It is spring and love is in the air. I am in love with Athens. (Ok, I probably need to get out a little more often.) Athens has added some nice customization features for libraries and users.

Resource Customization
When a library user logged into MyAthens and clicked on Resources they got generic resource descriptions supplied by the vendor.
For example:
Thomson Gale Databases
"Gain access to your institution's own Thomson Gale online reference and periodical resources, such as InfoTrac (including Onefile/Newspapers), Gale Virtual Reference Library (eBooks), The Times Digital Archive, ECCO and Resource Centers."

Yeah, not very helpful or informative to the general library user. It was also a problem for large journal/publisher sites.

For example:
Oxford Journals
"Research journals from Oxford University Press in the fields of Life Science, Medicine, Mathematics and Physical Sciences, Humanities, Social Sciences and Law."

I don't know but if I was the average library user, I would assume by that description my library had access to ALL of the Oxford Journals. If a library doesn't subscribe to the entire kit and kaboodle, the library can now change the wording to reflect that.

In fact the library can change the wording to all of the resources to better help the users. Lyn Norris from Athens says, "If you only subscribe to the Cochrane Library through Wiley InterScience, you can change the name of the resource to The Cochrane Library, and amend the text to describe the Cochrane Library. Alternatively, if you have a second STAT!ref subscription, perhaps for Anatomy TV, you can amend the name from STAT!ref Supplemental to Anatomy TV, and give it a description related to Anatomy TV."

Browser Toolbars
Athens now has toolbars for both Firefox and Internet Explorer. The toolbar replicates the features of the MyAthens web page and can be used to access Athens authenticated resources. What is nice is that you just click on the Athens Options to login and once you are logged in you can used the pull down menu on the toolbar to jump to your resources.