ISSNs NOW IN PAIS DATA RECORDS ON TAPE

PAIS --- Public Affairs Information Service, Inc., publishers of the
premier international index of public affairs and social policy
information, is pleased to announce that its magnetic tape format of the
PAIS International bibliographic database now includes the International
Standard Serial Number (ISSN).

In 1993 PAIS introduced a new magnetic tape format providing distinct data
fields, such as Library of Congress number, journal name, or
Superintendent of Documents number, which had previously been formatted in
a single citation field. The new tape format is designed to provide data
elements in separate fields in order to make index-building easier and
consequently to improve search results.

The ISSN, while provided as a data element in the separate Periodicals
Authority file, the complete listing of periodicals used for PAIS indexing
documents, was not provided in the periodical bibliographic entry. Now the
bibliographic entries for 94% of the PAIS periodical articles includes the
ISSN.

PAIS expects the provision of the ISSN in the bibliographic entry to prove
valuable. One anticipated benefit is in the area of document delivery. It
will be easier to order documents identified in the PAIS International
database with the ISSN number in the bibliographic entry. Subscribing
organizations can also use the ISSN as a match element to identify
periodicals held in their collection.

PAIS -- Public Affairs Information Service, Inc., founded in 1914, is a
nonprofit educational corporation, chartered by the Regents of the
University of the State of New York, providing online, printed, and
optical bibliographic indexes to the public policy literature of business,
health, law, government, political science, and other social services. Its
products include PAIS International in Print, PAIS On CD-ROM, PAIS
International On SilverPlatter, PAIS/EBSCO CD-ROM, and PAIS International,
available online through DlALOG/DataStar, OCLC, and RLG. PAIS leases PAIS
International for on-site loading by colleges, universities, consortia,
and database distributors.

Public Affairs Information Service Inc
521 West 43rd Street
New York, NY 10036-4396
Administrative: 212-736-6629
Editorial: 212-736-4161

 ============================================================
 From the  'New Product Information'  Electronic News Service
 on AOL (Keyword = New Products) & Delphi (GO BUSINESS PROD)
 ============================================================
 This information was processed from data provided by the
 above mentioned company. For additional details, contact 
 the company at the address or telephone number indicated.
 OmniPage Pro is now used for converting all printed input! 
 ============================================================
 All submissions for this service should be addressed to:
 BAKER ENTERPRISES,  20 Ferro Dr,  Sewell, NJ  08080  U.S.A.
 Email: RBakerPC (AOL/Delphi), rbakerpc@delphi.com (Internet)
 ============================================================
