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Discovery Guide

This guide gives basic details on searching the library collections using the Discovery tool

What can you request

Our physical and online resources are available to all staff. To request a physical item, you can place either a loan request or a digitisation request:

Loan request – use this if you want to borrow the whole book.

  • You can choose to have it sent to your work address, home address, or pick-up from the site (available to staff woking where the item is kept).

Digitisation request – use this if you don’t need the whole book or require a journal article.

  • We will scan the required chapter, pages, or article (up to one chapter or 10%, or 1 article from the selected journal) and email you a PDF.

How to place requests

  • Log into Discovery and find the item you need
  • select the Available at link
  • to request a loan, go to the Document Delivery section of the record, and select Get a loan
    • select your Pickup location from the drop-down options
    • you can also select a volume (if there are multiple to choose from) and add a note to the library
    • click send.
  • To request a digitisation select Get a chapter or get this article
    • complete the form with as much detail as possible
    • Read and then select the check box to acknowledge the copyright declaration
    • select send.

The library doesn't have my item

Discovery will display records of items not held in the CSIRO collection.

  • To access these items submit a loan or digitisation request using the steps above. 
  • If you cannot locate the item in Discovery, please submit a Document Delivery request.

Please refer to the Document Delivery Service page for more information. 


Library notices

The following system generated notices are issued by the library:   

  • Borrowing Activity Report: twice a year (in February and August), we send out a reminder to all users with items on loan.This report is simply a friendly reminder to help you keep track of what you have borrowed and when it's due.
  • Courtesy Notice: reminder notice sent 7 days before an item’s due date
  • Overdue Notice: sent the day after an item is due. Items are changed to overdue status
  • Lost Notice: sent 28 days after an item is due.  Items are changed to lost status.

Blocks

To ensure fair access for all library users, we ask that CSIRO staff return any borrowed items that they no longer require.

  • If you have 3 or more overdue items, your borrowing privileges will be temporarily suspended.
  • You can quickly reinstate your borrowing access by requesting a renewal of any overdue items you have in your possession.
  • If you've misplaced or lost an item, contact Ask a Librarian, and we'll work with you to get everything sorted out.