OCLC, the central catalog organization of most major college, university and public libraries, announces
the release of the new WorldCat.org Web site.
This site—and a downloadable WorldCat search box you can easily add to
your Web site—opens the complete WorldCat database to the public, not
just the smaller data subsets utilized by Open WorldCat partner sites such
as Google, Yahoo! Search and others. WorldCat.org builds on the success of
OCLC’s Open WorldCat Program that has elevated the visibility of library
materials on the open Web since the summer of 2003.
The main attraction of the new site is the WorldCat search box. Web users
can now search the entire WorldCat database with the method most familiar
to them: simple keywords. As in Open WorldCat, each linked result leads to
a “Find in a Library” information page. From there, users can enter
geographic information such as a zip or postal code, receive a list of
nearby libraries that own the item, and link right to a library’s online
catalog record to initiate circulation activity or access electronic
content directly. Users can also create their own WorldCat account and add
book reviews, table-of-contents information and notes to many WorldCat
items, helping to personalize their library search experience.
From WorldCat.org, any Web user or organization can also easily download
and install the free, WorldCat search box to their personal or commercial
Web page, allowing even more people to discover library content through
WorldCat. Libraries and other groups inside and outside the OCLC
cooperative are encouraged to add the box to their sites. … the ability to search for library materials to as many other sites as possible will help increase the awareness of libraries as primary
sources of reliable information and helpful personal assistance.
In terms of music searching, the WorldCat catalog includes books, names of journals, 78s, LPs, CDs, DVDs, sheet music, scores and musical anthologies that are held by many libraries in the US, Canada, Europe and other places.
To try the new WorldCat search box and download the box to your own Web
site, visit the site at http://worldcat.org.