LibGuides@Southampton: Electronics and Computer Science (ECS): Finding Useful Articles & Databases

Why Use Journals?

Articles are more up-to-date than books
They offer greater detail and insight into research
Peer-reviewed articles are considered more reliable

How Do I Know If You Have It?

Found a good article? Now you need to know whether you can get the full text.

If you've run a database search, the article's record may have a "Full Text" or "PDF" link - that's great: click to get the full text. If not, look out for the Full Text Finder icon - click this to find out if we have access to the journal.

How Do I Reference An Article?

Referencing articles you've used is important - it demonstrates that you've researched your topic, it allows others to find the article to read for themselves, and it avoids accusations of plagairism.

Check out our Citing and Referencing page for more information.

Finding More Articles and Reports using Databases ..

Try one of these Databases for detailed and focused searching. Go to the Technical Information page to access resources such as Patents, Standards, Reports and Data plus much more.

ePrints Soton This link opens in a new window
ePrints Soton is the University's Institutional Research Repository.
arXiv This link opens in a new window
arXiv provides open access to research papers in physics and related disciplines. It includes articles not yet peer-reviewed/ published and allows access to cutting edge research.
CORE This link opens in a new window
Core is the world’s largest collection of open access full text research papers - aggregating and enriching open access research papers from around the world.
Espacenet This link opens in a new window
Search and access full text of patents from over 90 countries. To restrict to UK patents add 'GB' to the 'Publication number' field.
British Standards Online This link opens in a new window
Search and access the full text of all current British Standards and many international standards (e.g. ISOs/IECs). See Terms & Conditions for printing and copying.
*From 1/9/2021 onwards, you will need to have the FileOpen plug-in installed to access BSI documents.
The plug-in can be downloaded from Serviceline here. For more information click here.
ESDU Data This link opens in a new window
ESDU is an engineering knowledge base which provides essential design and analysis methods and guides, data and software tools to help solve complex engineering problems. These design guides can be used in a wide range of engineering disciplines, including ISVR, aerospace, mechanical, civil, transportation and chemical engineering.
Electronics and Communications Abstracts This link opens in a new window
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This database provides bibliographic coverage on circuits, components and materials, photonics, control and systems, telecommunications, equipment and instrumentation, power systems and electrical engineering.
Proquest Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window
The world's most comprehensive collection of full-text dissertations and theses.
Click 'login' for on campus access. For access off campus, click 'login', enter 'University of Southampton' in the institutional field followed by your institutional username and password.
Compendex This link opens in a new window
Compendex is the broadest and most complete engineering literature database available in the world. It provides a truly holistic and global view of peer reviewed and indexed publications with over 20 million records from 77 countries across 190 engineering disciplines. Further information.
INSPEC This link opens in a new window
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A leading database in the fields of physics, electronics and electrical engineering, computers and control, and information technology. It contains abstracts of articles from over 3000 journals, as well as conference proceedings, books, technical reports and dissertations. Coverage: 1966 to date. Further information
Web of Science Core Collection This link opens in a new window
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Provides references, and in many cases abstracts, for peer-reviewed scholarly journal articles in the sciences, social sciences, arts and humanities. Includes the Science Citation Index Expanded (1970-present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1970-present) and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975-present). Also provides citation data and references to books and conference papers. Click on the Full Text Finder links to check for full-text.
Our access to WOS now includes the 'Emerging Sources Citations Index: 2005-present'. Journals included in ESCI cover all disciplines and range from international and broad scope publications to those that provide deeper regional or speciality area coverage.
ACM Digital Library This link opens in a new window
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Full text access to the Association of Computing Machineries journals and conferences - this includes all current content and in many cases a full backfile (to the 1950s in some cases).
IEEE Xplore This link opens in a new window
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Full text access to all IET and IEEE journals and conferences since 1988 and all active and archival (but not draft) IEEE standards.
Lecture Notes In Computer Science (LNCS) This link opens in a new window
Reports new developments in computer science and information technology research and teaching. Full text available from 1975 - present day. LNCS also includes the sub-series LNAI (in Artificial Intelligence) and LNBI (in Bio-informatics).
Scopus This link opens in a new window
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Scopus is the largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature: scientific journals, books and conference proceedings. Delivering a comprehensive overview of the world's research output in the fields of science, technology, medicine, social sciences, and arts and humanities, Scopus features smart tools to track, analyze and visualize research.
Gale Newspapers This link opens in a new window
You can access current UK newspapers such as the Guardian, Independent, Independent on Sunday and Observer from 1985 onwards.

Understanding An Article Reference

A correctly formatted reference will tell you exactly where to find the full article:

DING, Y., JACOB, E. K., ZHIXIONG, Z., FOO, S., ERJIA, Y., GEORGE, N. L. and LIJIANG, G. (2009) Perspectives on social tagging, Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 60 (12), 2388-2401.

This article was written by Y Ding & colleagues, and the article's title is "Perspectives on social tagging". It was published in 2009 in the journal called "Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology". It was published in volume 60, issue 12, and the article ran from page 2388 to 2401.

No Full Text?

Important article? Can't get the full text? Try our Inter-Library Loans service...

Off-Campus Access

Accessing library resources from home

To connect to library resources such as databases and journals you will need to use the University’s VPN service called Globalprotect. Advice on how to set your connection up can be found on the iSolutions page How do I set up VPN on my device?