Research Guides: Electrical Engineering Subject Guide: Finding Articles

Google Scholar Search Tips

How to use Google Scholar to find full text articles that the library has paid for?

Go to Google Scholar website.
Click on the title of an article in Google Scholar. If the library has subscribed to that journal, you can access the article directly, when you are on campus (If you are off campus, you will need your MSU NetID and Password to access the article, or you can install VPN).
Click on “Find It@MSState Libraries”. This will open up a dialog box. The Find It button will either connect to the library's online catalog or take you to the InterLibrary Loan request page.

To learn more about searching Google Scholar, check the Google Scholar for Academic Research guide.

Subject Specific Databases

ACM Digital Library This link opens in a new window
The full text collection of all Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) publications, including journals, conference proceedings, technical magazines, newsletters and books.
arXiv This link opens in a new window
Open access to more than 1.2 million e-prints in Physics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Quantitative Biology, Quantitative Finance, and Statistics
IEEE Xplore This link opens in a new window
IEEE Xplore digital library is a powerful resource for discovery of and access to scientific and technical content published by the IEEE and its publishing partners. IEEE Xplore provides access to more than four-million full-text documents from some of the world's most highly cited publications in electrical engineering, computer science and electronics.
MathSciNet This link opens in a new window
Based on Mathematical Reviews, MathSciNet is a database offering access to reviews, abstracts, and bibliographic information of the mathematical sciences literature.
Tutorial: http://www.ams.org/mathscinet/help/full_search_help_full.html
Scopus This link opens in a new window
Scopus is the largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature including scientific journals, books, and conference proceedings.
Tutorial: http://info.scopus.com

CiteSeerX
CiteSeerX is a search engine that primarily provides literature in computer and information science research. CiteSeerX indexes PostScript and PDF research articles on the Web.
Computing Research Repository
This repository is established through a partnership of ACM, the arXiv.org e-print archive, and NCSTRL (Networked Computer Science Technical Reference Library).
USENIX Conference Papers
The Advanced Computing Systems Association web site publishes conference papers since 2008. All videos of conference technical session presentations are also available.

Interdisciplinary Databases

ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window
ScienceDirect is the portal to retrieve Elsevier eJournals and eBooks. (MSU does not have full-text access to all Elsevier journals and books.)
Google Scholar This link opens in a new window
Provides a Google search of scholarly content and literature across many disciplines and sources, including theses, books, abstracts and articles. Set Google preferences to access full-text via the MSU Libraries many databases and journals.
Tutorial: http://library.msstate.edu/content/templates/?a=884

Finding the Full Text

To find journal articles, use the library's online databases . In the databases, you can conduct keyword, author, title, or subject searching.

Always use the Find It button for possible full text online. Examine any holdings statements to see if we have the volume and issue that the article appears in.
If no full-text available online, then use the Find It button to connect to the library's online catalog to see if the library has the journal in print format, so you can locate the article in the library.
If the library doesn't have the article online or in print, use Interlibrary Loan to get it from another library.

Searching Techniques

Boolean Connectors

AND: narrows the search by finding records with both terms
OR: broadens the search by finding records with either term
NOT: narrows the search by finding records with 1st term but not 2nd

Truncation

Using the asterisk (*) to stand in for variant endings of a search term

Subject Terms

Database indexing terms
Once subject terms for a database have been identified, can change search fields from “Select a Field” to “SU Subjects” (exact wording can vary by database)

Library update: Recent database changes

Electrical Engineering Subject Guide

Google Scholar Search Tips

Subject Specific Databases

Interdisciplinary Databases

Finding the Full Text

Searching Techniques