OAIster on EBSCO Discovery Service, FirstSearch, and OAIster.worldcat.org

This review of OAIster investigated the utility of OAIster as a tool for library users to discover and access relevant information. Because the vision for OAIster is so large, one goal of this review was to describe OAIster based on reviewing search results. FirstSearch, OAIster.worldcat.org, and EBSCO Discovery Service interfaces were reviewed. Five searches were performed in each interface, and the material types and counts were recorded. Because OAIster is intended to link only to publicly accessible resources, links to resources were also tested. The review found large differences across interfaces in the number of results, classification of records into material types, and access to resources. Discovery tools do not always map OAIster metadata effectively, and public search engines do not seem to thoroughly index OAIster. Some OAIster records link to non-full‐text or not publicly accessible resources. OAIster is a valuable tool for discovering resources in archives, special collections, and institutional repositories, but its place among Open Access search tools is still somewhat unclear.