Library Resource Discovery Products: Context, Library Perspectives, and Vendor Positions

Interfacing with library collections has changed drastically in the past several years, now integrating not only with the ILS but other local and external resources. Offering valuable guidance for effectively evaluating discovery systems, this issue of Library Technology Reports is filled with information on recent trends and the current state of the art in discovery. Breeding surveyed discovery vendors and 396 libraries on overall satisfaction and perceived effectiveness, and this report details his findings and conclusions. Focusing on the dominant index-based web scale discovery systems for academic and research libraries, and the emergent e-book lending functionality for public libraries, this report covers

• EBSCO, Ex Libris, OCLC, and Serial Solutions descriptions of their resource coverage
• Librarian comments on coverage from eight different products
• Product profiles of four major web-scale discovery services, six general discovery interfaces, and three integrated discovery and portal services
• APIs for e-book integration from Overdrive, 3M Cloud Library, and Baker & Taylor s Axis 360
• Insight into the competitive environment that impedes comprehensive article-level indexing

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