Discussing our approach to providing walk-in access at the University of Bath, including our use of a wiki to manage licence information and ezproxy to manage access control.

1. Walk-in Access to e-Resources at the
University of Bath
Lizz Jennings

2. The Problem
• Librarians no longer free to decide who use their stock
• Licences try to strike balance between access and
publisher viability
• Most user groups covered, but community users with no
formal affiliation are a challenge
• Licences may accommodate them, but making access
available through existing IT systems can prove difficult
– Restrictions on location e.g. to library building
– Requirement for user registration
– Requirement for supervision

3. The Problem
• Moving to more online only content
• Widening participation becoming increasingly important
• Groups wishing to access university library resources:
– SCONUL access users from other institutions
– School/college students undertaking Extended Project or
International Baccalaureate
– Independent researchers
• Diverse research topics
• Need to:
– identify what can be accessed
– make it available within existing systems and terms of licence

4. The Solution: Identifying Licence Terms
• E-Resources have become large part of collection
• ERM systems to manage associated information, but
costly
• Carried out assessment of available products vs local
solution
• Opted for existing wiki intranet to store information
– flexible – could contain any kind of information
– accessible to all library staff, but not outside of library
– only needed to record information that was useful to us

5. The Solution: Identifying Licence Terms
• Wiki databank contains:
– Licences
– Usage statistics
– Title lists
– Access information
• Licence data marked up with labels to provide a
summary table of terms
• Improved accessibility of e-resources information
• Ability to extract particular terms from many
licences, e.g. summary of inter-library loans permissions
using labels

6. Licence information page

7. Summary List

8. The Solution: Walk-In Access Information
• Details not part of original design – simple yes/no
• But this did give us a list of providers, and we knew we
had licences or terms and conditions for them
• Importantly, gave us an idea of how many licences
might allow walk-in access, and whether the technical
project was worthwhile
• Standard licences made locating details much quicker

9. The Solution: Conclusions on Use of a Wiki
• Use of the wiki as an ERM system has been successful
• Improved information control
• Embedded in existing systems
• Flexible enough to store information to appropriate level
of granularity
• Very low cost
• However:
• Lack of reporting functions
• Not able to integrate directly with workflows
• Required time and expertise to populate

10. The Solution: Access to Licensed Material
• Used OPAC Terminals
– “locked down kiosk” facility as suggested in the Higher
Education Access to e-Resources in Visited Institutions
(HAERVI) Guide
• Did not want to provide dedicated machines
– Library is also main computer centre
– Demand for walk-in access often in group visits
• Used existing OPAC terminals
– Already located on four floors of the library
– Useful to students as well as visitors

11. The Solution: Access to Licensed Material
• Catalogue terminals already set up as kiosks
• Needed to extend access to walk-in resources
• Originally used Opera to provide access to a whitelist
– Nothing happens when a user tries to access a disallowed URL
– Confusing for users
• Alternative was Firefox add-on named OpenKiosk
– Still used whitelist
– Disallowed URLs redirect to an information page
• Whitelist includes EZProxy servers which control access
to e-resource sites

12. The Solution: Access to Licensed Material
• EZproxy mainly used to provide off-campus access
• Typical users would log in using their normal network
password, via LDAP
• IP address authentication also possible, called autologin
• System configured to autologin OPAC terminals
• Authorised web sites placed in groups:
– Accessible to registered staff and students
– Accessible to all authorised users

13. The Solution: Access to Licensed Material
• Access controlled by host or domain
– If two resources with different access conditions were hosted on
the same site we would have to use most restrictive terms
– A list is generated showing available providers
• No simple way to indicate in catalogue whether access
is allowed
• No options for the user to print, e-mail or download
• Can read on screen and make notes - no time limit
• Accessible at any time that visitors are admitted to the
building

14. Conclusions
• Generally successful
• Provide access to licensed resources where permitted
• Time and expense of this solution relatively low
• Positive impact on school visits
• Hard to measure usage
• Unknown impact on cost of e-resources if take-up were
high

15. Based on:
Kate Robinson, Lizz Jennings, Laurence Lockton. "Walk-in
Access to e-Resources at the University of Bath". July
2012, Ariadne Issue 69
http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue69/robinson-et-al