In my opinion linkresolvers like SFX from Ex Libris have been libraries saviors for visibility and findability in the ever expanding webification of information.
Findings show users are moving away more and more from library websites and find scholarly information in big freely available search engines like Google Scholar.
Linkresolvers are contributing largely in the awareness that libraries are responsible for making the information available and accessible for their patrons. They connect information on the web with the local library and the library services. Without linkresolvers the idea that all information is free and in fulltext available for everybody on the web would have become an idée fixe by all (and not just by many which is the case right now...;-)
I have been tracking the use of out preferred linkresolver SFX for years in relation to PubMed and wrote some posts about the use and functionality in the past :
- Usage PUBMED Outside Tool : SFX Statistics of RUGLinks (2010)
- Usage PubMed Outside Tool : SFX statistics of RUGLinks (2008)
- PubMed Updates : Linkout & Filters & New records
Here is the 2013 update on the use of PUBMED wíth Get it!, our Outside-tool, the SFX-linker (previously called "RUGlinks").
The special URL turns on our library’s Outside Tool for every record displayed in PubMed.
People click the special URL with our Outside Tool username on average:
• 786 times per day
• 32 times per hour
• every 111 seconds somebody clicks TO PubMed with this URL!
(See previous posts for more details)
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Even more interesting is the numbers of users actually CLICKing on our library’s Outside Tool icon, on average:
• 1109 times per day
• 46 times per hour
• every 79 seconds somebody clicks the GET IT! icon in PUBMED to get access to the fulltext and see info about the availability of the specific document.
•Total 2012: 404833
The special URL turns on our library’s Outside Tool for every record displayed in PubMed.
In 2012 it was clicked: 286893 times
Unfortunately we do not have the full data for 2010 ( 276.897 in oktober 2010) and 2011. The 2009 amount was exceptional. I think we can conclude that there seems to be a steady amount of clicks per year now with no big growth to be expected.
The questions are:
- Is there another tool getting more popular (UpToDate, Google Scholar ...) to get to PubMed data?
- Are other databases used more frequently to find biomedical scientific information?
- Are people getting to PubMed more WITHOUT using the right url?
People click the special URL with our Outside Tool username on average:
• 786 times per day
• 32 times per hour
• every 111 seconds somebody clicks TO PubMed with this URL!
(See previous posts for more details)
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Even more interesting is the numbers of users actually CLICKing on our library’s Outside Tool icon, on average:
• 1109 times per day
• 46 times per hour
• every 79 seconds somebody clicks the GET IT! icon in PUBMED to get access to the fulltext and see info about the availability of the specific document.
•Total 2012: 404833
SFX from Ex Libris is also used at University of Groningen Library and the Central Medical Library, University Medical Center Groningen to:
- find E-Journals: A-Z Titles, By category, Locate by Vendor/Category
- create persistent Citation Links: Citation Linker
- create an xml-holdings file to activate PubMed Linkout tool and make library collection and fulltext availability direct visible
(more on this later, read also: PubMed Updates : Linkout & Filters & New records) - create an xml-holdings file to activate the OpenURL Get It visible in Google Scholar. IN Settings of Google Scholar users can set their preferred Library to connect with and again, make the library visible for the user to contact directly.
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