More about searching

When you have selected the catalogue you want to search, you can choose either Search or Construct a Search by clicking on the relevant tab.

Using the Search tab

Use the Search tab when:

• you want to find all items by a particular author
• you know the first words of a book or journal title
• you want to browse the call number list
• you want to see if the Library holds a particular journal title
• you want to search for items on a particular topic.

Select the search type you want and enter the words you want to search for. For example:

Keyword Anywhere: australian prisons 
Title List: for the term of his natural life 
Author’s Name: clarke marcus 
Subject List: horticulture Journals/Magazines/Newspapers
Title List: art and australia 
By or about a Person: white patrick  
By or about an Organisation: coles myer 
Call Number List: 641.877 m19p 
Boolean Search: (cats and dogs) or (mice not rats)

For author, subject, title and call number searches you do not have to enter the full details. If you are unsure, just enter the first words or letters. For example:

AUTHOR’S NAME: malouf d 
TITLE LIST: fly away pe 
CALL NUMBER LIST: 778.1

When doing keyword searches you can use quotes (“ ”) to link words or phrases and ? for shortened words. For example:

Keyword Anywhere: “drug testing”
Boolean Search: athlet? and drugs (i.e. to find athlete and drugs,    athletes and drugs, athletics and drugs)

Using the Construct a Search tab

Use the Construct a Search tab when:

• you are not sure about the first word of a title
• you want to build a search by combining different types  of searches, e.g. author, title, subject, publisher
  For example, if you are looking for recent conference proceedings on adult education, you might try something like:

Keyword Anywhere: conference proceedings

This search will retrieve records with either of the terms ‘conference’ or ‘proceedings’ anywhere in the record and the phrase ‘adult education’ in the subject field. The Keyword Anywhere index was selected because the words ‘conference’ and ‘proceedings’ can appear in various fields, such as author, title and notes.

Setting search limits

You can limit your search to specific languages, publication dates, types of materials (e.g. videos or sound recordings) or item location by clicking on More Limits.

Limits must be applied before entering the search and will remain in effect until you clear them by clicking on Clear Limits. In the Search tab, limits apply only to the Keyword Anywhere and Boolean searches.