Hi,
I must admit when ingenta updated its site and there were loads of teething
problems I thought I would bury my head in the sand for a few weeks and then
come up for air and hope everything was hunky dory. Fat chance!!
First of all I share all the concerns that have already been raised by list
members.
My email concerns the easylink feature or the not so easylink feature, as I
am about to rename it!! and the question of authentication for on campus
users.
I was slightly when I read Ian's message as I've been using the BIDS format
for all our ingenta journals. However, I've just been informed by the BIDs
helpdesk that the old BIDs format easylink will not work for any new titles
uploaded. They will continue to work for existing titles. I've just had an
example where that was the case for a Blackwell Publishers title, Milton
Quarterly, which has only just gone online where only the www.ingenta.com/
easylink format works.
Apparently that has been the position for the last few years, although I
used the BIDs format easylink for the recent Sage journals which were only
uploaded this year!!! So who is telling the truth??
I guess that means that those of us who use the BIDS easylink format should
change all our URLs to point to ingenta. However, this is not without it's
difficulties as it appears that we have to authenticate our access using the
ATHENS username and password even from on campus. The box for this
information hardly dominates the screen, whereas the form to fill in for
document delivery via payment does!!! I thought the purpose of easylink was
make it easier for our users to get straight to the full text without the
need for a username and password via IP authentication. The system is
recognising my institution, so why can't I access my subscriptions without
the need for ATHENS authentication.
My experience today runs contrary to Kirsty's email (08/06/01) which said
"Users within IP registered institutions following an EasyLink will
now have direct access to their subscriptions and will not be challenged".
Well I was challenged today on accessing the full text of some of our
subscriptions using the www.ingenta.com version of easylink. Again Kirsty's
email (08/06/01) said "The Express Registration form was appearing to users
when they should have had free access via their institution's subscriptions.
This has now been fixed, and users will only be presented with this form
when there is a genuine pay-per-view situation". Again I can only say that
again this was not my experience when I tried to access one of our
subscribed titles via a www.ingenta.com easylink.
It's a pity that ingenta has forgotten the UK higher education sector who
were its bread and butter for so many years.
Cheers
Lesley
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Lesley Crawshaw, Faculty Information Consultant, LIS,
University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, AL10 9AB UK
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e-mail: [log in to unmask]
phone: 01707 284662 fax: 01707 284666
web: http://www.herts.ac.uk/lis/subjects/natsci/ejournal/
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-----Original Message-----
From: An informal open list, set up under the auspices of the United
Kingdom Seri [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Ian
Winship
Sent: 11 June 2001 11:40
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: ingenta EasyLink
Like others we are a little confused about the future of EasyLinks.
A query using the Contact form on the ingenta site produced a reply from the
ingenta Helpdesk in the US that the BIDS format
http://www.bids.ac.uk/journals/browse/bpl/acfi?mode=direct
will not be maintained and the ingenta format is needed.
Is this correct - or does the US part of the company not understand BIDS? If
it is correct then what is the timescale?
We would prefer not to have to change the URLs for 2000 titles on our Web
database and the library catalogue.
Kirsty wrote that "We intend to migrate BIDS users to the new service in the
next few months" What does this mean?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ian Winship
Learning Resources, University of Northumbria at Newcastle
City Campus Library, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 8ST, UK
----------------
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
phone: 0191 227 4150 fax: 0191 227 4563
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