Through netLibrary, the University of St. Thomas Libraries now provide access to a collection of electronic books or e-books.  E-books can be checked out and read online through the netLibrary website. 

Here's how it works:

1.  Go to the netLibrary website.

Are you a UST user, off-campus, coming from CLICnet?   Create a Free Account at NetLibrary.  Return to CLICnet for the e-book ("log in" to  view).  For help, call the OSF Library Reference desk at 651/962-5001.

2.  Browse or search through over 8500+ titles available to St. Thomas users (Minitex provides a list of ebooks they have purchased for library users in Minnesota.)
3.  View the full text of any title (that is not currently checked out) for up to 15 minutes.
4.  Set up an account with netLibrary (follow the "Create an account" link) if you want to check out one or more books and access them whenever or wherever you are through your web browser.

You will need go to the netLibrary website and follow the "Create an account" link to set up an account with netLibrary to check out books.  Then you can going directly to netLibrary without coming to the Libraries' web site.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are e-books?

Basically, ebooks provide book-length content in a digital (electronic) form.  Through netLibrary, UST students, faculty, and staff have access to selected titles that are electronic reproductions of the original publication with exact matches for pagination.  The CLIC library consortium and MINITEX provide access to approximately 4000 titles in a format compatible with your web browser.

How do I get started?

In order to check out titles, you must set up a user account (a username and password of your own choosing) from a St. Thomas computer.  Your user account allows for a variety of configurations and allows you to access to the netLibrary collection from anywhere in the world, as long as you set up your account originally on a St. Thomas computer.  To create an account, go to the netLibrary website and follow the "Create an account" link.  Follow the instructions to set up a username and password.  (Note that netLibrary, not the UST Libraries, keeps records of these accounts and passwords; if you forget your password, you must contact netLibrary.)

Once you've created your account, you can check out books.  You may access netLibrary directly from netLibrary.  To do a sample title search, type: Encyclopedia of Conflict Resolution.  Click on the search button.  Select "Preview" and you can view the contents of the book.  If you select "document" from the top of the title bar, you can see the single page without the frames. You can explore your options and test the "find" command if you are seeking a specific term within the content of the book.

How do I preview titles?  How do I borrow an e-book?

Anyone can preview a title for 15 minutes online.  You do not need to log in to preview a book, and you can preview books that are already checked out.  If you want to check out a book, the circulation period for an ebook is 4 hours.  When the loan period expires, the ebook will automatically disappear from your account and be made available to other interested users.  If you need to, you can check it out again to continue using it.  You can also return a book before it is due by choosing that option.

What about printing?

Selected pages can be printed, but you are prohibited from printing books in their entirety or otherwise redistributing them.  If you attempts to print an entire book, the system displays a copyright infringement notice.  After about three of these warnings, you will be cut off from the system.

Where can I find search tips?

netLibrary has a very nice Help section.

Minitex Ebook Collection

Email your comments to:  mdhageman@stthomas.edu
Last Revision:  March 2003, updated February 2004