LibGuides: Making Sense of Library Research: Ebsco Features & Blackboard Options

Ebsco Tutorials

My Ebsco Personalization Folder Features
This four minute Flash video describes the uses and benefits of My Ebsco. It is helpful to already have your account created. Click on any Ebsco database. In the top right corner, click the "Sign In" button and click "I'm a new user."
Creating Journal Alerts
This four minute flash video walks you through the process of creating journal alerts (to specific journal titles).
Page Composer
Page Composer is a simple web page creation tool and one way you can share your search results.

Did you know this about Ebsco?

Creating Direct Links to Specific Full-Text Articles in Ebsco

First, find the article. Before actually viewing the article, scroll down to the bottom of the page and look for the “Persistent link to this record.” Simply copy and paste this link into your Blackboard pages.

Creating Links to Specific Journals

When you first get to your Ebsco database, click the Publication tab and search for the journal.

On the next window, you can either type the journal title in the browse box or click through the alphabetical listing. IF you list the title in the top search box, you will search for articles, not publications.

In your results, look for the Link to this Publication section.

Copy and paste link into your Blackboard pages.

DISCLAIMER: You will need to check this links periodically as the publisher and database relationship may change throughout the years. At some point, publishers have been known to pull the rights from the vendor thereby disabling access full-text database. At that point, the journal could become an abstract only database. They could drop access to the journal altogether.

JOURNAL ALERTS

As you do your research, you may want to keep up with the latest edition of your favorite journal. You can get journal alerts delivered right to your Inbox or via RSS feeds if you are accustomed to using something like Bloglines. Here's how.

First, you will already need to have an Ebsco account setup. Just click the "Sign in" link and the "I'm a new user" link and create the account. It is worth exploring when you have some time. The account follows you no matter which Ebsco database you use. It's also a great secondary storage area for the journal articles you find.

Next, find a specific journal (as you did above) and look on the right-hand portion of your screen for the "alert" link.

Fill out the form as you prefer. Notice several things about this page. Your logon name is at the top left portion. Feel free to send the alert to any email address you wish and include your own customized subject header as well.

If you prefer RSS feeds, click the "No Email -RSS only" option (circled in blue below) followed by the "Save" button at the bottom of the page.

After it is saved, the next will will appear with the URL for the RSS feed.