FDsys Online Tutorials

For the last decade, GPO Access, the online version of the US Government Printing Office, has provided free electronic access to documents produced by the Federal Government. This free service, funded by the Federal Depository Library Program, arose out of Public Law 103-40, known as the Government Printing Office Electronic Information Enhancement Act of 1993. GPO Access has been the online source for the US Code, bills, committee reports, hearings, the Federal Register and Code of Federal Regulations, and other documents; most materials are available in PDF back to the mid-1990s. However, GPO Access's primitive search engine was generally useful for retrieving known citations.

Now, the Federal Digital System (FDsys - accent on the D) is the new advanced digital system that will enable GPO to manage Government information from all three branches of the US Government. The migration of information from GPO Access into FDsys will be complete in 2009. Until then GPO Access will contain all content. FDsys (http://fdsys.gpo.gov/) is currently available in beta format. It currently offers more than 150,000 of the same congressional and executive documents as GPO Access, with advanced search capabilities and a more user-friendly interface. It is also the only source for the Daily Compilation of Presidential Documents which replaced the former Weekly Compilation earlier this year.

GPO has made available brief FDsys video tutorials, including an FDsys overview, simple search, advanced and citation search, and browsing. The FDsys tutorials are:

• FDsys Overview - This video is a brief overview on the background of FDsys.
• FDsys Simple Search - This is a video tutorial on how to perform simple searches within the system and filter your results.
• FDsys Advanced Search - This is a video tutorial on how to perform advanced searches and citation searches within the system.
• FDsys Browse - This is a video tutorial on how to browse for government publications within FDsys.
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