<p>It seems that:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>The first paper was published in <em>Mathematical Morphology and Its Applications to Image Processing</em>, J. Serra and P. Soille (Eds.), Kluwer 1994, ISBN 0-7923-3093-5 (a.k.a. Proc. 2nd International Symposium on Mathematical Morphology, ISMM 1994). <a href="http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0792330935" rel="noreferrer">Amazon link</a>.</p></li>
<li><p>The second paper was published in <em>Proc. DICTA 1999</em>. <a href="http://www.worldcat.org/title/dicta-99-fifth-internationalnational-biennial-conference-on-digital-image-computing-techniques-and-applications-7-8-december-1999-perth-australia/oclc/657641883" rel="noreferrer">Worldcat knows about the book</a>. It seems that there are at least two Australian libraries that have it in their collections, so it should be possible to order copies of articles from them.</p></li>
</ul>

<p>Fairly often, the interlibrary services of university libraries can provide copies of papers published in hard-to-find books and journals.</p>

<p>As Peter Shor suggested in comments, you can also try to contact the authors. Usually, authors will be happy to send you copies of their articles – after all, researchers write papers in order to make their results as widely known as possible.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-09-04T08:59:52.677Z
2011-09-04T08:59:52.677Z
Jukka Suomela
<p>If you have access to a library, look for a hardcopy of the journal or proceedings in their catalog.  You might be surprised how much is available that way.</p>

<p>I have had good luck getting scanned copies of individual articles by making interlibrary loan requests (as suggested by others).</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-09-04T18:04:24.083Z
2011-09-04T18:04:24.083Z
Kevin A. Wortman
<p>I have Googled myself to death, but have been unable to find the following articles:</p>

<ul>
<li>Breen, E., Monro, D., 1994. An evaluation of priority queues for 
mathematical morphology.</li>
<li>R. Beare and H. Talbot., 1999 Exact seeded region growing for image 
segmentation.</li>
</ul>

<p>These articles are well known, important and often cited by others, but they seem to be impossible to find. Does anyone know where I could find these or maybe someone could point me in the right direction?</p>

<hr>

<p>More generally,</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>What should I do when I cannot find an online copy of an article?</p>
</blockquote>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-06-12T22:55:34.540Z
Very resourceful @Jukka.
Dave Clarke
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-06-13T11:31:59.850Z
@JukkaSuomela Thank you for your help. I don't want to seem ungrateful, I just want to point out that when the only way to read an article is to buy a book for 600 dollars and have it shipped 7000 km I am starting to think the authors don't want people to read their article. It's 2011. How about a downloadable PDF for 20 dollars? I should consider moving to a place with a decent library. Ok, I will stop complaining now. Thanks again for your help @JukkaSuomela
MyName1234211
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-06-13T12:21:14.577Z
@MyName1234211: If you email the author of an article, they are usually quite happy to send you a copy or better yet, post a copy on their webpage. This was done all the time pre-Internet.
Peter Shor 
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-06-16T17:33:50.050Z
As Peter suggests, emailing the authors in computer science or mathematics usually results in either a PDF by return email, or the article being made available for download from a web page.  Did you try this?
András Salamon
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-09-04T01:28:40.590Z
@Jukka do you want to post your comments + the advice to contact authors as an answer, just so that this question doesn't sit unanswered? Otherwise, should we close the question as too localized?
Artem Kaznatcheev
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-09-04T09:00:39.230Z
@Artem: Converted the comments to an answer.
Jukka Suomela
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-09-04T09:16:57.877Z
I generalized the question since the answer is general, and in future if we get a similar question we can close it as duplicate to this one.
Kaveh
CC BY-SA 3.0
2011-09-04T23:04:42.563Z
@Peter: wait, if you were already sending/receiving emails and having a webpage in the pre-Internet, then what is the Internet? :P
Alessandro Cosentino
<ds.algorithms><reference-request><soft-question><research-practice>
How can I obtain famous articles which are not available online?
MyName1234211
# How can I obtain famous articles which are not available online?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2011-06-12)

I have Googled myself to death, but have been unable to find the following articles:

* Breen, E., Monro, D., 1994. An evaluation of priority queues for
  mathematical morphology.
* R. Beare and H. Talbot., 1999 Exact seeded region growing for image
  segmentation.

These articles are well known, important and often cited by others, but they seem to be impossible to find. Does anyone know where I could find these or maybe someone could point me in the right direction?

---

More generally,

> What should I do when I cannot find an online copy of an article?

**Tags:** ds.algorithms, reference-request, soft-question, research-practice

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Very resourceful @Jukka.  
> **username_0**: @JukkaSuomela Thank you for your help. I don't want to seem ungrateful, I just want to point out that when the only way to read an article is to buy a book for 600 dollars and have it shipped 7000 km I am starting to think the authors don't want people to read their article. It's 2011. How about a downloadable PDF for 20 dollars? I should consider moving to a place with a decent library. Ok, I will stop complaining now. Thanks again for your help @JukkaSuomela  
> **username_2**: @username_0: If you email the author of an article, they are usually quite happy to send you a copy or better yet, post a copy on their webpage. This was done all the time pre-Internet.  
> **username_3**: As Peter suggests, emailing the authors in computer science or mathematics usually results in either a PDF by return email, or the article being made available for download from a web page.  Did you try this?  
> **username_4**: @Jukka do you want to post your comments + the advice to contact authors as an answer, just so that this question doesn't sit unanswered? Otherwise, should we close the question as too localized?  
> **username_5**: @Artem: Converted the comments to an answer.  
> **username_6**: I generalized the question since the answer is general, and in future if we get a similar question we can close it as duplicate to this one.  
> **username_7**: @Peter: wait, if you were already sending/receiving emails and having a webpage in the pre-Internet, then what is the Internet? :P  

---

## 2 answers

### Answer by username_5 on 2011-09-04. Score: 10

It seems that:

* The first paper was published in *Mathematical Morphology and Its Applications to Image Processing*, J. Serra and P. Soille (Eds.), Kluwer 1994, ISBN 0-7923-3093-5 (a.k.a. Proc. 2nd International Symposium on Mathematical Morphology, ISMM 1994). [Amazon link](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/0792330935).
* The second paper was published in *Proc. DICTA 1999*. [Worldcat knows about the book](http://www.worldcat.org/title/dicta-99-fifth-internationalnational-biennial-conference-on-digital-image-computing-techniques-and-applications-7-8-december-1999-perth-australia/oclc/657641883). It seems that there are at least two Australian libraries that have it in their collections, so it should be possible to order copies of articles from them.

Fairly often, the interlibrary services of university libraries can provide copies of papers published in hard-to-find books and journals.

As username_2suggested in comments, you can also try to contact the authors. Usually, authors will be happy to send you copies of their articles – after all, researchers write papers in order to make their results as widely known as possible.


---

### Answer by username_8 on 2011-09-04. Score: 1

If you have access to a library, look for a hardcopy of the journal or proceedings in their catalog. You might be surprised how much is available that way.

I have had good luck getting scanned copies of individual articles by making interlibrary loan requests (as suggested by others).


---

