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December 07, 2007

External Linking to Libronix Resources and Reports

A very handy and unfortunately very underused feature in the Libronix Digital Library System is the ability to link to resources from external documents (like Word documents and PDFs) and web pages. This functionality is part of the Power Tools Addin (Tools > Options > Power Tools). If you don't already have it, you can read about or watch how to download it for free.

Libronix allows for a much better hyperlinking experience than the web does. When you link to a web page, you usually can't link to a specific location on that page.* For example, if you wanted someone to read a certain portion of Van Til's "Why I Believe in God" at Reformed.org, you would have to direct him to go to the fourth section, third paragraph, etc. Not horrible, but not ideal.

In Libronix we provide far greater power and specificity in linking. You can link to a variety of different things:

(Note: These links may not work properly in all feed readers. Visit the site to try them out.)

And that's not all. I just learned, thanks to Sean Boisen's blog post "Libronix Links As Knowledge Resources," that you can even link to most reports! So you can take someone directly to—and even run for them—any of these:How cool is that?! And most of these links will even preserve preferences like version choice, etc. where applicable!

Some of you are already thinking of all the ways you can make use of this. Others of you might still be wondering how this would come in handy. Let me suggest a few ways:

  1. Include links to resources and reports in your digital teaching materials. If you use a computer while you teach, this will save you time by allowing you to look up sources and run reports more quickly giving you more time to spend actually teaching.
  2. Include links to resources and reports in your digital syllabi. Many universities and seminaries are now distributing syllabi as Word documents or PDFs. Having Libronix links in your material will make learning more efficient—and fun!
  3. Include links to resources and reports in your papers. This is helpful if you share your papers with others via your website or some other way digitally. If they use Libronix, they'll be able to run down your footnotes. But perhaps it will be of most help to you. If you want to look up one of your sources to double check something or recheck the data behind your conclusion, it's just a click away. My dissertation is full of thousands of hidden Libronix links.
  4. Include links to resources and reports in your blog posts. I regularly link to my Libronix library when blogging (e.g., see the notes section in this post).
So how do you create a link? It's very simple. Open a resource to the location to which you want to link, click Favorites in the menu bar, then click Copy Location to Clipboard (or just use the keyboard shortcut Alt+Ctrl+C). Create your hyperlink, and you're all set. It works the same way with most reports.

Here are a couple of articles where you can find more information about external linking to Libronix resources:

One warning about external linking and web browsers: Internet Explorer and Firefox don't handle Libronix encoding the same way, so you may occasionally run into trouble with more complicated links (e.g., spaces are particularly problematic). A link may work in one browser but not another. In addition, Internet Explorer struggles with Greek and Hebrew, but Firefox tends to handle them properly. You shouldn't have trouble with the simpler links, and we're working on ways to get browsers to behave properly with the more complicated ones.

* I say usually because some pages have anchors built into them, which allows you to link to a specific section of the page, but most pages don't have anchors and most people don't know how to find anchor text or how to link to it.

Posted by Phil Gons at December 7, 2007 06:00 AM

Comments

none of these are working for me from firefox...

Posted by: mike aubrey at December 7, 2007 10:08 AM

From the web page, or from your feed reader? All the links work for me in Firefox and Safari on three different computers. Most of the links work for me in IE as well, except for the ones containing Greek. None of the links work in Google Reader, regardless of the browser. Nor do they work in Bloglines, which strips the links out entirely.

Posted by: Phil Gons at December 7, 2007 10:45 AM

How about inserting a link in a Logos note file to an external PDF document or Word document on my computer? Is it possible using the Connect to Remote Notes feature?

Posted by: Fred at December 7, 2007 07:01 PM

Thank you very much, Phil. I've been playing with this and think it will be quite handy for PowerPoint presentations.

ALSO, it's great to have the frequency of helpful blogs like this back to what it was before a valued Logos staffer moved back East.

Steve

Posted by: Steve Maling at December 8, 2007 10:38 AM

I tried from google reader and then again from the webpage. The only thing the links are doing is changing windows from firefox to Libronix.

Posted by: mike aubrey at December 8, 2007 10:47 AM

Awesome! Thanks for sharing this with us, as I had no idea that we could do this with the software. I practiced by creating some links and placed them into the body of an email, and sent it to a friend. He was able to click on those links and read the materials that I directed him to.

Thanks

Andy

Posted by: Andy at December 8, 2007 12:17 PM

I am having the same problem as Mike...firefox takes me to Libronix and then nothing happens.

I copied the links into a word doc and tried that. It did the same thing just switching from Word to Libronix.

I would love this to work because I also can see the great applications it offers. So, if you have any ideas as to why some of us would struggle and other not....I would love to know what that would be since I would also have to put that work around in my documents.

Posted by: paul at December 10, 2007 08:47 AM

Fred, there are a couple of ways to link to an external document from within a Libronix note file. (1) Paste the file location into your note file (e.g., file:///C:/Documents%20and%20Settings/YourName/Desktop/Test.pdf). (2) If you want the actual file location to be hidden behind linked text, you'll have to create the link in Word or somewhere similar. Currently, you cannot create it in Libroinx. E.g., if you want the words "a sermon" to link to a particular sermon you preached, you'll have to select those words in Word or an HTML editor and create the link to the file location, and then paste the linked text into your note file.

The Connect to Remote Notes feature is something different from what you are asking.

Posted by: Phil Gons at December 10, 2007 11:27 AM

Steve and Andy, I'm glad you found it helpful. Steve, thanks for the kind words. I hope the posts continue to be a help.

Mike and Paul, I'll do some digging and see if I can figure out the problem. I assume you're running the latest version of LDLS. Have you tried other browsers? I'll send you an email and see if you are able to get them to work from there.

Posted by: Phil Gons at December 10, 2007 11:43 AM

Phil, thanks!

For a few years I've been listing all my sermons (by date, topic et al) on an Excel spreadsheet to plan the whole year's preaching with hyperlinks to the progress in the study on the passage which is on a Word doc (e.g. 08-01-06 study notes.doc).

Then in the Word doc I have a hyperlink to the Logos passage to open immediately to the place I'm studying for any given Sunday sermon.

Now I can hyperlink to some of my best research directly from a Logos passage long after I've forgotten the results of my previous study.

This feature just advanced the usefulness of Logos immeasurably for me. And I was already a Logos fanatic!

Thanks, again! And welcome to Logos!

Posted by: Fred at December 12, 2007 05:34 AM

Fred, thanks for sharing. That is great to hear. I'm thrilled that you'll be able to put this feature to good use! Blessings!

Posted by: Phil Gons at December 12, 2007 08:16 AM

Is it possible to link to morphological or syntax search results?

Posted by: Tim at March 27, 2008 09:48 PM

I am building up my note files with research from many sources. I am wondering if there is a way in Libronix to like one user annotation to another in the same or a different note file. For example if I have an extensive note on a character in John chapter 1 and in chapter 15 I want to add a note about this Character with the idea "see more in John 1:3" I know I can link to Bible and then have to click on the note icon, but can this be accomplished in the same click?

Posted by: Vladimir at April 15, 2008 10:05 AM

Vladimir, I addressed this question in a recent blog post: Linking Between Note Files and Other Documents.

Posted by: Phil Gons at June 30, 2008 02:23 PM

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