[Eril-l] Ebook central problem - do you see this?

[Matt Thomas]

Diane et al,

We don't have our patrons having to personally log in to ProQuest Ebook Central (PQEC) and we use EZproxy.  I remember when migrating from ebrary being told about the option to force our patrons to sign in immediately or to set it so that they only had to do that upon trying to use a function that needed it (like bookmarks or notes) so we just let them know we wanted the latter.  We didn't do anything special to set this up.  I believe everyone in our consortium (OCUL) has it set up like that.  Well, everyone who has PQEC.  I remember being shocked at even the suggestion that we'd force people to sign in twice or require a platform-specific username and password.

Matt

---------------------------------
Matt Thomas, MLIS
eResources Librarian, Wilfrid Laurier University
mthomas at wlu.ca<mailto:mthomas at wlu.ca> | 519-884-0710 x2812

From: Eril-l [mailto:eril-l-bounces at lists.eril-l.org] On Behalf Of Diane Westerfield
Sent: October 5, 2017 1:33 PM
To: eril-l at lists.eril-l.org
Subject: Re: [Eril-l] Ebook central problem - do you see this?

Does anyone have seamless, IP-authenticated, no-login access to full text content on Ebook Central? Anybody with WAM proxy, in particular? ProQuest said that we could set it up so that patrons could get as far as seeing the title display of an ebook, but patrons would still have to log in to reach the full content. We don't have Shibboleth for the campus IT single-sign on which may be an issue here(?)

External logins are a barrier for us, particularly with products that aren't super subject-specific. With something like ArtStor, it would be used in an art class and a librarian or the professor would show students how to set up a login and use the database. Because Ebook Central has broad subject matter, it could be accessed by any student or faculty member while conducting research for any class. Some of our patrons get confused and think it's their college login, and don't understand why it's not working. Some may stop right there and not ask for help.

We have a number of classes held abroad and it has been a reoccurring issue that students want to access a book on Ebook Central, but can't create an account from off-campus. We've been trying to address that by getting students registered before they go; the problem still crops up since it's impossible to reach all the students prior to their trips.

Thanks,

Diane Westerfield, Electronic Resources & Serials Librarian
Tutt Library, Colorado College
diane.westerfield at coloradocollege.edu<mailto:diane.westerfield at coloradocollege.edu>
(719) 389-6661



From: Eril-l [mailto:eril-l-bounces at lists.eril-l.org] On Behalf Of Heather Shipman
Sent: Thursday, October 05, 2017 7:31 AM
To: Cynthia Harper; eril-l at lists.eril-l.org<mailto:eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>
Subject: Re: [Eril-l] Ebook central problem - do you see this?

Cindy,

I haven't seen that bug myself yet, but our ProQuest reps visited recently, and we complained about the login requirement for printing/chapter download, which I have never ever seen any other major ebook platform implement. Our reps were surprised to hear that this requirement existed, though they mentioned there was some sort of "back door" that allows a loginless download, and they have folks working to "make that more visible". They promised to dig into it.

So we're currently prodding them on that, and I forwarded your email to our rep in the context of that existing conversation. Getting rid of that would at least fix the mobile device problem for PDF downloads. Not so much on full-text downloads, though, which I think would be the more likely preference on a small device, to get the content in a reflowable format1. So I pointed out that full-text downloads would still have this login display problem even if the login requirement were dropped from chapter PDFs.

I, too, would totally not mind if other institutions were also to complain about a login even being required for printing and downloading chapter PDFs. It would be nice if we could nip that nonsense in the bud.



1 I know Bluefire exists, but it's been a pain in the butt the few times I tried to test it. If anyone knows how to make Bluefire reflow a PDF into something actually readable without having to zoom in and slide the page back and forth over and over again, I would be super interested in instructions. My experiments with Bluefire thus far have just made me dizzy.


[Thumbnail2]
Heather Shipman
E-book Acquisitions and Management Specialist
110 Olin Library, Cornell University
Heather.shipman at cornell.edu<mailto:Heather.shipman at cornell.edu>



From: Eril-l [mailto:eril-l-bounces at lists.eril-l.org] On Behalf Of Cynthia Harper
Sent: Wednesday, October 04, 2017 5:27 PM
To: eril-l (eril-l at lists.eril-l.org<mailto:eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>) <eril-l at lists.eril-l.org<mailto:eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>>
Subject: [Eril-l] Ebook central problem - do you see this?

I've reported this problem to Proquest, they simply said I should flip my mobile device from portrait to landscape. I don't think they know what problem I'm talking about.

Have you seen this:
                "I have noticed before that on some devices, the ebook central login prompt is invisible as it's overlayed on a cover page image. I was able to replicate this, and reported this problem to Proquest last night, and their suggestion is that the user turn from portrait mode to landscape mode. I didn't find that suggestion helpful, and they went on in their message to reconfirm that there does need to be an individual login to ebook central, but when I checked again the problem didn't occur on the same smartphone I'd seen it on yesterday."

                It happens on small devices, after you request a book to download, and Ebook Central tells them "your library wants you to log in before downloading" (ahem - it was not our decision, it's Proquest's insistence).  At that time, it presents a screen that has the book cover as the background, and the prompts to "Register " for an account, or "Have an account? Sign In" in thin blue print. It's virtually invisible.  I only found it because I know it's there. To users, it's a roadblock.


Please help me alert them to fix this!
P.S. - I decided today to try to get others involved in begging for fixes, rather than relying on simply reporting them to tech support - that's why so many messages)

Cindy Harper
Virginia Theological Seminary
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