358 J . Chem. Inj Comput. Sci., Vol. 31, No. 2, 1991
BOOK REVIEWS Computrtioarl Geometry: Curve and Surface Modeling. By Su Bu-qing and Liu Ding-yuna. Translated by Chang Geng-zhe. Academic Press, Inc.: San Diego, CA. 1989. x + 295 pp. ISBN 0-12-675610-4. The technology of curve and surface modeling is foundational to many aspects of engineering. To assess its relevance to computational chemistry, one needs to look to developments in graphics which have taken place or are now on-going. Clearly, computational chemistry is concerned with representing potential surfaces and charge densities. This book contains the details, the technology, to permit one to accomplish such tasks effectively. In this sense, it would be very interesting to the technician with responsibilities for graphics programming. However, to the practicing computational chemist, this book might contain a bit too much detail. The interest of the computational chemist focuses more on interpreting the chemical implications of a potential surface than on the technology involved in representing it. If one is interested in acquiring a detailed understanding of the accurate representation of curves and surfaces by the techniques currently in use, this is a concise and well-organized source. The authors have structured their material in a logical and cogent fashion, beginning with a definition of what they mean by the term “computational geometry”. There is considerable development and use of the ideas of spline fitting to curves and surfaces. The subjects of nonlinear splines and Bezier curves are also included. Richard W . Counts, Indiana University
Chemical Inforumth Souma. By Gary Wiggins. McGraw-Hill: New York. 1991. xxiv 352 pp. + two 31/2-in. diskettes containing the Chemistry Reference Sources Database (CRSD) (P/N 836700-X) and Pro-Cite Search-Only Version for CRSD (P/N 8369911-8). Hardcover: $42.35. ISBN 0-07-909939-4. Gary Wiggins’s Chemical Information Sources is an eminently satisfying, readable-and important-book. Finally we have a modern, comprehensive text and reference book of chemical-information resources and techniques that is a b & , both by chemistry and information-science students and faculty and by practicing chemists and information professionals as well. It has broken, one hopes for all time, the classic (and deadly) mold of books on this subject: the endless recitation of treatises, encyclopedias,journals, handbooks, compilations, indices, ... . Yet revolutionary zeal for a modern approach to chemical-information retrieval has not extirpated discussion of time-honored and essential, albeit nondigital, works. Printed materials are treated as partners with computer databases, searching, and tools. Concepts and terms are defined early and clearly; the structure and types of chemical literature, and the publishing process, form a frame of reference; and the core of the book is the chemical concerns that compel chemists to the literature: compounds, structures, measurements, prop erties, reactions, and syntheses. Patents, often ignored in texts, are nonthreateningly dealt with in a chapter of their own. Furthermore, the book also covers toxicology, chemical safety, current-awarenesssearching and services, document-delivery services, science writing, managing one’s personal collections of literature, and such topics as the history of chemistry, biographical information, trade literature, chemical-business information, chemical news, directories, sources of chemicals and equipment, standards and specifications, teaching chemistry, and careers in chemistry. And all this without taking on the size and prose style of the Manhattan telephone book! Chemical Information Sources has three major strengths. First, it integrates printed and online resources and the techniques for using them. Second, it always teaches techniques in the context of real chemical-information problems. The book thereby avoids the fatal weaknesses of many texts attempting to teach online searching: the abstract and sterile listing of commands and techniques and the ignoring of the fundamental principle that you cannot search successfully if you do not understand the database. Printed Chemical Abstracts, Science Citation Index, Beilstein, &.-what they do and do not contain, their indexing practices, their structures-are discussed in tandem with their online siblings. This has the important benefit that it quips the student to recognize, and to act in, those cases in which the easiest and most productive way to answer the question at hand is to go to the book, not to the terminal. This is a point too often forgotten. Finally, and, perhaps most importantly, the book is pervasively informed by the author’s extensive experience both
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as a teacher of chemical information (to both chemistry and information-science students) and as a chemist and chemistry librarian. I might also ask how many authors provide you with their telephone and fax numbers and BITNET addresses in case you have questions. Some further general points about the book are that each chapter has a set of selected readings, as well as references to cited work; it is well written, edited, and organized, it benefits from many tables, figures, and excellent examples; and it is specifically designed to aid the teaching of chemical information in accordance with the American Chemical Society’s guidelines for accrediting undergraduate degree programs. The book is introduced by a discussion of the primary, secondary, and tertiary chemical literatures and their relationships to each other, along with definitions of key concepts in information science, e.g., classification, indexing, selective dissemination of information. Document and database types are defined. The introduction is followed by a chapter on database directories, guides to the literature, and the formulation of searching strategies. The fundamentals of online searching are treated in chapter three. Along with the benefits of online searching, its problems are also discussed. An important feature of this chapter is its discussion of the costs of computer searching. Tables and examples provide very practical information about gaining access to databases, telecommunications software and services, front-ends and gateways, how to log on, and troubleshooting. Chapter four is devoted to author and organizationalsource searching, the latter being an especially useful subject. Chapter five covers subject searching-both online and in printed works. Detailed attention is given to Science Citation Index and its online version, SciSearch, including citation searching and the use of the printed Permuterm Subject Index and organizational-source indices. These three chapters also introduce the Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) online databases. STN International is the principal database vendor used in teaching online searching. This is quite reasonable given that STN is, for good or ill, the only vendor that offers the full features of the Chemical Abstracts (CA) and Registry files, which include abstracts, the graphics printed in CA issues, chemical-structure connection tables, and easy Registry Number crossover to both CAS and non-CAS files. Furthermore, STN provides BEILSTEIN, Gmelin Formula Index, CAOLD (pre-1967 records), CAPreviews (CAS records too new to be indexed and abstracted yet), the reactions database CASREACT, and the full texts of American Chemical Society and other chemistry journals (all of which databases are dealt with in the book). Nonetheless, other vendors (DIALOG, ORBIT, BRS, Questel, Chemical Information System, etc.) are not ignored. Their files, capabilities, and unique features are discussed. Citation searching, for example, is taught using SciSearch on DIALOG. The remainder of the book addresses itself to selected resources and special searching techniques, e.g., structure searching, full-text searching, numerical-database searching, reaction searching. Of the resources discussed, particular attention is paid to that indispensable Teutonic trilogy: Beilstein, Gmelin, and Lundok-Bornstein. Printed and online versions of Beilstein are most thoroughly discussed. The attention paid to Lundolt-Bornstein is especially welcome, as it is the least user-friendly of the three. The clear and straightforward treatment of these three works demystifies them, something that is absolutely essential. Too often these sources fail to occupy their rightful place in every chemist’s armamentarium because they needlessly intimidate people. The patents chapter also demystifies. It deals with the patenting process and the importance of patents as sources of chemical information, some of which is to be found nowhere else. Wisely, no attempt is made to teach patent searching; instead, the author discusses such sources of patent information as Derwent Publications (World Patent Index), the International Patent Documentation Center (INPADOC), IFI/Plenum (CLAIMS), CA, and the American Petroleum Institute (APIPAT). Other sources and topics covered by the book include data handbooks (e.g., Heilbron), spectral databases and publications (e.g., Sadtler, ”C N MR), Theilheimer’sSynthetic Methods of Organic Chemistry, Index Chemicus, Current Chemical Reactions, treatises (e.g., Techniques of Chemistry), and in-house online chemical-information systems such as those marketed by Molecular Design Limited (MACCS, REACCS) or Chemical Design, lnc. (ORAC). The crowning glory of Chemical Information Resources is its Chemistry Reference Sources Database (CRSD), a database of 2156 books,
BCXK REVIEWS journals, databases, vendors, etc. It alone is worth the price of the book. (The CRSD, along with the author's good sense, is the reason that the book is of a reasonable size.) The CRSD is provided as a Pro-Cite search-only database on two 31/2-in.diskettes. (It is also available as an ASCII file from the author.) You do not have to have Pro-Cite software to use the CRSD. Included in the database are indications of which works can be borrowed from Indiana University's Chemistry Library, where Dr. Wiggins is librarian. The book includes an appendix of instructions for using the CRSD. There is an implication that the database will be updated. Nothing is perfect, and this book is no exception-but it comes pretty close. There are two substantive omissions in my view. One is the failure to deal with polymers. Searching for polymers in Registry or other places is not covered; although Derwent's chemicals indexing is mentioned, its polymers indexing (PLASDOC) is not; and sources of polymer-related information [e.g., Rubber and Plastics Research Abstracts (RAPRA, online), Polymer Handbook] are not much evident in the text. The other omission is the lack of a discussion of such 'nonchemistry" databases of great importance to chemistry as BIOSIS (biology and biochemistry), INSPEC (physics), COMPENDEX (engineering, including chemical engineering), METADEX (metallurgy), and GcoRef (geochemistry). Of minor import: the index could have been fuller; student exercises would have been useful: periods should be within quotation marks; and McGraw-Hill might have done a better job of printing and used paper a little less transparent. Chemical Information Resources is indeed a major book that should be in every chemist's and chemical-information specialists's library. As your broker might say, this is a strong buy recommendation. David K. Jobnson, Exxon Research and Engineering Company
Using dBASE IV 1.1. By Edward Jones. Osborne McGraw-Hill: Berkeley, CA. 1990. 803 pp. Softcover: $24.95. dBASE, in spite of its recent problems with version IV, is the most popular database management software program for the IBM PC and related clone computers. After a number of very serious problems with errors in the first release of dBASE IV (version l.O), Ashton-Tate recently released an improved version, 1.1. While Ashton-Tate has made many improvements to their software, it is still difficult to use in many respects. This book by Edward Jones is a well-organized publication designed to help users understand dBASE and make more efficient use of this software package. This book of almost 800 pages in 20 chapters affords a very helpful source to augment the very lengthy and bulky dBASE user manuals. This book provides the user with another approach to explaining many of the dBASE features and capabilities. The first chapter is a general overview and introduction to dBASE, including a discussion of the improvements from previous versions. Chapter 2 goes into designing a database, using the typical example of a list of employees. If there is one problem with this book it is that all the examples are business oriented. It is difficult to see how to solve the problems associated with scientific applications, such as numeric data or bibliographies, given the examples in the book. As dBASE has been recommended as the database management system for IUPAC databases, I would hope someone in the near future would consider writing a book with some nonbusiness applications, even though the market for such a book is clearly smaller than the business market. Chapter 3 describes how to set up the program and create and display a database. Chapter 4 discusses editing and other changes that one can make to the database, such as adding an additional field. Chapter 5 goes into how to create a more user-friendly data entry form screen. Sorting and indexing of a database is presented in Chapter 6. Chapters 7 and 8 go into the details of various search queries and reporting capabilities of dBASE IV. Macros are discussed in Chapter 9. File management is the subject of Chapter IO. Chapter 1 1 extends the discussions from Chapter 8 on how to create reports. Advanced queries and searching, initially presented in Chapter 7, is extended in Chapter 12.
Chapters 13-17 go into how to use the dBASE programming language and to exploit its power over and above the simple tools presented in the introduction. Depending on your needs, this section may or may not be useful. Interfacing to other programs and systems is the topic of Chapter 18,which is entitled Using dBASE IV with other Programs. For those who plan to use dBASE on a Local Area Network (LAN), Chapter 19 explains the differences between the stand-alone and LAN versions and what needs to be taken into account in this situation. The last chapter has some sample applications which include a membership roster or mailing list and a payroll system. It would have been nice if the example included how to print out the mailing list for distribution and showed how to print the mailing list on a set of standard labels. The book ends with two appendices containing a glossary of
J . Chem. If. Comput. Sci., Vol. 31, No. 2, 1991 359 dBASE terms and a glossary of dBASE functions. There is also an 18-page index. Overall this is highly readable book which will be of value to all who are using dBASE. Stephen R. Hekr, Agricultural Research Service
Windows 3: The Complete Reference. By Tom Sheldon. Osborne McGraw-Hill: Berkeley CA. 1991. 756 pp. Softcover: $29.95. Windows is a graphics-oriented front-end package for the IBM PC and related clones. It is designed to help novice and part-time users make more efficient use of the computer. With the great interest in Windows, a reference book which provides help and answers to many questions is most welcome. Most manuals do provide a good deal of information about what the software is able to do, but the problem is finding it and/or understanding what the author really means. This book of over 750 pages in 17 chapters is not a manual but rather is a very helpful source which supplements, and in many cases, goes beyond what the Windows user manual provides. This reference book provides an expanded collection of examples as to how to perform tasks under Windows and also gives the reader many more examples than the manual which the software vendor has written. The first three chapters are an overview and introduction to Windows, with examples showing one what Windows can do. Chapter 4 on global techniques discusses the universal aspects of Windows that anyone will need for most any problem, such as searching, saving files, and so forth. Everyone likes to fiddle, and Chapter 5 describes how to modify Windows for your particular likes and needs. The Windows Program Manager section, Chapter 6, and Chapter 7 on file, disk, and directory management, gets into the guts of how to organize and manage your system in the Windows environment. Chapter 8 then goes on to describe how to handle printers. This chapter, along with the next one on network access, is particularly useful to anyone who needs to figure out why a printer won't print or why a telephone won't connect to the network you are trying to access. Chapters 9-13 go into details of the Windows accessories and tools which add to the power of the product. Chapter 14 explains how to run programs outside the Windows environment, as many programs that either run under Windows or take advantage of the capabilities and features of Windows are not yet available. Getting programs to run more efficiently using Windows is the subject of Chapter 15, Enhancing Windows and Improving Performance. The next chapter goes off on a slight tangent to describe two additional software products, DayBook and ToolBook, which were designed to be used with Windows and to make the system more powerful. Finally, Chapter 17 is a very helpful alophabetical listing of all Windows commands with a short description of what each command does, no matter where they were found in this reference book. Of course, each brief write-up refers back to the appropriate section of the book in which details of the command can be found. Overall this is a well-written book which should be on the shelves of all who are using Windows. Stephen R. Heller, Agricultural Research Service The Chitin Sourcebook A Guide to the Research Literature. By E. R. Pariser and Donald P. Lombardi. John Wiley & Sons: New York. 1989. MIT Sea Grant College Program Report: MIT SG 8812. 686 pp. $174.50. ISBN 0471-62423-3. Long, long ago animals developed chitin as a structural polymer to give strength and suppleness to their exoskeletons. The design was so successful that the vast majority of animals continue to use it to this day. It confers toughness on their surfaces, sharpness on their beaks, and strength on the wings first used in true flight; in a pinch, it can also serve as a nutrient reserve, and animals can regulate permeability, flexibility, and transparency as needed. Annual rate of biosynthesis in the biosphere is estimated at 100 billion tons, and innumerable practical applications for chitin beckon. Since its first description in 181 I , chitin has intrigued and exasperated chemists. Even today, when we have accurate chemical descriptions of the proteo- and glycosaminoglycans comprising cartilage and sinews of vertebrates, the most detailed definition of chitin structure states that it consists "predominantly of unbranched @1,4-linked chains of N-acetylglucosamine". We still lack a generally accepted structural model consistent with all experimental evidence, there is no generally accepted means of identifying it unequivocally in situ, and problems persist with many assays of chitinases. The chitin literature is scattered over books and journals that may not be easily accessible, and soundly observed and reasoned papers exist side-by-side with others that are neither. A guide to the research literature as it has developed over the last several decades is needed, and The Chitin Sourcebook undertakes to provide 'a compendium ... to contain readily accessible and authoritative data of chitin product characteristics, methods of chitin preparation ...
360 J . Chem. In5 Comput. Sci., Vol. 31, No. 2, 1991 and similar topics of interest to commercial practitioners". The authors "selected about 500 readily accessible publications ... and specifically avoid(ed) cataloguing information that is of strictly academic importance". Sources utilized include books, papers collected in hardbound Proceedings of the first three International Chitin Conferences, Sea Grant Lectures, student theses, etc. This definition of 'ready accessibility" seems a bit odd, but that is the least of the problems with this book. The Chitin Sourcebook is divided into nine sections, the first eight of which organize the information under various headings that direct the readers to entries in Section IX, the Bibliography. The stated aim is to provide industrial managers with information useful for RBD work, but anyone familiar with the chitin literature must doubt whether this purpose is, in fact, achieved. Let us suppose that such a manager is interested in amino sugars-of which, after all, both chitin and chitosan are composed. In Section VII, under Index of Chemicals, one finds two entries: Amino sugars (Ref. 182) and Amino sugars, growth stimulation on B. bifidus (Ref. 322). In Section IX, the latter entry gives the title: Growth of Bifdobacterium bifidum var. Pennsylvanicus in Laboratory Media supplemented with Amino Sugars and Spent Broth from Escherichia coli. A journal reference, a list of authors, and a list of Keywords complete the entry. Keywords comprise Organisms and Chemicals. Under the former heading appear the following: Bifidobacterium bifidum var. pennsylvanicus; Bifidobacterium bifidum, effect of chitin level on bacterial growth rate: Escherichia coli. The heading Chemicals lists only: Amino sugars, growth stimulation on B. bifidum. Except for pagination, the rest of the page in this quartesized volume is blank. Ref. 182 (next to it is 180, 181 being unaccountably missing) is a patent citation: Anomer Enrichment of Alkyl Glycusidesof Amino Sugars. The only entry under Keywords for Ref. 182 is a list of chemicals that includes ethanol, methanol, several propanols, and amino sugars. The connection to chitin is obscure. Cross references are not given, presumably because entries under the names of individual amino sugars are not much more plentiful. Almost any entry (the reviewer did not try them all) in the organizing sections leads to disappointment when pursued into the Bibliography. Take no. 271 in Section VI: Methods of Analysis. Ref. 271 promises Paper Strength Determination and is the only one given for this important topic. The reference is to a 76-page Master's Thesis dating from 1975. There is a 2'/*-page list of Organisms, a number of which show up as follows: Locusts; Insects: Locusts; Grasshopper; Insects, chitin content; and Chitin, global resource. Paper strength does show up under Analysis, but since determination of intrinsic viscosity of diatomaceous chitin appears on the same page, when chitin is one of the most insoluble substances known to man, one may entertain legitimate doubts about the utility of pursuing this further. Padding in lists of organisms, chemicals, etc. is common. For example, ref. 188 lists Crab, Dungeness, Cancer magister; Dungeness crab, Cancer magister; and Cancer magisterDungeness crab, next to each other. Similar examples abound. The Chitin Sourcebook is beautifully bound, shoddily proofread, and apparently not edited at all. Indeed, it reads like the output of a vanity press. The authors state that research for it was begun in 1983 and continued to 1988; they acknowledge a number of sources for financial support. Given the paucity of monies available for chitin work in this country and the genuine advances which have over recent years been made in the field. one cannot help but feel a sense of despair that so much in the way of resources expended has resulted in so little that is useful. Maria L. Bade, Boston College "be Bebtein h l & e Data&
Implementation,Content, and Retrieval. Edited by Stephen R. Heller. ACS Symposium Series 436. American Chemical Society: Washington. 1990. 168 pp. $34.95. ISBN 08412-1 862-5. This book was developed from presentations delivered at a s y m p i u m
BOOK REVIEWS
sponsored by the ACS Division of Computers in Chemistry and from solicited articles to ensure thorough coverage of the topic. It covers in IO chapters the important aspects of the computer-based version of the Beilstein Handbook of Organic Chemistry, an invaluable source of chemical information. In the first chapter the editor provides a short overview of the history and contents of the Handbook and an introduction to the online version, including some cost considerations of online services. The next chapter discusses in detail the assembly of the Beilstein Online Database and future plans for its development. In subsequent chapters, contributors from the two online hosts which currently offer the database, STN and DIALOG, describe the 'design and implementation of Beilstein on their respective systems. Both chapters contain numerous search examples for factual data and reaction information. An explanation of the effective use of the indexing system specifically designed for accessing the Beilstein Database is featured in the DIALOG chapter. This chapter also discusses briefly the Softron S4 structure search system used by DIALOG. More information on this system is available in Chapter 5 which deals mainly with the MOLKICK PC-based software package used for u p loading structures to the DIALOG mainframe system. The use of the Beilstein Online Database in an industrial environment, specifically in a large pharmaceutical company, and in academe is discussed in Chaptm 6 and 9, respectively. In Chapter 7 the search for valuable reaction information contained in the database is described, illustrated by numerous examples involving different search strategies. The strength of the Beilstein Database is the large amount of physical property data stored with each chemical entity. Chapter 8 provides a comprehensive description of searching and retrieving these data, the logic of numeric range searching is explained, and new Messenger capabilities, including unit conversion and searching for missing values, is discussed. The last chapter contains a discussion of the Lawson number; its use, in particular for similarity searching, is illustrated by several examples and future enhancements of this important data field are described. The emphasis of this book is on providing a broad overview for the practitioner with a wide selection of searching strategies from which even experienced users can benefit. Readers who are interested in more detailed or theoretical aspects of the database are referred to the primary literature by good reference sections supplied with most chapters. The authors of the chapters are to be congratulated for being very objective in their discussions, and promoting commercial aspects are minimal. An exception is the chapter on MOLKICK, which dwells too much on promoting the program and on simple features, like query drawing. I would have liked to see instead a more extended discussion of S4, since the features of this program are not yet widely published. For a book of this type a certain amount of overlap is unavoidable. Where it occurs, in particular in dealing with definitions of the database, the repetitions do not distract from the overall purpose of the book. Some examples in the application-oriented Chapters 6 and 9 would have been even more effective had both chapters been placed at the end of the book since search strategies involve data fields for which a detailed description is found in subsequent chapters, e.g., the use of the Lawson number in the 'Markush search" in Chapter 6. The chapters are well written and produced, and a thorough index is provided. With few exceptions (Chapter 7) illustrationsare inserted close to the corresponding text for easy reading. The book is relatively free of typographical errors and mistakes (Table 7 in Chapter IV is missing and two paragraphs on pages 51-52 are interchanged). This book provides a broad overview of the large number of areas of numeric, factual, and structural information contained in the Beilstein Database and describes effective ways to retrieve these data. Experienced and casual users, from the information scientist to the practicing chemist, will gain a better understanding of this important database, and this should result in increased searching efficiency. Guenter Gretbe, Molecular Design Limited
