Easier Access to BIDS Services
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On Wednesday 30th September, we will be simplifying the login procedure
for BIDS services (bibliographic databases and the full text service -
currently known as JournalsOnline, but shortly to be renamed
ingentaJournals).
Instead of a separate login page for each service, users will be presented
with a single login screen for all services (bibliographic databases and
the full text service).
After login (using an ATHENS username and password), the user will be
presented with a tailored selection menu of services available to that
particular username. It will then be possible to select services and
switch between them without repeating the authentication process, making
it much easier, for example, to repeat searches on other databases.
We appreciate that this is not the ideal time of the year to be making
these changes, and in order to help with the transition, the direct access
route to these services (eg http://www.bids.ac.uk/isi) will continue to
work exactly as now until mid-October. After this date, these URLs will
point to an explanatory page which will link to the common login page
(http://www.bids.ac.uk/)
Alerting messages are being put into the BIDS homepage, and into the
individual service login pages. The new user-guides (available early
October), will reflect the new login procedure.
It should be noted that, although the Ovid and SilverPlatter services
(EMBASE, Education Server, INSPEC) will appear in the list of services
after login, for some time to come each of these will re-prompt for a
username and password. This is because this authentication step is
carried out by the Ovid or SilverPlatter software. We are investigating
ways of by-passing this re-authentication. Meanwhile, the direct links to
these services (eg http://www.bids.ac.uk/embase) will also continue to
be supported.
Note that telnet access to BIDS services will be unaffected by these
changes.
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Terry Morrow (Marketing & Training) E-mail:- [log in to unmask]
BIDS, University of Bath Telephone (direct-dial):- 01225-826277
BATH BA2 7AY, UK BIDS URL: http://www.bids.ac.uk/ Fax :- 01225-826176
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