Up to forteen thousand journals and twenty seven thousand books in the Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA), tracking down the resources you need could feel like looking for a needle in a haystack.

Summon – AGORA’s Google-like search engine, is an instant and easy way to find the research material you want from a single search box.  It searches AGORA’s catalogue and quickly brings up scores of credible, relevancy-ranked results in full text form.  You can search for specific keywords and expand or narrow your search using advanced filters.

Accessing content

You can only access content if your institution is registered with AGORA, and you’ll need your institution’s login credentials. If you don’t sign into AGORA access to certain links and publications won’t be possible. If you’re not already registered, sign up here. You’ll then receive a username and password, which is valid for your institution.

On the AGORA homepage, click on “Access Content”. Next click the “Summon” tab under: “Search Inside AGORA full-text.”  Alternatively, click here.

Depending on how vague or specific your search is you’ll be linked directly to scores of full text materials that match your keywords. As a general rule the more keywords you add the fewer results you’ll get.

The most relevant results appear at the top of the page along with some quick appraisal information such as where the item is located, and abstracts.  

You can filter searches to limit results to peer-reviewed only material and “scholarly” publications.  Or you can narrow your search by publication date and subject terms – plant sciences, life sciences and the like, as well as language.

There’s also the option to include results outside of Agora’s catalogues.

What kind of resources does Summon search?

The comprehensive knowledge of AGORA’s holdings, ranging from journals, media articles, technical reports, trade publications, books, e-books, and more. It goes beyond the scope of a standard search, comprising formats from single articles to entire e-journals.

Tips for searching on Summon

Don’t be too vague - you’ll be presented with thousands of search results.

Bear in mind that while the vast majority of Summon searches yield results that are immediately accessible in full text form, some results may be restricted according to country and institution. In these cases you’ll need to check your access to the content by clicking on the “check access” tab. You’ll also see a “get text in full” tab, which presents you with a list of publications where you can find your article.

In certain cases Summon may tell you that you can read the full text, but then direct you to the front page of the journal.  This happens when you access a journal in the Directory of Open Access Journals or those in Summon from SciELO, because as yet there’s no deep linking.  

In these cases keep an eye out for the instruction panel on the right hand side of the screen, which tells you to browse the journal online and look up the article via issue/year. You can also click on “additional options” - in the instruction panel, under ‘language’. This directs you to a “browse journal” tab and a “search cross reference” button: if there’s a deep link to the full text online, this will find it.