Friday, February 22, 2013

Comparing Journal Apps; February Update


Here is an update on the Comparing Journal Apps Post from February 4th 2013.
The plan is to arrange a trial and comparison period of 4 journal apps within the University Medical Center Groningen, University of Groningen.
Just talking and tweeting about it already had some nice feedback from patrons, but also some libraries are interested. It would be great to have more people doing the comparison in the same time.
Béfore we will start the actual trial period, we want all apps to be ready for our users to:

  • be abled to register, because for all app you need to...
    • Today (22.2.2013) the DocPhin registration is open for our Institution. Choose: Other: University Medical Center Groningen
    • DocWise made the Netherlands (and other countries) available with currently two in there: UMCG and University Utrecht
    • Read by QxMD has "Rijksuniversiteit Groningen" to use for proxy access
  • have the fulltext access via our ezproxy installed or availabe for all 4 apps.
  • use BrowZine (the only one covering ALL journal categories, not just MEDICAL) with our proxy and Holdings.
Flipboard-like (Medical)
  • Docwise and Read (by QxMD) personalized "Flipboard" for medical journals, news and topics.
    Both these Apps have Settings for our library's proxy off-campus access.
    • Docwise has updated the new version with new (read: outside US) countries like Australia, Germany, UK, France, Sweden and the Netherlands!
      • available for iPad only
      • fulltext via proxy settings; Choose Netherlands; UMCG
      • free
    • In Read: Choose Rijksuniversiteit Groningen for fulltext-access(reviews Docwise and Read)
      • available for iPad and iPhone
      • has push-notifications
      • free

Start Pages-like (Medical)
  • Docphin (22.2.2013: Just been activated to accept patrons from UMCG by email, we are cheking if proxy-settings are working). review Docphine
    • available for Web, iPhone and Android. (iPad in preparation; Use Puffin Browser for best performance on iPad for now!)
    • fulltext access via proxy settings. Choose "Other: University Medical Center Groningen.
    • free
Bookshelf-like (All Topics, including Medical)
  • BrowZine (We are talking to them for a possible trial. This is the only App with a license-fee plan)
    • available for iPad
    • fulltext via proxy-settings ánd Holdings file
    • covering ALL journal categories
    • licensed
    • review BrowZine


What do you think?

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