he latest release of DOCLINE, Version 2.1, released on April 5, 2004, features additional cues to alert users to free full text articles in both DOCLINE and Loansome Doc^®. For more information on DOCLINE 2.1, see the latest DOCLINE Release Notes.

In DOCLINE and in Loansome Doc when a free article is identified, a message is displayed at the top of the screen stating the number of items available free. In addition, below the citation, a yellow free icon is displayed followed by the appropriate text (See Figure 1):

 

When the free link appears, click on the link and the article will be displayed. When user registration is required, a login page will display where a new user can register with that producer or can login if a user account has already been established with that producer.

The definitions of the free links are as follows:

The free full text article is available at a LinkOut provider's website.

The free full text article is available at a LinkOut provider's website. Users must register at the site in order to get access to the free full text article.

The free full text article is available via PubMed Central® (PMC), the U.S. National Library of Medicine's digital archive of life sciences journal literature.

Full text links in PubMed are either voluntarily supplied and maintained by LinkOut providers or available in PubMed Central. Not all free full text providers participate in LinkOut or provide data to PubMed Central. The LinkOut team tries to work with providers to make sure their links work properly; however, this is the provider's responsibility. Problems with links can be reported to the LinkOut team at linkout@ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. To report a problem to the provider directly, a contact link is usually available at the provider's Web site.

Please Note
If requests are sent to NLM for articles that are free in PubMed Central, NLM will fill the request and charge the usual fee. We hope that users and library staff will use the free links and, thereby, avoid paying for articles that are freely available.

By Deena Acton
Technical Service Division

Acton D. DOCLINE Version 2.1 Adds Visual Cues for Free Full Text. NLM Tech Bull. 2004 May-Jun;(338):e6.