Linking Electronic Resources

Increase your students' awareness of library resources by including links from your Blackboard course.

Liaison librarians are available to help you enhance your Blackboard course pages in many ways, including creating a Subject or Course Guide for your class, providing a "Library Consultant" link and contact information to imbed library help in your course, or providing "Ask a Librarian" services, encouraging students to contact a librarian via email, SMS, instant messaging, or personal appointments.

For more information, or help with linking library resources, contact Carol Wittig, Head of Instruction and Information Services (289-8459).

From On Campus

Linking Directly to a Library Research Database
  • Go to the Research Databases under "Finding Information" on the library's web site. 
  • "Right click" on the database name you want to link.
  • Choose "copy shortcut" and paste into Blackboard or another web page. 

Linking from the Library Catalog
  • If you would like to display a subset of titles in the UR Library catalog, conduct a search, then copy and past the URL for the resulting list of titles.
  • If you would like to link to a specific book, locate the book in the library catalog and view the full record. Then copy the URL and past it into your Blackboard page.

Linking to Individual Articles from Databases

Tip: For any databases not listed below -- look for a url listed in the article citation information -- it's often called Persistent URL. 

For all linking, only UR faculty, staff and students with net ID accounts can access the information that is being linked.

Access Science
  • Some information in Access Science can be linked.  If this option is available for the article you are viewing- a DOI is provided -- look at the "Cite this Article" information at the bottom of the page:
  • To copy the article information -- use the url: www.accessscience.com and then include the DOI - it cannot be direct linked, but you can search DOI from the main Access Science search box.
  • You can also use the "email this link" option -- and the link will be sent to you for the article, but AccessScience provides limited linking access for only 7 days to these articles.
  • If the full-text of the article is available through UR- there will be a link in the citation - for example:
    • Eisenberg DM et al: Perceptions about complementary therapies relative to conventional therapies among adults who use both: results from a national survey. Ann Intern Med 2001;135:344. [PMID: 11529698] [Full-text]

APA PsycNET

Includes PsycINFO and PsycBOOKS.
  • Copy/paste article URL: Choose either way --1) From full-text article view in HTML or PDF, copy link url  from the address bar -- then paste link to your document or web page. 2) From link to article, right click on HTML or PDF icon or link and choose "copy link location" -- then paste link to your document or web page.

*DOIs are also provided in PsycINFO for journal articles - for more information on linking using DOIs, see sidebar.

Contemporary Women's Issues (CWI)
  • To link to an article, click on the title of the article to open the full record.
  • Click on "Bookmark" at the top left of the page.
  • Right click to Copy/Paste this link and provide direct access to the article.

EBSCO

(List of all databases available within EBSCOhost)
  • To link to an article, click on the title of the article to open the full record.
  • Go to the Toolbar on the right of the screen
  • Look for Permalink.
  • Click in the box and right click to Copy/Paste this link to your document.  This will provide direct access to the article.
  • BOOKMARK - this will enable you to bookmark the url and save to a social bookmarking website.

To link to a specific set of search results, conduct the search, then click on Save Searches/Alerts under Search History.  You use this feature, you must be logged in to MyEBSCOhost.

*DOIs are also provided in many EBSCO databases- for more information on linking using DOIs, see sidebar.

JSTOR

Project Muse
  • Copy/paste article URL: Choose either way -- 1) From full-text article view in HTML or PDF, copy link url  from the address bar -- then paste link to your document or web page. 2) From link to article view, right click on HTML or PDF icon or link and choose "copy link location" -- then paste link to your document or web page.

*DOIs are also provided in Project Muse - for more information on linking using DOIs, see sidebar.

ProQuest

(List of all databases available within ProQuest)
  • To link to an article, click on the title of the article to open the full record.
  • Scroll down to the bottom of the page.
  • Look for Document URL
  • Copy/Paste this link to provide direct access to the article.

For ProQuest Historical Databases, follow these instructions for linking:

  • Click on the title of the article to open the full record.
  • Look at the top left of the page for "Copy Link"
  • Click on this link -- and Copy/Paste the url provided in the pop-up window.

*This is our current list of online databases with permanent URL links to articles. Other databases will be added as they make permanent URLs available for linking articles. 

*Lexis/Nexis does not offer permanent URL linking at this time.  Articles can be saved or emailed, but not linked directly.

Course Reserve Reading

 You may link directly to electronic course reserve readings through your Blackboard course by inserting each reserve item's link in the Library catalog. To link directly follow these steps:

1. Go to the UR Library Catalog.
2. Select the Course Reserves Tab.
3. Search by either your name or course.
4. Identify the reading you want to link to.
5. Open the reading (this requires you to login the catalog).
6. After opening the file, you can use the link in the address bar for linking purposes.

You can also provide your students with directions on how to access course reserves through the library catalog (See steps 1 - 5 above)

Bibliographic Managers

RefWorks

 Instructors can provide links to existing RefWorks accounts in any of the course Content areas (Course Information, Course Documents, Assignments, External Links, etc.).  Each content area can link to an entirely different RefWorks account.

1. Navigate to the specific course's Control Panel.

2. Select the content area you would like the RefWorks account linked from.

3. Select Link to RefWorks database from the drop-down box on the upper right portion of the screen and press the Go button.

4. On the Link to RefWorks Database page, enter RefWorks account information for the account you wish to link to. Students can have either full access or read-only access. To establish read-only access, the instructor must create a read-only password in the

Update User Information area of RefWorks.

5. Enter a Title and Link text for display in the course's content area.


Using Citation Linker

Citation linker can be used to locate a specific journal article, if you're unsure where the full-text is located, or if you want to determine whether a journal title is subscribed to in print and electronic format.

Linking Using DOIs (Digital Object Identifiers):

DOIs are unique numbers assigned to intellectual property in a digital environment. Many databases now include DOIs. 

These items can be linked, using the DOI number and accessed via a search within the database or a  DOI Resolver (see links below).

DOIs may not all look the same -- below are examples of different schemes

doi:10.2345/S1384107697000225
doi:10.4567/0361-9230(1997)42:<OaEoSR>2.0.TX;2-B
doi:10.6789/JoesPaper56

For more information on DOIs, consult the following:

  • The DOI System - International DOI Foundation information and link resolver if you have a DOI number.

DOI Resolvers

Linking Streaming Audio

Contact David Tenenholtz (Music Library Associate) to request streaming audio reserves for your Blackboard course. Audio reserves have to be delivered through a password-protected Blackboard site and must be verified before audio files are created.

Submit the Streaming Audio Reserves Request form.

For Off-Campus Access

Follow the steps for each database as outlined. However, you must insert the following prefix in front of the URL to the database name or individual article--if it is not already there--to allow it to pass through the proxy server:

http://newman.richmond.edu:2048/login?url=

For example:
http://newman.richmond.edu:2048/login?url=http://nameofdatabaseurl.html