360 KB: LexisNexis - removal of article-level linking for some collections
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- Product: Alma, 360 KB, SFX
- Product Version: all versions
- Relevant for Installation Type: all
What is happening with Nexis Uni article-level linking in Ex Libris products?
Over the past months and years, Ex Libris linking teams have been working to address problems with article-level linking accuracy in LexisNexis' Nexis Uni product. Although many improvements have been made to Nexis Uni link resolution, we have unfortunately decided to revert Nexis Uni to resolve links to the title-level only by default. For Alma and SFX, customers may opt to keep article-level linking through a local override - see below for details, but before implementing this workaround, please carefully read this entire article to understand the issues that will persist with using this local override before deciding if doing so will be beneficial to your library.
This change will occur on: August 28, 2022 (note: the targeted release date was originally August 14)
edit 2022-08-08 The table below originally contained three collections. The "Lexis Library" collection has been removed from the list of affected collections, as the collection will be removed in August. The collection "LexisNexis Netherlands" has also been removed; this was added by mistake and does not experience the linking issues.
"Nexis Uni" is now the only collection pertinent for this article and linking change.
edit 2022-08-25 Changed the effective date of the change. Added language above regarding Alma/SFX workaround to keep article-level linking, and included the instructions on implementing this local override below. Please make sure to read the entire article to understand the issues before implementing this override.
The collection that this change affects is:
Alma Collection Name |
Alma Collection ID |
360 KB DatabaseCode |
360 KB Database Name |
SFX Target Name |
Nexis Uni |
613780000000001685 |
NXXTH |
Nexis Uni |
NEXIS_UNI |
We would like to briefly explain the contributing factors that led us to make this difficult decision, particularly considering the importance of Nexis Uni as a popular tool for Law Schools, and as a general news and reference source for academic libraries.
Organization of certain articles under different "titles"
LexisNexis may group certain types of titles under a LexisNexis-specific "title". This may be for an editorial decision, to put like articles together under a certain source to facilitate browsing or discovery, or to have a place to put more scattered articles from publications that they do not have sufficient coverage for.
For example, certain articles from the title "U.S. News & World Report", we would expect to find under the "source" (which is LexisNexis' term for a group of items, usually a "title") for "U.S. News & World Report", however this is not the case for this article, "Social Media Has Good and Bad Effects on Kids: Experts"):
https://advance.lexis.com/api/search?source=MTA2OTYxNw&q=HEADLINE("Social+Media+Has+Good+and+Bad+Effects+on+Kids%3A+Experts")&context=1516831&qlang=bool&collection=news (this link does not work)
But if the source is removed, we find the article under the generic title "Newstex Blogs":
Similarly, an article from the title "Washington Technology" does not work under this source:
But can be found under "RDS Business and Management Practices":
Truncation of article title and punctuation breaking search
Punctuation in an article title can break the search-based link on Nexis Uni. In addition, some titles may not work in Nexis Uni search when using the full title, but a truncated version does work. These can be related. For instance, this article "COOKING FOOD CUSTOMS IN THE POT OF SELFGOVERNANCE: HOW FOOD SOVEREIGNTY IS A NECESSARY INGREDIENT OF TRIBAL SOVEREIGNTY" produces this link in the resolver from a citation:
However, Nexis Uni's search does not work well with punctuation in this case - so a truncated version of the search URL works instead (the portion after the colon/punctuation):
CDI Alternate Coverage
Since we do not receive article-, chapter-, and/or item-level metadata directly from LexisNexis for most of their products, we rely on alternate coverage from other sources (the original publishers, ProQuest/Gale for news and misc. content, etc.), and these may differ slightly from how LexisNexis interprets the article name. Since we do not have a LexisNexis article-level identifier for these articles, we rely solely on the article title for the linking, which may not work if it differs even slightly in LexisNexis and the alternate coverage data.
Article-level workaround for Alma/SFX via local override
Following customer requests, we have decided to allow for continued use of article-level linking for Nexis Uni in Alma and SFX, using a local override. Please make sure you understand the issues with Nexis Uni article linking by carefully reading the rest of this article, before you make a decision to implement the local override.
To do this, you will need to add 'exception=use_article' to the service level of the collection:
Parser parameters (override): url=https://advance.lexis.com/api/search & exception=use_article
Example:
Article: About Ad Age Leading National Advertisers 2022
Permalink: https://na02.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/TRIAL_1_INST/1phghrm/cdi_proquest_reports_2682468113
If exception=use_article is implemented the target URL will be:
Otherwise, you will only get the title-level link:
https://advance.lexis.com/api/search?source=MTA1NDcyMw&context=1516831
If you decide that you want to implement the article-level linking despite the above issues, the change will be part of the 4th August Content Update ( 20223500 ) that will be released on August 28th.
Conclusion
There are other issues that factored in to our decision to discontinue search-based article linking to Nexis Uni, but we hope this illustrates some of the complexities in maintaining article linking for this platform. General search-based linking, such as used on Nexis Uni, is very difficult for any third party to get right, and unique to the platform's idiosyncrasies. We believe switching to title-based linking will improve the user experience overall with LexisNexis content for the collections above.
Our contacts at Nexis Uni have been extremely helpful in troubleshooting issues and developing strategies over the years to circumvent article-linking issues that we brought to them, and we want to thank them for their assistance.
If Nexis Uni supports or changes other types of linking, we will of course re-evaluate this decision and update this article.
- Article last edited: 25-Aug-2022