what Imagebank is and links to the Earth Science World Imagebank, Earth Science World and AGI homepages. Toward the middle of the page is a set of pre‐configured categories. These are hot‐linked directly into search results. Categories provided include Volcanoes, Weather, Petroleum, Lakes, Minerals, Dunes, and more. In addition, Imagebank has two new features – a coordinate search option called Coordinate Image Search – which allows users to search for photograph images by longitude and latitude and an announcement about the photograph quality link which tells users about the availability of “very high resolution photo‐quality (suitable to print) for both commercial and non‐commercial uses”. Along the bottom of the page is the information link about restrictions regarding image use, a link to submit images and a feedback link and links to the AGI resources. This page format is recreated in all the searchable databases. At present there are 3,443 images available through Imagebank.
Search Images is gateway that allows the user to limit his search by category, by continent, by country, keyword, or image ID number. Along the left hand side of the screen are the same links that were found on the Imagebank page and along the bottom of the page are links to AGI resources. Earth Data allows the user to select from a list of weather stations available and then choose a start and end date for the data that is to be compiled. When Next is selected, a list of 15 available fields, including such variables as mean temperature, mean due point, precipitation, fog, and maximum wind speed, can be selected to customize the user's search. Patience is a virtue when using this resource because, depending on the data needed and Internet traffic, the time necessary to gain access can be as long as one‐two minutes. Reports provide the station name, country, state, elevation, longitude, latitude, and date range. Reports are only printable if five fields are chosen. It would be extremely helpful if a print option were available for reports that tend to extend beyond the printer margins.
To get back to previous pages in Earth Science World, users can use the links provided along the left hand side of the page. This resource does not use the “breadcrumb” hierarchy for allowing users to go to previously visited pages. However, that does not take away from Earth Science World's wealth of resources or its ability to deliver these.
American Geological Institute's Earth Science World is one of the most extensive and invaluable resources for anyone wanting to know more about geosciences and for those considering a career in this discipline. There are few PDF articles, but Earth Science World offers a cornucopia of statistical data and digital images that more than make up for this. In the future Earth Science World may offer a database of articles on the geosciences as an added point of interest, but even in its current form, it would be tough to beat this resource gateway.
