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Frequently Asked Questions

Frequently Asked Questions

If you cannot find the answer to your question below, please contact us directly with your query. Please ensure you have also checked through our help notes before submitting your question.

About this Website

What is Cambridge Companions Online?
Cambridge Companions Online brings together subject or theme-based PDF collections of Cambridge titles, making them available together online as subscription packages.

At present, we offer four collections: The Complete Companions; The Companions to Literature and Classics; The Companions to Philosophy, Religion and Culture; and The Companions to Music.

Cambridge Companions Online are grouped according to the series they are commissioned into as print titles and are automatically allocated to the relevant collection upon publication.
I'm having trouble using the search facility. What can I do?
Please check our help notes for full information and tips on how to search, including how to refine your results. It may be that you need to narrow your search if you receive too many results by entering additional words to the search terms, or use less precise terms to search more widely.
Is it possible to trial Cambridge Companions Online prior to purchase?
Institutions may arrange a free, no-obligation 30-day trial. Please Contact Us directly to arrange a trial.
What will trial access allow us to see within Cambridge Companions Online?
Trial access to either the full Complete Cambridge Companions; Literature and Classics Companions; Philosophy, Religion and Culture Companions; or Music Companions is available as standard (institutions only).
What are the advantages of registering on Cambridge Companions Online?
When you register, you will have access to the following:
- Account administration area – to manage you organisation details (if you are the approved account administrator for your institution)
- Personalisation tools - you can save bookmarks, notes and searches and share them with others by creating workgroups.
May I purchase a subscription to Cambridge Companions Online through my consortium?
If you wish to purchase a subscription to a collection within Cambridge Companions Online through your library consortium, you can pass their details to us and we will contact them to arrange your deal. Contact Us for more details.
Does Cambridge offer any other online products that are similar to Cambridge Companions Online?
For full details of our other online offerings, please see our Cambridge products page
Do you offer individual subscriptions to Cambridge Companions Online?
Individual subscriptions to the Complete Companions Collection (password access only) is available. Please see our Subscribe page for more information.
How do I subscribe to Cambridge Companions Online?
Please check our Subscribe page for full information on how to subscribe to collections within Cambridge Companions Online.

About Content

How much material am I allowed to print out from Cambridge Companions Online?
Users may access, search and view individual chapters for personal use only. Print, copy and download permissions may vary from collection to collection depending on the sensitivity and rights available for the content. Unless otherwise stated in the Terms of Use, users may make copies, printed or otherwise, of one chapter or up to 5% of the pages from each CCO title, whichever is the greater.
How can I find out which new titles are being added to Cambridge Companions Online and when?
A full list of all new titles will be listed on the News page on the 5th of every month. New additions to the site will also be listed in the latest titles area at the bottom of the homepage.

Title lists are available to download from the homepage and will include all the latest titles. Subscribers can also sign up for content alerts within the Updates area. Alerts can be sent by email or RSS feed.
I've noticed an error in the text. How do I report it?
Unfortunately we are unable to alter or correct details within the actual chapter PDFs, but we can make changes to the chapter extracts, titles and author names. If you have found and noted an error in an extract, please contact us at onlinepublications@cambridge.org with full details of the error. We are not able to make changes immediately, but will upload the corrected text when we publish the next batch of new material on the site.
Which citation style is used by Cambridge Companions Online?
Cambridge Companions Online follows the Modern Language Association (MLA) format for citation examples. For more information on the MLA guideslines for documenting online sources, please see:www.mla.org

On this site users are able to download and e-mail citations through the export citation tool found on all book and chapter pages.
Why do some images not appear within chapter PDFs in Cambridge Companions Online?
We have endeavoured where possible to include all images within the online editions of titles in Cambridge Companions Online. However, an associated image may not be available in a small number of cases because of rights reasons. In this instance, we suggest that you refer to the relevant chapter in the printed edition of the title.

Technical Questions

I'm having trouble opening PDFs. What can I do?
Please see our 'Help with PDFs' page for PDF troubleshooting, including common viewing problems.
Which browsers will this website display on correctly?
This website will display fully in the following recommended platforms and browsers:
- Internet Explorer 8 and later
- Firefox 5 and later
- Google Chrome v.17 and later
- Safari v.5 and later
- Opera v.11.6 and later
What are the recommended display settings for this website?
The minimum recommended screen resolution for this website is 800 x 600 pixels, although we recommend 1024 x 768 pixels.. The recommended colour depth is 256. If the content of Cambridge Companions Online is too small to read comfortably, please increase the text size setting in your browser application.
What is a DOI?
A DOI, or digital object identifier, is a unique and persistent identifier that you can use to cite or link to information online. On this site, all books and most chapters/book sections will have a DOI, which you will see on the book landing page or chapter/section landing page. To create a link using a DOI, you can use the DOI itself preceded by the text http://dx.doi.org/— so, for example, http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511495212.002 is a link you can paste in your browser that will take you to a given chapter's landing page. The DOI is a persistent identifier: it will point to the piece of content it identifies, or to information about that piece of content. It enables readers to find information like digital books, digital book chapters, or journal articles irrespective of any subsequent changes in the website structure or the location of the website on which the information is hosted. For more information about DOIs, see www.doi.org or www.crossref.org.
What are cookies?
Cookies are text-only strings of information that a website transfers to the cookie file of the browser on your computer's hard disk so that the website can remember who you are. Institutional subscribers accessing via IP should note that usage statistics related to user sessions will not be available if cookies are disabled. For more information about cookies, please visit www.allaboutcookies.org.
Is this website Open-URL compliant?
Yes, this website does support Open-URL linking. This can be managed within the Account Administrator area under the Subscriber Services tab. Note: You must have account administrator access to view this area of the site.
Do you offer library card access/Athens/ Shibboleth authentication?
Unfortunately we don't offer library card access at present. We do offer Athens and Shibboleth authentication: if you have questions about setting it up, please contact us.
What is 'referrer URL' access, and how can I use it for my society or organisation's access?
Academic societies, or other organisations who are unable to set up access using IP authentication, may obtain access by making use of a 'Referrer URL'. A referrer URL is the URL from which all users from that society or organisation will access content on Cambridge Companions Online. With a referrer URL, the society or organisation's own site will allow users to log into it, and that site will present its members/users with a link to Cambridge Companions Online if those members are entitled to access. For further information, please contact your nearest regional office: ccol@cambridge.org for North America or onlinepublications@cambridge.org for UK and Rest of World.
How do I configure IP ranges for my institution?
Your institutional administrator should first log into Subscriber Services with their administrator username and password. Click ’Update Organisational Details’ in the Account Administrator menu bar, then enter the new IP ranges into the data entry box provided and click 'Update '. Please allow the system a few moments to update before attempting to access content. Please note that if you are accessing this site through a proxy server then you will need to provide the IP address of the proxy server in order for you to access the site.
When do usage statistics for each month become available?
Usage statistics for each month are processed at the start of the following month. For example, your COUNTER-compliant usage statistics for June will become available during the first week of July.
How can I see usage statistics for my library/institution?
Usage statistics are available to all institutional account administrators who will need to log in to the Account Admin area within Subscriber Services with their administrator username and password in order to access these pages. Once logged in, please select the 'Usage Statistics' tab from the ‘Account Administrator’ menu. Please note: Usage statics on the new site will only contain data from 30 November 2012 onwards. If you require usage data from the old site (pre-30 November 2012 usage statistics), please visit: http://subs.sams.cup.semcs.net . Once on the main Subscriber Services page, you will be required to enter your administrator email address and password in order to update any account details.
How do I update my institution's subscription record?
Institutional account administrators may update their records by logging in and going to the Account Administrator area within Subscriber Services and clicking ’Update Organisational Details’. Any changes made to the institutional account (including IP changes) will be automatically updated on submission.
I am a subscriber and I can't access Cambridge Companions Online. What can I do?
If your access details have been set up incorrectly in our database you will experience problems in trying to access Cambridge Companions Online. Please check with your librarian or account administrator that the details that have been entered into the database are correct. To do this, your administrator must first log in to Subscriber Services and check that you are using the correct username and passwords or that the correct IP addresses have been entered for your institution. If either has been entered incorrectly, your administrator should update the details. If you are still having trouble accessing the site, please ask your administrator to contact us directly. If you hold an individual subscription, please check that you are entering the correct email address and password to access Cambridge Collections Online. If you still cannot access the site, please contact us.
Is it possible for remote users to access the site?
Please ask your users to authenticate to your network for access in the normal way. Provided that users access the site from an IP address within your organization's configured IP ranges, they should be able to access content. Alternatively, your administrator may set up designated users to have remote access with a username and password. To do this, your administrator should log into the site with their administrator username and password, then click the ‘Subscriber Services’ tab on the top menu bar. On this page, below the ‘Account Administrator’ menu, choose 'Remote User Access' on the side menu, then click the 'Add Remote User' button. Please then type in the remote user's information, using the email address of the user as his/her username. We recommend that you use email addresses to keep everything consistent across our systems. Finally, please click 'Save.' This will enable remote access for this user, upon login, to any purchased titles listed in your account
What are valid IP formats?
IP addresses are made up of four numeric components separated by a full stop (period). Each numeric component ranges from 0 to 255. You can express an IP range by using a hyphen (-) and you can use a wildcard within a range by using an asterisk (*). Examples of valid IP address formats (note the numbers are used as examples only):
- 121.18.19.20 = a single IP address
- 121.18.19.* = all IP addresses beginning 121.18.19
- 121.18.19.0-255 = a range of IP addresses from 121.18.19.0 to 121.18.19.255 inclusive (ie the same as the example above)
- 121.18.* = all IP addresses beginning 121.18
- 121.18.0-255. = all IP addresses in the range 121.18.0-255 (ie all addresses beginning 121.18)
- 121.18.0-255.0-255 = all IP addresses beginning 121.18
- 121.0-255.0-255.0-255 = all IP addresses beginning 121
Is it possible to have more than one account administrator?
You may have more than one administrator for an institutional account, but please contact your nearest regional office for further advice. Contact ccol@cambridge.org for North America or onlinepublications@cambridge.org for UK and Rest of World. Please note that administrator login details to Subscriber Services should be kept in a secure place and only allocated to librarians or site administrators.
How do I use Subscriber Services?
Subscriber Services are only available to administrators of subscribing institutions. To access our account management pages, either click on the ‘Account Admininistration’ links in the 'Subscriber Services' tab on the home page and follow the instructions. Once on the main Subscriber Services page, you will need to log in with your administrator email address and password in order to update any account details.
I've forgotten my password. How do I retrieve it?
Individual users should contact us directly. Unfortunately we are only able to reset your password, so please specify a new password along with your full account details when contacting us.
I've forgotten my administrator password. How can I retrieve it?
Please Contact Us. specifying your full details, together with a new password. We will update our database and confirm your new details by email as soon as possible.
Does Cambridge Companions Online provide MARC records?
Cambridge Companions Online provides MARC records free of charge for all titles in the collections. You may download a MARC21 format file (.mrc) containing records of all titles contained within each collection from the MARC records page within Subscriber Services. We will add a new file for each upload of new content as and when it is published.

MARC records for these titles are also available via OCLC. Please visit their site for more details.

MARC record reader software such as MarcEdit will be required to add these files to your library system. If you have trouble saving or opening the file, make sure it's saving to your computer with a .mrc extension. If you don't have MARC record reader software installed, you can right-click when downloading the file, save it with a .mrc extension, and then open that file in a text editor like Notepad.

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Frequently Asked Questions

About this Website

About Content

Technical Questions

Welcome to Cambridge Companions Online

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