E-Books on Demand. © Universität Wien / Franz Pflügl

E-Books on Demand (EOD)


Please note that books from the main library cannot digitised between 28 October 2024 and mid-January 2025 because they are being relocated to the new book depot.

Our service

You can request the digitisation of any book from the holdings of the Vienna University Library as long as it is no longer protected by copyright (i.e. 70 years after the author’s death) and in a condition suitable for digitisation. We only digitise complete media units (volumes) – from cover to cover.

Your requested book will be scanned carefully and in high resolution. After scanning, books can be processed with an optical character recognition software (OCR without correction). Subsequently, the images of the individual pages are compiled into a single PDF file.


From book to e-book

The EOD service is available on the University Library Website – via the search engine u:search and the scanned catalogues ("Nominalkatalog der Hauptbibliothek") – as well as the EOD network's common search engine .

Follow these steps to order an e-book:

  1. Search through the catalogues, click the “Digitise”-button and order a cost estimation for the digitisation of your desired book
  2. You receive a cost estimation, or information about whether the book you ordered can (not) be digitised
  3. You are notified about the completion of your e-book order
  4. After successful payment, you can receive the e-book either as a PDF file for download, or on a DVD (additional fee)

Costs

  • • Basic price: € 10,-
  • • Price per page without optical character recognition: € 0,12
  • Price per page with optical character recognition: € 0,16
  • • DVD and postage (not applicable for delivery via download)
    • o € 6,- (Europe)
    • o € 8,- (worldwide)

Payment can be made online via credit card (American Express, Diners Club, JCB, Mastercard and Visa) or via ClickandBuy. We can also issue an invoice, if needed.

If you have a valid library card for the Vienna University Library, you can also pay in cash at the library: The costs for the digitisation will be charged to your account and can be paid either at the Main Library (lending service, inter-library loan, textbook collection) or at any of the special libraries that offer online lending services.

Conditions for Vienna University staff  can be found on the University Intranet (login needed).


Advantages

You can read the original

Our e-books deliver the original pages to your screen; you can print them any number of times.

You can use the electronic full text

E-books contain, in the case of books with a publication date from 1801 onwards, a full text of the complete book, if requested. E-books can be browsed for any keywords; contents can be easily transferred to other programmes via copy & paste for further processing.

You can use free standard software

Use your standard PDF reader and benefit from options like browsing, zooming, printing, etc. You need no additional software.

Save on travelling costs

Order your desired book online instead of travelling to a distant library. The digital copy will be made available via download or on DVD.


E-Books in Phaidra

Phaidra is the repository for the permanent secure storage of digital assets at the University of Vienna. The Phaidra book viewer is a web application in which books that were scanned as part of the EOD service are made available worldwide after a blocking period. You can find these books either via full text search or in the collection Digitised holdings of the Vienna University Library .


EOD network

With e-books on demand (EOD), rare books are digitised on demand Europe-wide. This service is offered as part of the EOD network , which consists of more than 30 libraries from over 15 European countries.