There are lots of ways to access research materials while working from home. Here are a few things we recommend! [Thread] #openaccess

If you are looking for specific papers use @OA_Button or @unpaywall to find freely available versions of articles which are stuck behind paywalls. Both are available as browser plugins, and they search for (legal) free versions while you browse publisher websites.

If you are running searches, we have a dedicated section of our BL Explore catalogue for open access online materials, including books, articles and other resources: http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?mode=Basic&vid=BLVU1&tab=available_online&

If you are based at a university or other organisation with a library, you may have access to many subscribed-to resources while working from home (normally if you go to your home library’s catalogue and log-in before searching). Check with your librarian if unsure.

@oacore ( https://core.ac.uk ) and @BASEsearch ( https://www.base-search.net ) are excellent resources if you are searching for content freely available from home with almost 200 million articles (and other resources) indexed.

@DOAJplus ( https://doaj.org ) is also well worth searching, which includes articles published in journals from around the world and in different languages, and may provide different results from Core and BASE.

@Redalyc ( https://www.redalyc.org/ ) provides access to research published across Latin America and the Caribbean, @redescielo ( https://scielo.org ) primarily across Latin and South America. AJOL ( https://www.ajol.info ) provides access to research published across Africa.

Google Scholar https://scholar.google.co.uk  indexes from various sources and attempts to give you a direct link to the full text. Coverage of a full text is a bit patchy, though, and you may find yourself on a publisher’s website and behind a paywall.

Open access books can be harder to find. One of best resources for books is @DOABooks ( https://www.doabooks.org ) which indexes from lots of different publishers.

Finally: authors may privately share copies of papers with other researchers - try asking one of the authors as a last resort. If you are an author, make sure you upload a copy of your work to an open access repository to enable easier access (ask us how if you need to).