WorldCat Discovery release notes, 25 September 2024

Expand search results to include newspaper articles (early adopters)

Improve the usability and precision of WorldCat Discovery search results for your users seeking original works and scholarly publications by activating a search expansion toggle for news articles. 

OCLC has invited libraries who wish us to activate search expansion for news articles in their WorldCat Discovery instance to participate in an early adopter period from 12^th September. We will activate this feature for any remaining WorldCat Discovery libraries in mid-December.

To adopt this feature early, request activation via the Community Center WorldCat Discovery Early Adopters area.

What this means for your library

When OCLC activates this feature for your WorldCat Discovery:

•       News articles are excluded from search results by default

You may:

•       Configure display of a search expansion toggle on search results for your users

Within OCLC Service Configuration > WorldCat Discovery and WorldCat Local > Search Settings > Search expansion settings, activate the toggle to allow users to control whether news articles appear in search results.

Please see additional information in the OCLC Service Configuration guide: WorldCat Discovery and WorldCat Local > Search Settings > Search Expansion Settings > News Articles

•       Configure your search box to include or exclude news articles from searches

If you leave your current search box(es) unchanged, searches entered from them will exclude news articles by default. To replace or update your search box:

Search Box Generator: Within OCLC Service Configuration > WorldCat Discovery and WorldCat Local > Search Box Generator > Create Search Tabs, check the box for News Articles within the Expand Search section to include news articles in searches from a given search box tab.

Please see additional information in the OCLC Service Configuration guide: WorldCat Discovery and WorldCat Local > Search Box Generator > Create Search Tabs > Expand Search

Custom search box: To have a particular search box or search box tab already embedded in your web pages include news articles in searches by default, update the search box code so that it appends the parameter &newsArticles=on to the query string that it sends to WorldCat Discovery.

Example: https://[yourlibrary].on.worldcat.org/external-search?queryString=milk&clusterResults=true&groupVariantRecords=false&newsArticles=on

What this means for your users

The following table summarizes how feature activation and your configuration choices affect your users’ experience.

Please see additional information at WorldCat Discovery Help > Filter and refine search results > Expand This Search With > Expand search with news articles

Accessibility enhancements for a more inclusive user experience

This release includes several accessibility enhancements as part of our ongoing effort to ensure a more inclusive user experience:

1.    You will be able to display a link to your institution’s accessibility statement. To configure this feature, navigate to Service Configuration> Display Settings > Institution Accessibility Statement:

Users will see a link to your institution’s accessibility statement display below OCLC’s accessibility statement in the footer section.

2.    The Chat and Additional Database icons will no longer appear as floating buttons on mobile or at a zoomed-in view. These buttons will now appear in the header when viewing on a small screen, so they do not block content on the page. On a desktop view, the buttons will remain in their current position on the right side of the screen.

Product website

More product information can be found here.

Office hours

·       https://community.oclc.org/t5/worldcat-discovery-events/eb-p/worldcat-discovery-events

Support websites

Support information for this product and related products can be found at:

• WorldCat Discovery support resources  
• WorldCat Discovery training
• Release notes
• OCLC customer support
• Browser compatibility chart

Include Request ID with problem reports

When reporting an issue with WorldCat Discovery, it is extremely helpful to include the Request ID. The Request ID is found at the bottom of the screen where the issue occurred. Including this information allows us to directly trace what happened on the request we are troubleshooting.