guide/artic

Finding Articles Online

Most researchers are familiar with the value-added online services
such as Dialog and Factiva

which lets you search a number of the fee-based online services
without a subscription

is an effort by Google to point you to either a summary or,
occasionally, the full text of 'scholarly' articles and books.

(Although the name of this service is Google Scholar, it also includes
articles from less academic publications that are directed at
professionals, such as Dental Assisting, Library Trends, and
even The New York Times.)

While the search page and the search results look similar to the
regular Google search engine, you're searching a different index of
material.

And the search results are strikingly different from the Google search
engine.

Many of the search result items link to article citations and abstracts
provided by the publisher or an aggregator.
You can purchase a copy of the full text of the article directly from the
publisher or aggregator - most prices range from $10 to $30 per article.

A relatively small number of citations include links to a free, full-text
copy of the article.

The search results page also provides information on the number of
citations to each article within the Google Scholar database
(which isn't the same as ALL citations to the article, of course).

This is sometimes a useful way of gauging an articles impact within
that discipline.

Google Book Search *

Some results are labeled "citation", and are just that - all that Google
knows about the item is the title, author's name, publication title and
date.

There is no link to an abstract, nor a direct way to purchase a copy
of the article, report or book.

Likewise, entries from the Google Book Search database
(http://books.google.com) also appear in Google Scholar results,
along with a link to the Google Book Search page for that book.

There is a link labeled "web search" next to each of these Google
search engine for the words within the title.

Scirus *

It includes both summaries of scientific/technical journal articles
and selected science-oriented web pages.

(You can also choose to search only articles or only WEBSITEs.)
If you click the link to an article from the search results screen, you
will be taken to a web page through which you can purchase a PDF
copy of the full text.

In the case of Web material, you can click through to see the full text
of the item.

The search results page also includes suggested words and phrases
that can help you narrow your search.

Since this list is generated automatically, some of the phrases may
be more useful than others.

You can also click a box on the left side of any of the search result
items and then click the "Email checked results" or "Export checked
results" to produce a list of the articles you have selected.

PubMed *

PubMed is the well-known database built and maintained by the US
National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health.

Very few of the records within this database are in full text; on the
other hand, this is a very in-depth collection of medical research,
dating back to the 1950s.

There are links within selected article summaries that will take you to
a free, full text archive.

Look for a link labeled "Free full text article".

Be sure to click the "Help | FAQ" link for detailed information on how
to conduct focused searches and limit your results to just the types
of information you need.

CiteSeer | SMEALsearch *

CiteSeer and SMEALsearch provide access to summaries of scientific
and business literature, respectively.

What is particularly intriguing about these two databases is that they
let you look for articles that reference a particular article, thus letting
you track down articles related to your topic.

Individual records list the articles that cite that record ("Cited by:")
as well as a list of "Similar documents" and "Related documents",
calculated by analyzing the articles themselves.

These two databases are built by specialized search engine spiders
that scour the web for full text articles, so you can download the full
text of any of the articles retrieved in CiteSeer or SMEALsearch.

Because of the requirement that all articles are in full text, these are
smaller databases than Scirus or Pubmed.

OAIster *

OAIster is an index to academically-oriented "digital resources"
available for free from close to 600 libraries and other organizations.

These digital resources range from images at the Library of Congress
to audio files, reference books such as dictionaries, articles from
online journals, and electronic books.

You can search for any word within the document, or you can limit
your search to the document title, author, subject or type of material
(audio, video, text and so on).

The search results page includes a description of each item, along
with a link you can click to get a copy of the item.

There is also a link next to each listing, "add to bookbag".

Click this link and the item is added to the equivalent of a shopping
cart (except that there is no charge for any of the material retrieved
through OAIster).

When you are finished with your searches, click the link
"View Bookbag" and you can then select to have the OAIster records
emailed to you or downloaded.

Note, however, that what you receive is simply the OAIster record,
not the "digital resource" described.

You'll still have to click the link in each record in order to view the full
text of the resource.

NOTE:

Some publishers are making the full text of their articles available for
free on their WEBSITE, even to people who don't subscribe to their
publications.

Newspapers and general-interest magazines such as Newsweek and
Car & Driver usually make all or most of their articles available on their
site, although they may offer a limited archive of articles from prior
issues.

Gradually, more of the academic, medical and sci-tech publishers are
also beginning to make their publications available on the web.

One striking example is the Public Library of Science
(http://www.plos.org), which publishes six peer-reviewed journals on
the Web; you can pay $175/year to have a print subscription mailed to
you, but the expectation is that readers will download and print the
issues themselves.

Other examples of free, high-quality publications include the

IBM Journal of Research and Development,
(http://www.research.ibm.com/journal/rd/) and
JAMA (http://jama.ama-assn.org),
the journal of the American Medical Association.

* Source: Search Tip of the Month, January 2006, www.BatesInfo.com/subscribe.html

BioMed Central **

Provides free access to full text articles from over 100 Open Access
journals

In biology and medicine

This site requires free registration

Directory of Open Access **

Provides an advanced search for finding articles among the 347
journals searchable this way

Various academic topics are included among those journals

FindArticles.Com **

Provides access to over 900 publications and over 5.5 million articles

Provides both basic and advanced search options

Highwire **

Free online full text science articles

Most articles will be available in full text format

PubMed Central **

A large digital archive of biomedical journal articles

** Source: John Jaeger - Dallas Baptist University Library

Updated November 1, 2006