PDS, Primo, Aleph, MetaLib, SFX General workflow 6

Overview From the end-user point of view, the only application he enters is Primo. This presentation will explain what products are used behind the scenes.

Legend Yellow arrows - The User navigate from one URL to another The URL is changing at the browser’s address bar because the user pressed on some link or button on page Dotted arrows - The system navigates the user from one URL to another. The URL is changing at the browser’s address bar, but it is done quickly and is hardly noticed by the user. Blue arrows - One software requests information from another software. This is done behind the scenes and is not visible to the end-user. Technically this is called “API” or a “Web Service” call.

Primo, PDS, Aleph OvP – Aleph’s OPAC via Primo

Primo, PDS, Aleph Once the user enters Primo’s URL he is quickly redirected to PDS. PDS checks if he already “knows” him, and sends this information to Primo. The user is automatically redirected back to Primo.

Primo, PDS, Aleph Primo will be requesting information from Aleph (e.g. for item locations) using the REST/DLF API. It also updates RTA (Real Time Availability) by calling Aleph’s X-server

Primo, PDS, Aleph Since at the first time the user visited PDS, PDS didn’t “know” him, he was considered as ‘guest’. Now, when the user chooses to Log-in, he would reach the PDS Login Screen

Primo, PDS, Aleph Z308 After entering username and password, PDS will ask Aleph if the user is defined in Aleph and if the password is correct.

Primo, PDS, Aleph Z308 If the password is fine, The user will be redirected back to Primo and PDS will notify Primo that the user was authenticated.

Primo, PDS, Aleph The Database for username & password doesn’t have to be Aleph’s Z308 table. It could be AD(LDAP) or other DBs. Z308 In this Case, the 3rd party Database, must send PDS the user’s ID (ת.ז.) as it is in Aleph since this is what Primo will use when contacting Aleph

Primo, PDS, Aleph Z308 If for any reason, such as for Course-reading or viewing an ADAM object, the user moves to Aleph’s OPAC he will be quickly redirected to PDS, and then back to Aleph with confirmation that this patron is already authenticated.

Primo, MetaLib Searching external content providers

Primo, MetaLib Z308 After the user was authenticated, (by PDS querying Aleph’s Z308 or 3rd-party PW database), he may wish to search for online articles.

Primo, MetaLib He types the search in Primo, and Primo will ask MetaLib to run the query on a set of Content Providers. The search will run on their web-sites.

Primo, MetaLib Since the Content Providers might only accept searches coming from specific IPs (which MetaLib’s server might not be one of them), we tunnel the request via the Campus’s EZproxy (and then, the content Provider “thinks” that the requests came from within the campus). Since using the EZproxy requires a username & PW, MetaLib is contacting the EZProxy with a hardcoded user (which is shared by all patrons).

Primo, MetaLib Free resources may be accessed without EZproxy. Also resources which use username/PW authentication are searched without EZproxy.

Primo, MetaLib The results are collected by MetaLib and MetaLib sends them back to Primo to be displayed to the user.

Primo, MetaLib Above is a screenshot from MetaLib management interface, Institutional Setting  Proxy Management. We can see that a search of Content-Provider can be done for selective resources (IRD-Selective) using the college’s Proxy.

Primo, MetaLib And here we see that a search of Gale/InfoTrac is configured to use the proxy defined in the previous slide.

Primo, SFX Reaching Full Text at the external Providers

Primo, SFX After the user clicks on one of the articles he received, he would like to see all available ways he can reach it: Online, print, ILL etc.

Primo, SFX This is where SFX comes into the picture. A new window opens with a URL which is based on information about the Article meta-data (“OpenURL”)

Primo, SFX Note that the SFX window is independent from Primo and MetaLib. e.g. if you configure Google Scholar that you are a student in a specific library (who has SFX) Google will display a link to the SFX of your library.

Primo, SFX When the user clicks on a link to ProQuest, he will get to the full text via the EZproxy. This is the same EZproxy that MetaLib used, only that this time, because the user is accecing ProQuest directly, the user needs to idenfiy himself to the EZproxy with his personal username & password.

Primo, SFX If the resource is free, the link from SFX may be direct. If the resource requires username/PW, in some cases SFX will be able to include them as well.

Primo, SFX Above is a screenshot from SFXAdmin interface showing how we choose for a specific Content-Provider that there is no need for a Proxy Server.

Note As we’ve seen, the most problematic situation is when: The Content-Provider is allowing access to material based on the requester’s IP address. The user is off-campus. When the content is free or based on user/password, the flow is simpler. Also, when the user is in the campus, the access to the full text doesn’t require EZproxy.

Ori.Miller@exlibris.co.il