[Eril-l] EBSCO Discovery & ebooks issues

Fri Aug 8 05:15:45 PDT 2025

I encourage you to join the EDS partners listserv, as this specific issue was just discussed earlier this week, and what came out of that was:

  1.
if you will only have a single "customlink" under Access Options, EBSCO converts the pulldown into just a button to that one link
  2.
that link should be the text of the customlink unless your link text is longer than 35 characters, then a generic label will be used instead
  3.
there is a bug in that right now that it is not displaying the text even when shorter than 35 characters, so a Service Issue is open to fix it

This is NOT evidence that EBSCO is favoring itself over Proquest or anyone else. The problem would have been the same for any other vendor's customlink. You just happened to see the bug for a Proquest link. In my very long experience working with EBSCO products, EBSCO only favors its own content in its platform when doing so makes for a genuinely better user experience.  I wholeheartedly support that value judgment.

Melissa Belvadi
Collections Librarian
University of Prince Edward Island
mbelvadi at upei.ca<mailto:mbelvadi at upei.ca>  902-566-0581
ORCID iD: 0000-0002-4433-0189
my public calendar<https://outlook.office365.com/owa/calendar/0fbab27c909e4493be65313bd66d66b6@upei.ca/5fa60af92c6d451c9ddf90c0bb11e00f15552192987609852692/calendar.html>
Make an appointment<https://mbelvadi.youcanbook.me/> via YouCanBookMe
My pronouns are ಅವರು/ಅವರನ್ನು
My emails are sent during the hours that I work and I understand that you will respond during the hours that you work.
________________________________
From: Eril-l <eril-l-bounces at lists.eril-l.org> on behalf of Electronic Resources in Libraries discussion list via Eril-l <eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>
Sent: Thursday, August 7, 2025 4:28 PM
To: Electronic Resources in Libraries discussion list <eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>
Subject: Re: [Eril-l] EBSCO Discovery & ebooks issues

CAUTION: This email originated from outside of UPEI. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe. If you are uncertain, please use the Report Message button in Outlook and delete this email.

WARNING: The sender of this email could not be verified and may not match the person in the 'FROM' field. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe. If you are uncertain, please use the Report Message button in Outlook and delete this email.

Thanks Linda,

It is over 35 characters long, but as I recall, EBSCO assisted with creating the custom link to begin with. Ebook Central is a consortia based sub for us and they told us to work with EBSCO to make things happen on the Discovery end.  That was several years ago though.

I'll ask EBSCO for suggestions, I don't want to break it entirely.

Thanks for the info!

Dana Mastroianni, MLIS

Manager, Library & Public Services | Jennie King Mellon Library<http://library.chatham.edu/>

Office: 412.365.1602

Chatham University|Woodland Rd. Pittsburgh, 15232

[Intsa]<https://www.instagram.com/jkmlibrary/>[FB]<https://www.facebook.com/JKMLibrary/>[Social, Circles, neon, Spotify, line Icon]<https://open.spotify.com/user/fuwu26wdwqq6ums8xs4utraq5>

________________________________
From: Eril-l <eril-l-bounces at lists.eril-l.org> on behalf of Electronic Resources in Libraries discussion list via Eril-l <eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>
Sent: Thursday, August 7, 2025 3:13 PM
To: Electronic Resources in Libraries discussion list <eril-l at lists.eril-l.org>
Subject: Re: [Eril-l] EBSCO Discovery & ebooks issues

Hi, Dana,

How long is the Link Text for your custom link?  A number of libraries have reported similar issues.  If the link text has more than 35 characters, EBSCO is replacing it with stock text, as described on this Q&A page https://connect.ebsco.com/s/article/CustomLinks-Frequently-Asked-Questions?language=en_US (Scroll down to the section called Q: Why does the text I entered in EBSCOadmin for the Link Text field of a CustomLink not display in the new user interface?)

Linda

Linda J. Fox
Electronic Resources and Acquisitions Associate

(816) 235-5290

foxlj at umkc.edu<mailto:foxlj at umkc.edu>

University of Missouri - Kansas City
Miller Nichols Library

Electronic Resources & Acquisitions
800 E 51st Street
Kansas City, MO  64110

https://library.umkc.edu<https://library.umkc.edu/>

From: Eril-l <eril-l-bounces at lists.eril-l.org> On Behalf Of Electronic Resources in Libraries discussion list via Eril-l
Sent: Thursday, August 7, 2025 1:52 PM
To: eril-l at lists.eril-l.org
Subject: [Eril-l] EBSCO Discovery & ebooks issues

WARNING: This message has originated from an External Source. This may be a phishing expedition that can result in unauthorized access to our IT System. Please use proper judgment and caution when opening attachments, clicking links, or responding to this email.

My library uses EBSCO Discovery service, and we have both EBSCO's ebook collections and Ebook Central collections. Ebook Central listings are included in Discovery.

We've noticed that EBSCO ebook results have a clear link for full text under the Access Options menu, usually EPUB. When an eBook Central result appears in Discovery there is just a More Information box that takes place of the Access Options box.

The More Information box does link to the title in EBook Central but seems to be misleading.  I have no doubt this is another way EBSCO is trying to put their content first, just wondering if anyone else has contacted them about it.

We're also experiencing odd search result relevancy issues in Discovery, but that's probably another entire discussion.

Thanks in advance for any info!

Dana Mastroianni, MLIS

Manager, Library & Public Services | Jennie King Mellon Library<http://library.chatham.edu/>

Office: 412.365.1602

Chatham University|Woodland Rd. Pittsburgh, 15232

[Intsa]<https://www.instagram.com/jkmlibrary/>[FB]<https://www.facebook.com/JKMLibrary/>[Social, Circles, neon, Spotify, line Icon]<https://open.spotify.com/user/fuwu26wdwqq6ums8xs4utraq5>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.png
Type: image/png
Size: 1442 bytes
Desc: image001.png
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment.png>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image002.png
Type: image/png
Size: 808 bytes
Desc: image002.png
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment-0001.png>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image003.png
Type: image/png
Size: 968 bytes
Desc: image003.png
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment-0002.png>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Outlook-Intsa.png
Type: image/png
Size: 1442 bytes
Desc: Outlook-Intsa.png
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment-0003.png>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Outlook-FB.png
Type: image/png
Size: 808 bytes
Desc: Outlook-FB.png
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment-0004.png>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Outlook-Social, Ci.png
Type: image/png
Size: 968 bytes
Desc: Outlook-Social, Ci.png
URL: <http://lists.eril-l.org/pipermail/eril-l-eril-l.org/attachments/20250808/324e0e4a/attachment-0005.png>