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The University of Manitoba campuses are located on original lands of Anishinaabeg, Cree, Ojibwe-Cree, Dakota, and Dene peoples, and on the National Homeland of the Red River Métis. More

Technical Reports

Technical reports are valuable sources of highly specialized information not available through usual means.

Technical Reports Information

Technical reports describe the progress or results of scientific or technical research and development. They are usually produced in response to a specific request or research need, and serve as a report of accountability to the organization funding the research and development. Technical reports are valuable sources of highly specialized information - information that is not indexed in most commercial databases.

The Articles / Databases list (above) will facilitate access to these resources.

The publication and dissemination of technical reports are not officially coordinated. They are usually not available via the usual channels (publisher, book stores), and as a result, they can be particularly difficult to identify and locate. Issuing (funding) agencies may or may not make reports publicly available and some charge for copies of their reports. But, increasingly, many reports are available electronically via search engines.

National or international reports and preprints are usually published by university departments, institutes, private industry, or government agencies and laboratories. Technical reports usually appear as part of a numbered series from the issuing agency. These numbers are important and are often the easiest way to find a specific report or document. Each agency has its own numbering system, however technical report number systems usually include the following elements:

agency, society, or company delineator
year code
specific number for each report

Some examples of numbers are:

NASA-TM-111279
N96-29630/6GAR
EPA/456/R-99/002
FHWA-RD-97-028 2
SAE 2001-1096


(Univ. of Texas at Austin)