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Indexes in E-Books

Friday, April 16th, 2010

Electronic book readers such as the Kindle and the Nook have changed the way people read books. With the electronic book reader, pages are turned electronically and silently, but what happens when the user tries to look up a subject in the index?  The index is static.  It has the same list of subjects and page references as the print version, but requires that the user tediously page through the alphabet to find the subject, then wade through the text to find the referenced page.

The publishing industry has a great opportunity to make indexes dynamic in e-books by adding hyperlinks to index references.  By clicking on an index reference, the reader would be linked to the appropriate section in the book.  Embedded indexing offers this technology, by creating index entries that are inserted electronically into the computer files along with the text of the document.  Instead of creating a separate index file with dedicated indexing software, an embedded index is created in the same software as the rest of the document.

Currently, print documents produced with embedded indexing can be posted online.  When the user clicks on the index entry, the relevant text is displayed because index references have been turned into links.  Adding hyperlinks to index references in e-book indexes would be the next step.

For more information about the services provided by the author of this blog, see the Stellar Searches LLC website, http://www.stellarsearches.com

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Concordances vs. Indexes

Saturday, March 6th, 2010

An index requires a degree of sophistication and skill lacking in a computer-generated concordance.  A concordance is an alphabetical list of words with locations in the text, a somewhat rudimentary index.  The computer automates the process, parsing the text and collecting the index words and the locations in the text, then writing the generated concordance to a PDF or text file.  The computer greatly reduces your time and effort, but the results are far inferior, for a number of reasons.

A computer cannot distinguish between what is important and what is not.  Many concepts that are mentioned only in passing are not useful to the reader, but are included along with all other concepts.  Readers are quickly overwhelmed.  In addition, a concordance does not cross-reference subjects.  A concordance may also leave out a subject that is discussed at length without ever being mentioned by name.

Indexers can adapt and stay true to style guidelines, while a computer-generated concordance would not.  While an indexer is self-reflective, visiting and revisiting the index to improve upon it, a computer merely generates a list of words contained within the text, then the work stops there.

Computers are capable of many things, but creating a high-quality index is not one of them.

For more information about the services provided by the author of this blog, see the Stellar Searches LLC website, http://www.stellarsearches.com

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Going Rogue without an index

Tuesday, February 16th, 2010

Sarah Palin’s autobiography, Going Rogue: An American Life, published in November 2009, lacked an index.  Why?  An index, as explored in the previous post, would have been an invaluable tool to the scholars who will undoubtedly refer to the 413-page book to survey the political climate during the 2008 presidential election and Sarah Palin’s role as John McCain’s vice presidential running mate.  Other readers may want to refer to an index to find coverage of her interview with Katie Couric or the Saturday Night Live skits.  Whether the book was rushed to print or whether Palin tried to foil “the Washington read,” a practice in which people look up their names in the index before purchasing the book, the lack of an index is a huge flaw.

The American Society for Indexing (ASI) awarded Sarah Palin and HarperCollins Publishers a Golden Turkey Award for not including an index, and in their memo dated November 20, 2009 posted to the ASI discussion list, took the opportunity to tout why indexes are so important.  ASI says that “Palin’s book performs a crucial public service.  The inaccessibility of information in this text makes it clear to any reader that a good index is essential to a book’s long-term value.  Sarah Palin’s Going Rogue has no index at all – a brilliantly simple if deviant way of proving the need for an index, worthy of one who prides herself on being a bit of a maverick.”

To fill the void, since Sarah Palin did not put an index in her book, others have produced indexes for Going Rogue and posted them on the Internet.  I am including links to two, one from Slate and the other from The New Republic:

The Going Rogue Index from Slate

http://www.slate.com/id/2235917/

The Going Rogue Index from The New Republic

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/the-going-rogue-index

Despite these indexers’ commendable efforts, there is no substitute for including an index in the original book.

For more information about the services provided by the author of this blog, see the Stellar Searches LLC website, http://www.stellarsearches.com

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Why is an index needed?

Sunday, February 7th, 2010

Even if a book is well-written and contains a clear table of contents, a reader may still have trouble finding what he or she is looking for.  A good index acts as a bridge between the author’s concepts and the readers’ particular needs.

  • A good index saves the user time.  Whether the reader is looking for one key date or an in-depth discussion of a complex topic, an index that is concise, accurate, and unambiguous points the user directly to the information in question.
  • A good index may be a reader’s primary avenue into the work.  Some books, especially those that are technical in nature, may never be read cover-to-cover.  Users may, instead, look to the index to find the information that they need at any given moment.
  • A good index gives potential readers a clear sense of the content of the book.  The index gives a first impression for teachers, researchers, librarians, and reviewers, who all look to the index to tell them how comprehensive or detailed the book may be.

An index is an invaluable tool for readers.  It identifies and distinguishes information within a book that would be of significance to the reader.  It enables readers to quickly and conveniently access desired information.  The index focuses and groups together similar ideas and concepts enabling the reader to gather together all pertinent information relating to their search.  Subentries within an index allow for a more narrow and specific search.  We will explore how quality indexing enhances search retrieval in future posts.

For more information about the services provided by the author of this blog, see the Stellar Searches LLC website, http://www.stellarsearches.com

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Welcome to Optimal Indexing, my indexing blog!

Saturday, January 30th, 2010

This blog will focus on optimal indexing for effective search retrieval.  How do you index books and documents in such a way that patrons will easily and effectively find the needed information?  As an Information Professional for Stellar Searches LLC, I depend on quality indexing to find the information that fulfills a query.  While I conduct searches for information, I also provide indexing and abstracting services.  This blog will examine how to enhance your indexing and focus on tips for indexing that will help the patron find the needed information.  But most importantly, I’ll explore why an index is needed in the first place, how it enhances a book.  An index, in short, is indispensable.

For more information about the services provided by the author of this blog, see the Stellar Searches LLC website, http://www.stellarsearches.com

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