Managing Discovery and Linking Services

Abstract

There is a growing trend toward a consolidation of services for electronic resources management, A–Z journal listings, full text link resolving, and discovery services under a single service provider. In many cases, the adoption of a discovery service from a provider that is not the same as the libraries’ existing link resolver service means managing multiple knowledgebases. In this session, three librarians gave an overview of their experiences and strategies for maintaining separate link resolving and discovery services in lieu of adopting a full suite of services from a single service provider. Each speaker presented a case study on the advantages and challenges of managing their chosen discovery service: EBSCO Discovery Service, Ex Libris’ Primo and ProQuest’s Summon, in conjunction with the CUFTS/GODOT open source knowledgebase and link resolver service.