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Abstract
The article discusses a research aimed towards carrying out an evaluative study of websites of selected library networks of the USA. The study analyses the design and structure, website presentation, availability of links and webpages, accessibility of information content and availability of website aid tools on selected library networks' websites on the basis of number of checkpoints. A checklist was prepared to evaluate the design and structure of selected library networks' websites, and the data was collected from the websites. The study examines the type of links (internal links, external links, dofollow links, nofollow links, etc.) used by selected library networks websites. The result highlights that most of the library networks of the USA have well-structured and properly maintained websites with accurate information and accessible uniform resource locator (URL). It also reveals that most of the library networks' websites are using website-aid tools (such as search, navigation, comment, feedback, and Web 2.0 tools), which makes it easy to navigate information from different webpages.
Keywords: Website design, Website structure, Website evaluation, Library networks
Introduction
Information has become a pervasive necessity in nearly every phenomenon of life. The present age has also been defined as the information age, global information village, and global information economy. We live in an infotech age where every user requires accurate, factual, and quick information. The major concern today for libraries is that the users including the students and the teachers have begun to use web resources for their study as WWW is interactive, easy to use, and includes sounds and animation that makes it a rich communication medium. World Wide Web (WWW) has a lot to offer but not all sources are equally valuable or reliable. Nowadays, users have begun to use web resources for everything frequently (Chaubey and Kumar 2004). The WWW is widely used in every sector of information organization as it is useful for gathering timely information which is freely available (sometimes a subscription needed) 24 x 7. The WWW fulfils the Fourth Law of Library Science as it saves the time of the users by providing Library Science them as timely it saves and the easy time access of the to well- users by organized information content.
Library networks' websites are extremely useful in the...