WorldCat database, a combined library catalog which covers the collections of more than 10,000 libraries in the world, is an essential part of ILL/DD transactions in North America. ILL/DD staff will search WorldCat and identify the holding libraries of the requested materials. (A few Japanese Libraries also use this WorldCat database to do ILL/DD transactions with North America.
Hints for Using WorldCat to Make Your ILL/DD Requests
PROVIDING THE ACCURATE BIBLIOGRAPHIC INFORMATION is the most essential to make your ILL/DD requests successful. In addition, if you could identify the material you are looking for in WorldCat and include the accession number in your ILL/DD request, it would be very helpful for ILL/DD staff to promptly process your request.
If the bibliographic information in your ILL/DD request is inaccurate or incomplete, ILL/DD staff will have a very difficult time to process your request. For example, these requests prevent ILL/DD staff from promptly finding proper records in WorldCat:
NG: Citation is in Japanese only
NG: Citation does not use the standard Romanization system (Modified Hepburn)
What Makes Your ILL/DD Requests More Successful?
Provide ACCURATE bibliographic information as much as possible:
oAuthor, title (article title, journal title), edition, publisher, publication date, etc.
However, do not include such symbols as macron or alif (because they may not be displayed properly in the ILL request form)
oNG: Tanizaki, Jun’ichirō → Tanizaki Junichiro
Include OCLC’s “accession number” (also called “OCLC number”) in your request. If you are requesting journal articles, include the accession number of the journal.
Click here to find the OCLC number in the WorldCat record
Click here to find the sample form of an ILL request.
