Home > For Peabody Students > Online Tutorials > UnCover : Periodical Index and Document Delivery Service
What is UnCover?
UnCover is a database of current article information taken from more than 17,000 multidisciplinary journals developed by the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries (CARL). Ingenta has made this bibliographic database available for free searching over the Internet and integrated it with a fee-based document delivery service. You may search by journal title and browse the table of content pages of your favorite journals, or you may perform name searches for specific authors or word searches for topics or persons of interest to you from multiple journals and limit searches by year. Many of the articles may be available by fax within 24 hours. You may copy or email citations at no charge.
UnCover contains brief descriptive information for over 7,000,000 articles which have appeared since Fall 1988. More than 4000 articles are added daily. If you find an article that you wish to obtain in whole, you may have it faxed to you for a fee that will be charged to your VISA, MasterCard, or deposit account. The fee varies per article, but will generally be between $15 and $25, which covers copyright fees, service charges, and fax costs. Articles will be delivered directly to your fax machine within 24 hours of ordering (Mon-Fri). There is also a limited number of '1 Hour' articles available for immediate delivery 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
How To Access UnCover
You may connect to Ingenta's UnCover service using a Web browser.
- Go to http://www.ingenta.com
- Click on the Search UnCover database button.
- You will then have the option to Search UnCover Now or Create a new profile (See below for info on profile).
- You may search by keyword, name or author, or journal title by selecting the appropriate radio button.
- There is on-line help, as well. Just click on Help.
User Profile
You will need to decide if you want to set up a user account (User Profile) or simply enter the database and browse. If you are going to regularly use the document delivery service, you will be charged a lower rate if you have an account set up. This involves giving your personal information such as name, address, fax number and credit card number. You will also be required to set a password. If you enter the system under Open Access and should decide to order an article, you will then have to submit the required information for each article until you set up an account.
Obtaining Journal Articles
UnCover will deliver documents to you, but only for a fee. Remember to first check ACORN to determine if the article is available in a journal held at Vanderbilt. If the article is not found at Vanderbilt and time is not a critical concern (and you are a graduate student or faculty/staff of Vanderbilt), then you may chose to use the traditional Interlibrary Loan service. You may make an Interlibrary loan request at any of the Vanderbilt libraries, or you may submit the request directly to the Interlibrary Loan office by sending an email message with the complete citation for the article to ill@library.vanderbilt.edu or by using the Web form at Interlibrary Loan Forms. You can expect to receive the article in two-to-three weeks.
UnCover's Document Delivery Service
While no fee is charged for searching the UnCover database, there are charges for the document delivery service. You can register your name, fax and credit card numbers in a User Profile before searching. At any time you can MARK an article (telnet: Type article number + M; Web: click the Mark for Order button) for purchase. Copy and delivery charges will be listed. When you are finished searching you will be prompted to type O <Enter> for Order. You will again have the opportunity to enter name, address, FAX and credit card numbers. Visa and MasterCard are accepted or you may set up a deposit account.
Articles Not Found in UnCover
UnCover Complete allows you to order items from any periodical listed in UnCover, even if it is not indexed in the database. This includes things from earlier issues of the journals in UnCover as well as things which are not always indexed such as book reviews and letters to the editor. To use UnCover Complete, simply do a Browse search for the journal title and follow the prompts for UnCover Complete. Once you have selected a journal, you will see the prompt <C> for UnCover Complete. After entering a <C>, you will be asked a series of questions about the item, such as author, page number, etc. You should enter as much information as possible to enable UnCover to locate and deliver the item to you. Once you have answered all of the questions, you will be given the chance to EDIT any incorrect entries. After you are sure the information is correct, enter an <M> to MARK the article for Delivery. When you are ready to Order, use the regular ordering function (<O> to Order). The price you see for the article includes the service fee, copyright charge, and fax surcharge, if applicable. There are no additional charges for UnCover Complete.
Remember, before you purchase an article, make sure you check ACORN to see if it is available from a Vanderbilt library. There is no requirement to purchase anything, and the database can simply be used as an article index. Other database services are also available from the Ingenta menu, though most require a password to access.
Further information and assistance in searching the Ingenta UnCover database is available from the liaison librarians at the Peabody Library (see the specific liaison for your program [under the Research Consultation heading]).
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Last updated September 9, 2004.