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	News from AustLII (31 May 2006)
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CONTENTS

     Improved Results Interface and Search Features
     New Databases
     AustLII National Training Programme
     Employment Opportunities at AustLII
     Subscription Information
     Contact Details

IMPROVED RESULTS INTERFACE AND SEARCH FEATURES

AustLII launched its new search results interface on May 30. The new search results interface has been significantly improved in both its functionality and ease of use. Sino, AustLII's search engine, has also been enhanced.

RESULTS INTERFACE

The first thing you will notice about the new results interface is that it uses the tab theme popularised by the Mozilla Firefox web browser. The default tab displays your search results in the conventional "By Relevance" order. By simply clicking on the new "By Date", "By Title" or "By Database" tabs, your results will quickly be displayed in date order, alphabetical order by document title or by database. But that's not all.

The "By Relevance", "By Date" and "By Title" tabs come with two options: "Collapse Multi-sections" and "Show All Sections". By choosing "Collapse Multi-sections", search results with numerous legislation references can now be made more readable by displaying just the name of the Act or Regulation and the most relevant section or clause. All other sections or clauses may be displayed by clicking on "More results from this legislation". "Show All Sections", the default, ranks and displays every section or clause separately.

The "By Title" tab also has a "Collapse Titles" option which groups the results together based on the first letter (A-Z) or number (0-9) in the document title.

The "By Database" tab has two options: "Collapse List" and "Expand List". Choosing "Collapse List" collapses the database listing by jurisdiction (eg by State/Federal), if chosen again it will collapse further by database type (legislation/cases/law journals/secondary materials) and if chosen a final time will collapse by country (Australia/New Zealand).

A new box at the top right of the results pages allows you to repeat your search over Legal Publishers (searches full text of content on CCH Australia Limited), Catalog & Web search (searches categories in the WorldLII Catalog, and full text of those sites indexed by AustLII's web spider), WorldLII Databases (searches all 650 databases on WorldLII); and Law on Google (converts the AustLII search into the correct format for Google and adds terms to restrict it to law-related materials).

Finally, you may choose to 10, 20 (default), 50 or 100 results per page.

SEARCH ENGINE

• The search language is now more compatible with Lexis, Westlaw and Google syntax. Google style searches like +murder -child etc work as do /10 style Westlaw/QL operators.
• Dates now work properly for sorting results.
• All results from a search, no matter how many, are now returned. A previous limit of 20,000 maximum results that could be sorted has been removed.
• All words will become searchable (not fully implemented). However, a new smaller list of common words needs to be put in double quotes before they are searchable.
• Search times are much faster. However, excessive placing of phrases in quotation marks can lead to very slow results.

FEEDBACK

If you have feedback, let us know by filling in the AustLII feedback form at <http://www.austlii.edu.au/austlii/feedback.html>.

NEW DATABASES

"Australian Privacy Case Summaries 2004-" This database contains summaries of Australian privacy cases, including summaries of NSW Administrative Decisions Tribunal and Appeal Panel cases by Anna Johnston, from 2004 onwards. See: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/AUPrivCS/>.

"Commonwealth Numbered Regulations Explanatory Statements 2005-" This database contains the full text of explanatory statements to numbered regulations from 2005 onwards. Each explanatory statement is also linked back to the relevant regulation and each regulation has a link to its explanatory statement via the [Related Items] link in the table of contents page for the regulation. See: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/num_reg_es/>.

"Joint Standing Committee on Treaties (JSCOT)" This database contains publications from the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties. See: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/other/jscot/>

"Journal of the Australian Tax Teachers Association 2005-" The full text of the Journal of the Australian Tax Teachers Association is now available on AustLII from 2005 onwards. See: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/JATTA/>.

"Murdoch University Electronic Journal of Law 1993-" The full text of the Murdoch University Electronic Journal of Law is now available on AustLII covering issues from 1993 onwards. See: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/MurUEJL/>.

"Victorian Legal Profession Tribunal 2004-2005" This database contains selected decisions of the Legal Profession Tribunal of Victoria from 2004-2005 before its jurisdiction was merged with VCAT. See: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/vic/VLPT/>.

AUSTLII NATIONAL TRAINING PROGRAMME

The AustLII National Training Programme in Internet Legal Research, presented in conjunction with Continuing Legal Education (CLE) at UNSW, is being held in Sydney at UNSW on Wednesday 28 June 2006 and on Friday, 28 July 2006.

Courses in other cities are scheduled when there is sufficient demand. To register your interest for a course in another city, please contact CLE at UNSW on Tel: (02) 9385 2267 Fax: (02) 9385 1155 or Email: cle(at)unsw.edu.au.

This full day course is a systematic introduction to Australian and international legal materials on the Internet, with the emphasis on those available for free access. The wealth of free-access digital resources that have become available in recent years make them indispensable both to those who depend on free access, and to those who also have access to the commercial legal publishers' services. The course includes:

• Researching Australian legislation;
• Researching Australian case law;
• Australian secondary legal research resources;
• Foreign legal systems and international law.

For a brochure or to register, see <http://www.austlii.edu.au/training/>.

EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES AT AUSTLII

AustLII is hiring additional staff in 2006. We are looking for systems and project officers. These officers will be responsible for the development and maintenance of AustLII and WorldLII databases as well as developing AustLII and WorldLII systems and software. We are seeking applicants with strong skills in computer science. A background in law is highly desirable.

These positions will be situated at AustLII's offices at the UTS Broadway campus. Applications close on 30 June 2006. For more details, see: <http://www.austlii.edu.au/austlii/employment/20060512.html>.

SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION

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CONTACT DETAILS

Australasian Legal Information Institute (AustLII)

m: PO Box 123 Broadway NSW 2007 AUSTRALIA
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