OCA Shortcuts

TIPS AND SHORTCUTS

  1. OCA bookmarklet: connect to databases and journals as a UCSC subscriber without going through the library Website.
  2. Maintain your own Web page links or bookmarks of library e-resources
  3. Use Google Scholar and have UC-eLinks show on the results page
  1. OCA bookmarklet: an easier way to connect to databases and journals without going through the library Website.
    The UCSC OCA Bookmarklet allows you to go to restricted access pages without going through the library website.

    For example, you may receive links to ejournal articles through email alerts, or through RSS feeds, or links in online papers. Instead of going to the library's homepage and logging in, then searching for the journal just to return to the page in question, try this bookmarklet and save all of those steps. The bookmarkelt will redirect you through the OCA server for the page you are currently viewing. In some cases you may need to use the browser's "Back" button to return to the resource URL, not the vendor's login/error page.

    To download the bookmarklet, right-click on the UCSC OCA Bookmarklet link above and choose "Bookmark this link..." or "Add to Favorites".  When you are on a Web page you'd like to run through the OCA server, simply choose that bookmark from your Favorites or Bookmarks menu. This even works with Google Scholar search results page.

  2. Maintain your own Web page links or bookmarks of library e-resources.

    You'll need to change the links to your licensed resources to invoke the OCA server. Do this by prefixing your URL with the OCA server URL,
    http://oca.ucsc.edu/login?url=
    Note: the link to the restricted resource must be absolute (starting http://); it cannot be a relative URL.

    So, if you have a link in your page to:
           http://a.library.licensed.product
    You must change it to:
            http://oca.ucsc.edu/login?url=http://a.library.licensed.product

    Alternatively, you can download the UCSC LibX Firefox extension. This extension allows you to right-click on any link and load the page through the OCA server.

     
  3. How to make Google Scholar display UC-eLinks on the results page, like it works on-campus.

    You'll need to run your Google Scholar search through the OCA server. Use the following link to connect to Google Scholar:
    http://oca.ucsc.edu/login?url=http://scholar.google.com.

    You can bookmark that site or search for it in the library electronic resources database.