Högskolan i Halmstad
Halmstad University - For the Development of Organisations, Products and Quality of Life

Creating links to electronic articles or books

If you copy a link from the browser´s location bar when searching our licensed databases the link won´t work outside the University´s network. The databases will not know that you should be granted access.

Guides for creating links to a number of our licensed databases »

Question


How to construct a hypertext link to an electronic journal article or electronic book and ensure student access from both outside and inside the Halmstad University Network.

Answer


Two things must be taken into account when constructing a hypertext link to an electronic journal article or electronic book (for example in a course in mechatronics):

1. Link via the proxy-server (for access outside of the University´s network).

When constructing a hypertext link to a certain journal or journal article, always link via the proxy-server. This ensures that students can have access to the article from outside the University´s network - from their home address for instance - as well as from inside the University network. This can be achieved by starting off the link with a so called proxyprefix,  http://ezproxy.bib.hh.se/login?url=

For example:
http://ezproxy.bib.hh.se/login?url=http://search.epnet.com/direct.asp?an=8599234&db=buh
If a student is working from home or elsewhere outside the University´s network and clicks on this kind of link, a log in screen will appear automatically, allowing the student to log in using his/her student account. Then the article will appear on the screen. If an article is accessed from within the University´s network it is shown immediately, no log in is needed.

2. Use a permanent internet address in the link.

You also need to make sure that the internet address you are using in the link is a PERMANENT one. Not all urls are suitable for linking. Be careful when using urls from the location bar on the internet. These urls can often be used only temporarily.
 
Many publishers – i.e. EBSCO – assign a permanent url to an article. Such a url can safely be used in a hypertext link. It may say: 'Persistent link to this article:…' or 'Bookmark this page as: …' You can copy a url of this kind into your link (not forgetting to place the proxy-server url in front of it of course). 

Other publishers, such as Elsevier Science Direct, assign a so-called 'Digital Object Identifier' (DOI) to each article. An example of such a doi is: 10.1016/j.datak.2005.05.008. If you copy this code into your link you may be sure that the link will stay operative, even if the content is moved to a different site.
 
Place the following in front of the doi-code: http://dx.doi.org/ and in front of that the address of the proxy-server of course.

The link will then look like this:
http://ezproxy.bib.hh.se/login?url=http://doi.org/10.1016/j.datak.2005.05.008
Page editor: Patrik Bergvall
Page last updated 2010-07-23
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