swisscovery Help Page
Introduction:
Dear User
Welcome to the swisscovery's help page.
swisscovery is the Swiss Library Service Platform Network (SLSP) discovery tool. In this page you will find useful information about how to use swisscovery and how the SLSP network is organized.
Attention: this help page has been created for the whole SLSP Network! This means that some services may not be available in this specific user interface. Please note that the start page or the record's full display may look different from institution to institution to what is showed in this help page.
Index
General
- SLSP: The Swiss Library Service Platform
- SLSP Network
- Open an account
- Library card
- How to Sign in and Sign out
- My Account
- Update your account
- Set language
Online resources
- Online resources
- Online services for university members
- Online services for people who are not members of a university
- Open Access
- National licences
Borrowing/ordering documents
Searching
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- SLSP search profiles +
- swisscovery search profiles
- Simple search
- Advanced search
- Searching for a phrase
- Searching with wildcards
- Using Boolean operators to expand or narrow a search
- My favorites
- Search history
- Saving and managing searches
Displaying the results
Questions?
General
+
General
SLSP: The Swiss Library Service Platfom
+ SLSP: The Swiss Library Service Platfom
The Swiss Library Service Platform, along with his subsidiary Consortium of Swiss Academic Libraries, with more than - 470 members, is the biggest network of academic and research libraries in Switzerland. Created by libraries, for libraries, it is a joint effort to provide a series of services at the entire country such as, a shared multilingual catalogue of scientific information, a unique representative for e-resources licensing and a performant courier network for physical items sharing. + 475 members, is the biggest network of academic and research libraries in Switzerland. Created by libraries, for libraries, it is a joint effort to provide a series of services at the entire country such as, a shared multilingual catalogue of scientific information, a unique representative for e-resources licensing and a performant courier network for physical items sharing.
SLSP represents an innovative and significant step forward in the digital evolution of scientific libraries in Switzerland. By managing the cloud-based Alma system, the organisation brings together scientific information stored in libraries across Switzerland. By making this information accessible and easily findable, SLSP contributes to scientific discovery and progress.
SLSP Network
+ SLSP Network
SLSP Network is divided in several "zones". SLSP itself manage the network zone (NZ) called swisscovery, while libraries have been distributed in 29 "institution zones" (IZ).
An institution zone (IZ) is a group of libraries that have similar needs. The IZ is a key component in the SLSP system and represents a division that enables synergies and increases efficiency. In SLSP we distinguish two types of institution zone: single entity zones and mixed entity zones.
In a single entity zone, most of libraries are legally related to one main entity (for instance a university). In a mixed entity zone, libraries are legally related to different entities (for instance they are grouped together due to geographical considerations)
To access the resources of SLSP members, users must access the users' interfaces called "views". In SLSP we have prepared a view for the Network Zone (NZ), a view for every Institution Zone (IZ) and several views for single libraries.
Every view has its specifics search scopes, which will return different results when used for the search. The swisscovery network zone contains all records coming from the SLSP libraries, some general external resource (for example e-rara data) and the CDI index. The institution zones views and the library views contain the local inventory of the institution zone / library, general and local external resources and the CDI index.
Central Discovery Index (CDI): is a central database of more than 3 billion of records such as: journals articles, e-books, dissertations, conference proceedings, etc.
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At the following link you can find the topology of the SLSP Network, comprehensive of the list of all SLSP member libraries divided per institution zone and the link to every existing view of our network. For every IZ and library you can find the address, the contact information and the services they provide.
Open an account
+ Open an account
To register with SLSP please first visit to: https://registration.slsp.ch
After starting the registration, you will be asked to login with a SWITCH edu-ID account. If you already have a SWITCH edu-ID account just login to proceed with the registration. If you don't have your password yet, there is a password reset link on the login page.
If you don't have a SWITCH edu-ID account yet, you can click on "Create account" on the login page.
Note: If you study at a university it is possible that you registered with SLSP previously. In this case a message will appear, and you will be forwarded to the view's login section.
Library card
+ Library card
With your library card you have access to a series of services, for instance, you can loan a physical item in a library.
If you already have a library card of the BibliOpass network you can optionally provide the library card number during the registration with SLSP or afterwards. Some campus / university / student cards are also valid as library card. Also, some universities will provide the library card number for their users. Which library card numbers are associated to an SLSP account, will be show during registration process with SLSP (see "Open an "account" chapter).
If you don't have a physical library card, you can ask your library to provide you with one.
How to Sign in and Sign out
+ How to Sign in and Sign out
In Swisscovery: click on "Sign in" - choose your institution zone - click on "SWITCH edu-ID" - enter your email address and password - click on "Login"
In an institution zone / library view: click on "Sign in" - click on "SWITCH edu-ID" - enter your email address and password - click on "Login"
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You need to be signed in to do the following:
- Order documents (loan, digitization order, ILL)
- View and control your loans and requests from libraries in the SLSP network.
- Extend loan periods, cancel reservations
- Save favorites
- Save searches and set alerts
- Change your language settings permanently
As a guest, your favorites, search requests and selected language can only be saved for the current browser session.
Sign out after a session to protect your account against access by other users.
NOTE:
To access online resources, it is not relevant to sign in.
Access to online resources often depends on whether your device is within the network of a licensing university and if you work for or study at this university. Some universities and libraries allow users to access online resources from outside their network using a proxy service. For more information concerning the conditions to access the online resources, you can consult the chapter "Online resources" of this help page, the Consortium's website or the website of the library which licenses for the respective resource.
These conditions aren't applied to the National licences (for more information see the corresponding chapter of this help page).
My Account
+ My Account
You must sign in to access your account. Once you did that, click on your name at the top right of the page, you will access to a menu containing some of the submenu of your account. To have full access at your data's account click on "My Account".
From this page you will be able to consult your loans, fees, reminders, requests, messages and many other functionalities.
NOTE: every institution zone has its own space, this means, for example, that if you loan a resource in the BCU Fribourg's institution zone and one at ETH Zürich's institution zone they are splitted in different pages, see below:
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Update your account
+ Update your account
- To modify your address or other information of your account go to the My edu-ID page on https://eduid.ch/ and update your edu-ID account. If you want to manage your library card numbers, please go to https://registration.slsp.ch/register/library-card/
+To modify your address or other information of your account go to the My edu-ID page on https://eduid.ch/ and update your edu-ID account. If you want to manage your library card numbers, please go to https://registration.slsp.ch/register/library-card/
Set language
+ Set language
- To permanently save your language setting log in and select your account in the top right corner of the page. Under “My account” – “Personal details" change the settings in the box “Default interface language”. In alternative, you can change the language setting also in your SWITCH edu-ID account. This change also regulates the language in which the letters (emails) are sent.
+To permanently change the language of the swisscovery user interface, log in and select your account in the top right corner of the page. Under “My account” – “Personal details" change the settings in the box “Default interface language”.
+Please note: The language in which the letters (emails) are sent can only be adjusted in your SWITCH edu-ID account by changing the preferred language. +
Online resources
+Online resources
Online resources
+ Online resources
All kinds of online resources offered by the participating libraries are indexed in the search: books, journals, databases, digitized photos, maps, manuscripts and other collection items. However, not all documents are freely accessible. Many documents are acquired with what is known as a licence and are only available in the network of the licensing university. With the aid of filters, you can narrow the search down to freely accessible (Online - Open Access) or licenced (Online) documents.
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For online resources, the "View Online" section in the full display provides information about the availability of the resource in your institution and in others IZs of the SLSP Network. To access the resource,
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+ click on the icon 
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Online services for university members
+ Online services for university members
In addition to Open Access documents, you can use your university's online services. E-journals, eBooks and databases are acquired with what are known as licences and the access is restricted exclusively to the network of the licensing institution (on campus). From outside the university, you can use VPN, Eduroam, EZProxy, etc. to access these documents. Please check your library or IT university's website for remote access information.
The "View Online" section provides available services for the resource at your institution and in other institution zones of the SLSP Network. Click on "Available online"
- and the icon to get the full display view.
+ and the icon to get the full display view.
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Online services for people who are not members of a university
+ Online services for people who are not members of a university
In addition to Open Access and online resources under a national licence, you can also use the universities' licensed resources, albeit not from your own computer.
Academic e-journals, eBooks and databases are acquired with what are known as licences and the access is restricted exclusively to the network of the licensing institution (on campus). You can download and/or access the resources on premise of the licensing library.
Which libraries offer access to an online resource are displayed under locations:
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Open Access
+ Open Access
Open Access documents are freely accessible. These are journal articles or books on various platforms or in institutional repositories on the one hand and digitized documents from library holdings on the other. These documents are marked in the list of results.
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National licenses
+ National licenses
All people who reside in Switzerland have access to online resources under the national license. This requires a one-off free registration; further information is available at the address https://consortium.ch/zugriff/?lang=en . Resources available under a National licence are marked in bracket in the "Full text availability" section.
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Borrowing/requesting documents
+Borrowing/requesting documents
Borrowing/requesting documents
+ Borrowing/requesting documents
Under "Get It" in the full display, you can see the libraries where the document is located and whether it is currently available.
Under "Other options" you can see if SLSP libraries from other IZs also have this item available.
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Select your desired request option: Request (physical item), Digitization (electronic or paper copy) or Resource Sharing. You must be signed in to place an order.
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If you select Request, you can request a physical item to pick-up at a library. You can also order some items per post. If this option is allowed, you can choose it by selecting your institution in the "Pick-up institution" field and Home Address in the "Pick-up location" field.
If you would like to get an electronic or paper copy of an article or chapter, click on Digitization and fill in the form with as much details as possible.
Note: These services may not be available in your IZ / library and may be subject to costs. For further information click here.
Extending loan periods
+ Extending loan periods
In My Account, you see your current loans and can renew them all or individually, provided this is permitted by the loan conditions.
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Note: The new loan period always runs as of immediately. If you renew a document yourself before the automatic loan period ends, the maximum possible loan period becomes shorter.
Note: Loan conditions may vary depending on the institutions and type of material.
List of previous loans
+ List of previous loans
In My Account, in every the "Loans" section of the IZs, you can see your active and previous loans.
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Note: In some institutions zones / libraries this option is not available due to cantonal privacy laws restrictions.
Searching
+Searching
SLSP search profiles
+ swisscovery search profiles
- SLSP operates with two standard search profiles that can be found in every view. The first is "swisscovery", the second is "My Library". This infographic explains where you search while using one of the two. In certain institution zones or library views it is possible to find additional custom search profiles created by the institution zone / library.
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- My library: Includes the local inventory of the institution zone / library + external resources loaded in this institution zone (general and local) + CDI (CDI could also be used as a separate search profile). This search profile is always named after the institution.
-All SLSP libraries: All records of the SLSP network + general external resources + CDI
-Custom Search Profile: Some institution zones / libraries prepared their own search profiles including Custom Local Data Scope(s).
-Central Discovery Index (CDI): Is a central database comprehensive of thousands of sources for a total of more than 3 billion of records such as: journals articles, e-books, dissertations, conference proceedings, patents, reports, government document, images and videos. Depending on the institution zone / library view, the CDI is searchable in the "My Library" search profile, in a separate search profile or both.
-General External resources: swisscovery has been enriched by adding general electronic external resources. A detailed list of these resources is available here.
-Local external resources: In addition to the general external resource, some institution zones also provide local external resource.
+swisscovery operates with two standard search profiles that can be found in every view. The first is "swisscovery", the second is "My Library". This infographic explains where you search while using one of the two. In certain institution zones or library views it is possible to find additional custom search profiles created by the institution zone / library.
+swisscovery:
+Within the library platform swisscovery around 475 academic libraries from all over Switzerland have joined forces. The search portal of the same name allows users to search not only the physical media holdings, but also a wide range of electronic resources such as databases, newspapers, digital objects, articles and journals. Thanks to the central user account via the SWITCH edu-ID, this content from all libraries can not only be searched, but also borrowed, reserved, delivered nationwide via digitization order, courier or postal delivery, or accessed directly in full text online with just one registration.
+My library:
+You only want to search the holdings of your favorite local library? No problem, after conducting a search you will find filter options on the left to narrow down your results to a single library or a specific region, so that only results from their physical and electronic media collection are presented. In case some of the items are currently unavailable at your local library, you will find an information whether they can be retrieved from another library within the large swisscovery network in the detailed view of each result under "other loan and request options".
+E-Resources:
+In swisscovery you can find not only printed media, but also search for a wide array of open access and licensed digital media collections. All electronic databases, journals, daily newspapers, articles, film, and audio streaming services offered by swisscovery libraries can be searched and found here. Access to individual electronic resources may be restricted to members of a particular university or residents of a particular canton, depending on the license conditions of the provider. To have accurate information about what is available, it is recommended to login with your account in swisscovery.
+Physical resources:
+In swisscovery you can find all media, which the participating libraries have in their holdings on site. In addition to printed media such as books, magazines, and newspapers, this also includes other physical media such as images, film, and sound recordings, as well as precious manuscripts, old prints, letters, bequests, and maps.
+Digital objects:
+The valuable holdings from the swisscovery libraries with special and historical collections are extensively digitized, indexed and prepared for immediate online use. In addition to books, journals and newspapers, these may also include manuscripts, letters, old prints as well as archive holdings and bequests from platforms such as e-rara, e-manuscripta and e-codices, all of which can also be searched and accessed on swisscovery.
+Consortium resources:
+The consortium of Swiss university libraries acquires licenses for scientific resources (electronic journals, e-books and databases), which can also be searched on swisscovery. These include the so-called national licenses, which are available in full text not only to researchers, students and university staff, but also to all private users with permanent residence in Switzerland.
+Institutional repositories:
+Many universities make their researchers' and students' papers and theses freely available to the general and scientifically interested public in open access online repositories. These repositories are also searched in swisscovery and linked directly to the full text of the publication.
+Full text articles and more (CDI):
+The Central Discovery Index (CDI) is a search index and thus the elementary basis of index-based search engines such as Google. A search index can best be compared to a (very) long list that includes all the searchable content. In addition to descriptive information, such as the title or author of a work, this content can also include the full texts of complete books, databases, or journals. In the end, the search engine only searches this list and not the actual data source directly. This has enormous advantages: On the one hand, even with billions of recorded entries, a search of the entire database is possible in just a few seconds. On the other hand, these results can be sorted by "relevance" - results in which the search terms appear more frequently or in a more prominent position (e.g. in the title) are displayed before others with fewer matches. The Central Discovery Index is a search index aggregated by the provider Ex Libris / ProQuest. It contains complete articles from journals, book chapters, book reviews, research data, but also many film and audio documents. The total number of entries is well over 3 billion. The individual swisscovery libraries and regions can decide for themselves which of these contents they would like to have included in the swisscovery search by activating them. You can also select for yourself at any time next to the search line whether you want to perform a search "with" or "without CDI", if the search bandwidth in the Central Discovery Index seems too large to you.
+Courier services and Interlibrary Loan:
+If you have found a book you are interested in during your research in swisscovery, but you are not able to view or pick it up at the owning library, you have the possibility to have the book delivered directly to your home (CHF 12 / medium, depending on the user group) or to your preferred local library (CHF 6-12 / medium, depending on your user group). For all swisscovery libraries that are connected to the SLSP Courier, this is possible within 48 hours nationwide. In addition, it is also possible to have media from all libraries in Switzerland and abroad delivered by interlibrary loan. For this service, the delivering libraries charge different fees and the delivery usually takes longer.
Simple search
+ Simple search
The simple search enables a rapid access to the library resources.
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Advanced search
+ Advanced search
The search fields of the advanced search can be combined with AND, OR or NOT.
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In this example the search is limited to books in English that contain "mountain railway" in the title and Switzerland as a subject.
With the aid of the second (or third field), you can specify whether the search terms should be contained in the field or if it must correspond exactly at the search terms.
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Here you can put a few words from the title, not necessarily in order
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Here you are looking for this exact title
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And here, you're looking for titles that start with the word "mountain"
Searching for a phrase
+ Searching for a phrase
If you would like to search for a phrase (word group), put it in quotation marks. You can combine phrases and words in a search:
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The results include documents that contain both the term "piz buin" and the aspect "mountain".
Searching with wildcards
+ Searching with wildcards
The asterisk * and the question mark ? can be used as wildcards for the search.
The asterisk * is used to replace zero, one or several characters:
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For example, it allow to searches for culture, cultures, cultural etc.
The asterisk * can also help to find different spellings:
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searches for yogurt, yoghurt, yogourt, yoghourt, etc.
The question mark ? is the wildcard for replacing one single character:
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searches for both woman and women.
You can also combine these two characters:
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You'll get results with yoghurt, yogurt, yoghurts or yogurts.
Using Boolean operators to expand or narrow a search
+ Using Boolean operators to expand or narrow a search
You can use the Boolean operators AND, OR and NOT. These must be written in capital letters.
Without operators, the search terms are automatically combined with AND. In other words, all search terms must appear in the results.
OR
At least one of the search terms linked with OR must appear in the results. For example, use OR to combine related terms in order to expand the search to several terms (synonyms, different spellings):
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NOT
The search term excluded with NOT must not appear in the results. In other words, NOT enables words or phrases to explicitly be excluded.
NOTE: The Boolean operator NOT is available only in the simple search
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The results include documents that contain the phrases "climate change", but not "global warming".
My Favorites
+ My Favorites
In "My Favorites", you can save titles that you find during your search. Long-term saving is only possible if you are signed in. As a guest, the favorites are only at your disposal during the current browser session.
If you click on the pin icon
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of a title, the title is added to your favorites; the pin icon changes to
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of a title, the title is added to your favorites; the pin icon changes to
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. If you click on
+ , the title is removed from the favorites.
You can access your collection of favorites via the pin icon
- at the top right of the page.
+ at the top right of the page.
You can remove or export individual titles from your favorites list. Highlight one or several titles and use the symbols at the top of the page in order to delete them, add labels, export them to reference management programs, print them or send them via email:
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In order to view the details of a title, click on the title.
You will also find the search history for the current session in "My favorites".
Search history
+ Search history
The searches from the current session are recorded in your favorites under "Search history".
You reach it directly via the icon
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at the top right of the page.
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at the top right of the page.
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Saving and managing searches
+ Saving and managing searches
If you are signed in, you can save searches permanently. To do so, click on "Save query" above the list of results:
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NOTE: The "Save query" option is only displayed if you are signed in and have submitted a search.
When saving your query, you can receive email notifications when there is an update to the query. To activate this service a message will appear automatically at the top of the page.
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The saved searches are stored in "My Favorites"
- in the tab "Saved searches".
+ in the tab "Saved searches".
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You can perform the search again by clicking it. You can set up a notification (by RSS or email) using the symbols on the right to keep you informed of newly added documents that match you search.
Displaying the results
+Displaying the results
Narrowing down results
+ Narrowing down results
Filtering terms are proposed on the left-hand column which enable you to narrow down your search results:
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Clicking on "Books" limits the list of results to the 4'075 books found.
In order to exclude a term, click on the red symbol on the right next to the term.
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With "Show more", you can display additional terms and refine the search by including or excluding several terms.
Example: Narrow down the results to "dissertations", "videos" and "audios".
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In order to remove one filter, click on the x. "Reset filters" removes all filters.
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A new search entry automatically removes all filters. However, you can retain a filter for the duration of the browser session by selecting it and then clicking on the lock symbol. To remove this filter, click on the lock again.
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List of results: sorting
+ List of results: sorting
By default, the results are sorted by relevance. You can also sort them by date, author and title.
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List of results: versions
+ List of results: versions
If a work is available in several versions (i.e. in different editions or prints), click on the icon, the title or "See all versions" to list all the versions.
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You can return to the list of results by closing the list of versions under "Active filters".
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Viewing individual titles
+ Viewing individual titles
When you click on a title, you can select the following actions:
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Top: go back at the top of the page
Loan and request options: view locations, place orders for loans, reservations or photocopies.
Send to: export title information to reference management program, export citation, create permalink to result, print or send title by email. Export actions can be applied in bulk up to 50 records.
Details: further information on the title.
Links: links to table of contents, to earlier/later title, to all volumes of a series.
Virtual browse: you can see a library shelf in relation to the selected record so that you may find other items that are related to their search.
Questions?
Contact information
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- For any question, doubt, comment or request don't hesitate to contact us
+ +Contact information
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+ For further questions please contact your library directly.
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