Improve ILL Workflows with this OA Search Tool

A growing number of web tools are available for discovering cost-free, open access, full-text scholarly articles. These tools are attractive to both ILL staff, who are interested in retrieving materials quickly for their patrons, and library and university administrators, who want to minimize operational costs. With so many tools available, which are most effective for the task at hand? This poster compares the services of Directory of Open Access Journals, Google, Google Scholar, Jurn, OAIster, OpenDOAR, and Open Access Button in their ability to locate full-text scholarly articles that are freely available online. While most of these tools offer metasearch functionality, one comes out on top with regard to quantity of successful results and ease of use. Findings have implications for optimizing the efficiencies of ILL departments; staff will feel empowered to conduct a sufficient search for open access materials prior to submitting ILL requests.