Faculty: How to Create Links to Library Resources  

EZ Proxy is the way that students, staff and faculty can connect to article databases, e-journals, and most e-books directly from the links within Canvas when they are off-campus.

EZ Prozy requires a short URL-like string, or "prepend" attached to the beginning of all links for library subscription resources, which then prompts for an A number and password. The prepend is:

http://dist.lib.usu.edu/login?url=

Example 1:

The link to the IBIS World database is:

http://www.ibisworld.com

which becomes:

http://dist.lib.usu.edu/login?url=http://www.ibisworld.com

Then,anyone off-campus trying to access IBIS World will simply be asked for their A number and Access (Banner) password before getting access to the database.

Example 2:

If you want to link to an article in an EbscoHost database and the permanent link is
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=buh&AN=53303746&site=bsi-live, the link you would paste in Canvas is:

http://dist.lib.usu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=buh&AN=53303746&site=bsi-live

If the student is on campus, the EZ proxy prepend is ignored and students will have direct access to the resource.

This error message shows up if you attach the EZ proxy prepend to a link that is not connected to our EZ proxy, or if the prepend was added to an open access (freely available) journal or other free resource in the A-Z database list:

"To allow http://data.un.org/Default.aspx [or other URL] to be used in a starting point URL, your EZproxy administrator must first authorize the hostname of this URL in the config.txt file..."

To access the resource, delete the EZ proxy prepend from the web address in the browser's menu bar: