About the Libraries
Related Links
Quick Links
Libraries and Engineering Testing Self-Service Document Delivery
Nowhere has the information explosion been felt more keenly than in the field of journals publishing. The number of published journals is growing steadily. At the same time rampant inflation in the cost of subscriptions is forcing libraries to reduce existing commitments and to cancel journals. Recognizing the importance of journal literature for scholarly research, libraries are looking for alternative, cost- and service-effective ways to acquire journal articles for their clients.
Document delivery provides an exciting and beneficial way to bring users and desired journal resources together. Commercial document delivery vendors with access to tens of thousands of journals world-wide can supply desired articles via fax within hours, sometimes minutes, of a request. Library users benefit from both the speed of delivery, which can come directly to any location with telefacsimile equipment, and from the broad scope of vendor databases.
Interlibrary Loan staff currently use several document delivery services to provide articles for researchers. But a pilot project, conducted jointly by the School of Engineering and the University Libraries will test the value of "unmediated" document delivery for the UConn community. "Unmediated" means that faculty members and others can, from their personal workstations, request materials directly from one or more commercial vendors without the intervention of library staff. Users of these services can also be "profiled," to receive automatic notification of new articles or journals that are germane to their research interests.
The pilot project will continue through the 1996/1997 academic year. At its conclusion an analysis will determine, among other factors, user satisfaction and the viability of the tested vendor(s). For more information contact Bill Uricchio at 486-4911; or bill.uricchio@uconnvm.uconn.edu.
Back to the Table of Contents