Lightening grey literature: Making the invisible visible

Technical reports are an important and unique source of engineering information. This has been recognised in the US where federal technical reports are freely available via the Internet. UK reports are hard to identify, locate and obtain. Within the context of new initiatives promoting cross‐sectoral partnership and collaboration, the Research Support Libraries Programme (RSLP) and British Library Co‐operation and Partnership Programme (BLCCP) have funded the MAGiC project. MAGiC aims to provide the UK engineering community with a greater awareness of, and access to, key collections of technical reports by: mapping UK report collections; developing a methodology for prioritising digitisation of reports; providing an entry point to search and browse widely distributed resources; developing a core electronic archive of engineering report literature; evaluating the feasibility of creating a commercial service based on the supply of electronic documents. An exposition of work in progress is given with a projection of how the demonstrator service will operate. A call for help with the project in locating report collections within academia, industry, and government, and contact details, are given.