Most ebook platforms offer a large number of features including: exporting citations, highlighting sections, downloading of the entire book or sections of a book for a defined loan period and printing a specific number of pages. Not unlike accessing journals online, each ebook platform will have a slightly different look and feel. Additionally, these features will vary across providers and may require you to create a platform-specific account.
It may be necessary to sign up for an account with an ebook provider to use their special features. The EBSCOhost platform provides an example of this procedure. Using the sign-in navigation, users can create a My EBSCOhost account in order to save their search preferences as well as save items to a folder than can referenced later.
Some ebook platforms allow you to make and save annotations to ebooks, and to build virtual bookshelves from items in their collection. For example, signing up for an account at ProQuest Ebook Central allows you to save different colours of highlighted text and save books to a bookshelf that you can refer back to at a later date.
Some ebook platforms provide different functionality for copying text than for downloading whole or partial ebooks. For example, using the "Copy Text" feature at Scholars Portal Books allows users to select and export text with citation and URL information included.
One of the most important features that ebook platforms offer is support and training. This platform-specific training is kept up to date and allows users to get the most of out of their ebook viewing experience. For example, Scholars Portal has a variety of online guides, including one for Scholars Portal Books.
