The Advanced Search function enables you to select various options to narrow your search and, in doing so, increase the relevance of the hits found. To begin an Advanced Search…
- On the VLib main menu, click on the Search option to access the Search database screen
- Under the Search box, select Advanced
- Press the Enter key or click on the Search button to access the Advanced search database screen
a) Limiting Search Criteria
You can narrow your search by changing the search criteria using the pull-down menu provided.
- On the Advanced Search database screen, click the pull-down menu button to the right of the Keywords in Title, Subject, Author option
- Scroll down the menu to select from the list of search criteria
- Once the criteria is selected, enter your search term(s) in the Search box
- Press the Enter key or click on the Search button to begin the search
b) Using Boolean Operators
On the Advanced Search database screen, you may either key in search terms in just the first box or use more than one box and do a Boolean search using either the “And”, “Or” or “Not” Boolean operators. The radio buttons for the Boolean operators are located below each search criteria line.
Using the “And” Boolean operator
- Select the “And” radio button to narrow down the results of a general search term
- Enter your search term(s) in the relevant Search boxes
- Press the Enter key or click on the Search button to begin the search
Example:
Keywords in Title: mark
*And*
Keywords in Author: cranfield
The example above narrows the search for a title with “Mark” by combining the search with the author “Cranfield”. The results will contain both “Mark” in the title and “Cranfield” in the author. A shorter list of hits is produced compared to a search using only the term “Mark”.
Using the “Or” Boolean operator
- Select the “Or” radio button to widen your search to produce combined results for different search terms
- Enter your search term(s) in the relevant Search boxes
- Press the Enter key or click on the Search button to begin the search
Example:
Keywords in Title: mark
*Or*
Keywords in Subject: theology
The example above will produce hits which contain either the term “Mark” in the title or “theology” in the subject heading.
Using the “Not” Boolean operator
- Select the “Not” radio button to omit titles containing a specified search term
- Enter your search term(s) in the relevant Search boxes
- Press the Enter key or click on the Search button to begin the search
Example:
Keywords in Subject: theology
*Not*
Keywords in Title, Subject, Author: mark
The example above will produce hits of any titles with the subject heading containing “theology” as long as those titles do not have “Mark” in their title, subject or author fields.
c) Selecting Information Type
On the Advanced Search database screen, the default is to search by all the information types or categories of materials catalogued by the library. You may limit the search to just one or a few types.
- Select one or more radio buttons against each information type you want to search (e.g. “Books (English)”, “Theses”, etc.)
- Enter your search term(s) in the relevant Search boxes
- Press the Enter key or click on the Search button to begin the search