Accessing electronic resources and e-books

Following up from chatting about passwords, I'll briefly talk about how to access electronic resources via the library website - and e-books  The library pays a lot of money to purchase licences for electronic resources.  These resources provide access to bibliographic data and full-text for journal articles, newspaper articles, books, company, market sector and country reports and so on.  Our licences restrict who can see the material, so we have to use usernames and passwords.

Electronic Resources
On campus, go to the e-library page on the library website.  Go to the subscribed databases section and look at the instructions for each resource. 

Off-campus, access to most resources is through EBSCOHost Integrated Search (but here, I'll call it EBSCO)

You should be able to access EBSCO from the search box on the library home page, the advanced search page or the e-library page where you access individual databases.  If you are off-campus, you will need to login with your student number and date of birth, in format dd/mm/yyyy 

If you try to login to EBSCO from elsewhere, say for example, after searching for EBSCO on Google, it is possible that the EBSCO page won’t recognise your DBS login.  In this regard any error message that you see is important.  If you see error code 102, it means you are entering the wrong DBS username or password.  If you see error code 101, this means that the login page is not primed to accept DBS usernames and passwords, and therefore somehow, you've done something wrong!  If you see another error code, contact the library.

If you access EBSCO correctly, you will see the following on the login page:

Dublin Business School

Login with your student number and date of birth (in format dd/mm/yyyy). If you cannot login, please contact the library

If you do not see this on the login page, you will not be able to login to EBSCO

E-Books,
We purchase the vast majority of our e-books through Dawsonera.  On-campus you don't need a login  to see them.  Off-campus you will need a username and password.  Usernames and passwords have changed over time.  If you are new to DBS your username is your student number and your password is your date of birth in format dd/mm/yyyy (we try, though sometimes fail, to be consistent!).

There are two ways of finding out what e-books you can access. You can use the search/browse facilites on Dawsonera, or you search the library's online catalogue.  On the catalogue click the advanced button.  The third search box you see has the title 'Media type'.  In the dropdown menu, tick  the box next to E-books. In the search-term box, type your search-terms and away you go.

There is another way to access electronic resources, but I'm not going to write about that right now, other than to say that it's called Athens and you can look for details on the library blog or the e-library webpage (or even the next post down).   

Passwords

Hello and welcome everyone to a new academic year.  For new students this can be a daunting experience (though we have an *excellent* student services department - if you are having any problems call into to see Caitriona), not made any easier by the number of passwords that you have to remember.  Here follows a list of usernames and passwords that you need.

Moodle, College PCs and checking your library account online.

To access these please enter your student number as your username and your student number as your password. If you are unsure what these are please contact IT or fill out their help form  or do both.  If you stop to think about, you'll probably realise that it's not a good idea to have your student number as both your username and password (it's a little like writing your PIN on your bank card), hence we strongly recommend that the first time that you login to a college PC, you change your password.  

Student E-mail  

Don't shoot the messenger here, okay?  I'm cutting and pasting here: 

To access your student email please enter your student number for your username and your password is the first 2 digits of your date of birth and your course code. Day of birth is in numerical format i.e. DOB 05th January insert 05 and the course code is as on your student card


When you log into your email it will ask you to change your password.

Any problems, contact the IT department as above.

Off-campus access to E-books and search results from the search box on the library home page

Use your student number and date of birth in format dd/mm/yyyy

Athens

If you want an Athens account, contact the library to have one set up for you.  You need to provide your student number, course code and a valid email address.  Within 24 hours of your request, you should receive an email with account activation details.  Follow the instructions therein to activate your account. You get to set your own password.  Any problems, contact the library again.

Welcoming ...Esource!

Here follows a guest post by Alex Kouker, our Digitisation librarian.  Take it away Alex...

DBS Esource is our recently launched library online service hosting full content materials produced by Dublin Business School staff and students. It contains the full text of articles, theses, conference papers, book chapters and more. DBS Esource is an open access repository, with the aim of making all content as widely accessible as possible.

DBS Esource aims to give you ammunition for intellectual inspiration, as well as examples of solid academic writing.

DBS Esource also provides the means to advertise your academic achievements as each item is permanently archived and accessible via a permanent link.

Check out the FAQ to find out more about DBS Esource.

Academic year 2011/2012 - Library opening hours

The new academic is about to start and we hope you had a great summer and feel ready for a new academic year and here are our opening hours to help you with your studies:

Aungier Street Library
(01-4177572)
Monday 9.00-22.00
Tuesday 9.00-22.00
Wednesday 9.00-22.00
Thursday 9.00-22.00
Friday 9.00-21.00
Saturday 9.30-17.00
CLOSED on Sunday and Bank Holiday*

Dame Street
(01-4178745)
Monday 9.00-22.00
Tuesday 9.00-22.00
Wednesday 9.00-22.00
Thursday 9.00-22.00
Friday 9.00-21.00
Saturday 9.30-17.00
CLOSED on Sunday and Bank Holiday*

*We will open on sundays and bank holidays closer to winter and summer exam times.

All the best with your studies!

Free Journal of the Week from Emerald

Emerald are now offering free access for a week to two of their journals... every week. Their new Journal of the Week feature provides free weekly access to two of Emerald's high quality journals.

Check the list on this page to see which journals will be featured over the coming months. You will be able to access, free of charge, content from the featured journals, for one week only.

Click on the links and you will be taken to the table of contents page where the free issues will be highlighted.

Another post enthusing about Zotero

Now and then We blather about Zotero, but that's because we love it so much. Here are two more reasons to love it.

1) Zotero 3.0 beta

Zotero 3.0 (beta) is now available to download. Unlike previous versions, Zotero 3.0 is standalone; it no longer runs in your browser and does not require Firefox. Hence if your objection to using Zotero was having to use Firefox as your browser, that objection no longer exists.


2) Zotfile.

Zotfile is a plugin for Zotero that allows you to automatically organise pdf (and other files). You can rename, move, and attach files to Zotero items by pressing a single button. Zotfile will work with both browser and standalone versions of Zotero. Zotfile is ideal for saving and associating with Zotero records files from the increasing number of sites that choose to embed PDFs in a web browser rather than offer a straightforward manual download (not the best sentence ever written, but you get the
idea, I hope). Not offering the choice of a manual download also prevents Zotero from capturing pdfs... hence Zotfile.

Serious bit: Zotero is an excellent tool for managing your assignment and dissertation bibliographies and it's free. Especially now that that it no longer requires Firefox, you should give it a try. To help you with this, we run occasional classes in Zotero. Keep an eye on the Library Classes page on the library website for their details.

Auniger Library Closure Wenesday 7th September

On Wednesday 7th September the Aungier St. library will close at midday to facilitate a Library, Careers and Student Services open day for DBS staff. The Dame St. library will be open as normal until 10pm, so hopefully any inconvenience will be minimised.