Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

This Thesaurus relies heavily on the indexing vocabulary developed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for their NASA Thesaurus (1982). It also draws on terms found in the Joint Engineer's Council Thesaurus of Engineering and Scientific Terms (1967) produced by the Department of Defense. Thus, the entries found in this thesaurus reflect not only the subjects of greatest interest to these two agencies but also the types of access most appropriate to their information needs. For example, many of the terms represent concepts that are application-oriented rather than drawn from the basic sciences. This vocabulary listing is organized into two volumes (bound as one): ``A Hierarchical Listing,'' containing both subject terms that are recommended by the compilers for indexing purposes and cross-reference, and an ``Access Vocabulary'' arranged alphabetically that directs the user to the preferred term. The introductory pages of the book offer definitions of the various types of terms and conventions employed in preparing the vocabulary. Each term to be used for indexing has an entry in the ``Hierarchical Listing'' that provides a scope note (if needed to clarify usage) and any cross-references from synonyms as well as narrower, broader, and related terms. Entries may be single words or phrases; there is a limit of 42 characters (which includes spaces). The ``Access Vocabulary'' displays all permuted terms, embedded terms, cross-references, and preferred terms and is intended to complement the ``Hierarchical Listing.'' The Thesaurus will be most useful to those information professionals indexing documents in the disciplines it covers or searching databases that employ the vocabulary. It is difficult to imagine that many undergraduates or faculty members would find great need to consult this reference work. Purchase is recommended most strongly for those collections serving scientific and technical information specialists.-J.M. Hurd, University of Chicago