Setting up authentication in FLEX is critical to ensure that only students enrolled in your institution will have access to the content of the links you share with them.
Authentication needs to be set up before your students can access the links you have created in FLEX.
Currently it is possible to set up authentication for your students 5 different ways:
- via a referring URL (default option)
- via EZproxy
- via Shibboleth.
- via Microsoft Authentication
- via Google Authentication
The default set up for authentication is set as 'Referring URL'. When you log into FLEX for the first time, you will need to follow the steps below to set it up before any links can be created. Otherwise, every link you will create will show an error and won't display your extract.
Setting up authentication via a referring URL
To be able to use this method of authentication, you need to be using an online platform to share reading links with your students, for example a Learning Management System (LMS) or a website.
- From the menu, click on 'My institution'
- Click on the button 'Add referring URL' which will open a pop up as per below
- Enter the URL you want to whitelist and click 'Save'. Note: the URL needs to be entered as per example moodle.myinstitution.com.au (no http://www. at the beginning and no / or other character at the end).
- If you want to whitelist a few URLs, you can repeat the same steps and enter as many URLs as necessary.
- Click on 'Update' at the bottom of the page to save all your changes.
- Verify that students are able to open FLEX resources by copying a link into the system that was whitelisted and opening the link from that system.
Setting up authentication via EZproxy, Shibboleth, Microsoft or Google authentication.
These methods of setting up authentication are more technical and might require assistance from your IT team. Please contact our support for more information.