This FAQ is about searching for library materials. If you are looking for your course textbooks, see How do I get my textbooks for the semester?
Getting Started
For a basic search, use the gray/green box in the middle of the library homepage:
The basic search box searches for your text, anywhere in the item record. If you are looking for a specific book, you can put in the title or author of the book--just know that, if we have books about that person or work, you'll see those, too.
Searching by topic
If you don't have a specific book in mind, enter a word or short phrase that describes the topic. For example, if you want to find out about the relationship between climate change and severe weather events, such as hurricanes, you might start by just putting, "climate change."
Narrowing Results
Once you have done a basic search, the results page will give you some tools to narrow those results. These are in the gray box on the left-hand side of the screen:
Some of the things you can filter by include:
- Availability: whether the book is online or on the shelf in the library
- Search Found In: which part of the record the search term is in. For example, the term might be found in the title, the author's name, or the subject headings.
- Format: whether the item is a book, ebook, streaming video, DVD, or something else
- Collection: Most of our materials are either in the "circulating" collection--regular, physical books that you can check out, or the "electronic" collection--ebooks that you can access through your web browser. Other collections include children's, reference (physical books that you usually can't check out), reserve (physical books set aside for a particular class) or media (DVDs or other audiovisual material).
- Location: Most of the books in our catalog are either in the library or online, but the catalog also lists physical books kept in a few other places, like the Career Center and the Teacher Education Lab.
Each of these options displays the number of results in that category. When you check a box, the results page will update to show only the results that match the filter you chose. If you wish, you can select another filter, from a different category, on the results page. For instance, you want ebooks that have climate change in the title, click "title" in the "search found in" section, and "ebook" in the "format" section.
Advanced Search
In advanced search, you can search for multiple terms at once, or specify a particular part of the record to search. To go to advanced mode, click "advanced search" under the search box on the results page--circled in green in this image:
You will be taken to the advanced search page, which looks like this:To
Your original search term will show up in the first box. You can enter an additional search term in the second box. To add more boxes, for more terms, click the "and" button.
You can also use the dropdown menus in front of each search box to specify a particular part of the record to search: author, title, or subject.
The lower half of the advanced search box offers a few ways to limit your search. These options are also available in the "refine by" box on the results page.
When you are ready, click "search."