Early Access Block

Display Online First articles in your journal's sidebar

What it does

Early Access Block adds a sidebar widget that lists articles published before their issue is officially released — commonly known as Online First, Early Access, or Ahead of Print. Readers see the latest work immediately, without waiting for the full issue.

How it works

The plugin works with the Forthcoming plugin to identify articles that are published but not yet assigned to a released issue:

  1. Create a forthcoming issue in OJS and publish articles into it
  2. The sidebar block automatically lists those articles
  3. When the issue is officially published, the articles move to their regular position

Key features

  • Automatic listing — articles from the forthcoming issue appear in the sidebar automatically
  • Configurable count — show as many or as few articles as you want
  • Galley links — optionally display direct links to PDF or HTML files
  • Author names — each entry shows the article’s authors
  • Multilingual — block title can be customized per language

Features

  • Sidebar block with articles from the forthcoming issue
  • Configurable number of displayed articles
  • Multilingual block title
  • Optional links to galley files (PDF, HTML)
  • Clickable article titles linking to the full article page
  • Author names displayed with each article
  • Localization: English, Polish

Requirements

  • • OJS 3.4+ or 3.5+
  • • Forthcoming plugin (to designate the Early Access issue)