Book Title Searches

You now know how to identify citations to books, and chapters in books and now you need to know how to find their locations and call numbers using The Catalogue or Summon.

There are three ways of searching for known books in The Catalogue:

Search for the Title if you know the exact book title. It's usually the quickest option.

Search for the Author if you know an author's surname and first initial, but you are unsure of the title.

Use Keywords when you know only a few words from the title and/or an author's (or editor's) surname.

Title

Title searches are not case sensitive so it doesn't matter if you use capital letters or not.
Punctuation is ignored, including foreign language accents.

You can type in all of the title of a book       e.g. principles of anatomy and physiology
You can truncate the title                             e.g. principles of anatomy and

Never use a, an, or the if it's the first word of the title!

Start at the Library Home. Click on the Catalogue tab Click on the triangle at the end of the box containing Keyword (search engine style) Click on Title (omit beginning 'The', 'A' etc) Use Alt-Tab, or the task bar button to return to this tutorial

Right click on the link to the Library Home
Then choose Open in New Window
Library Home

Type the book title  principles of anatomy and physiology into the Search for box. Click on the Search button. Then return to this tutorial.

 

Notice that The Catalogue finds nine books with this title. These are eight editions of the same book plus another book with a similar title.

You can sort these books in various ways.
Left click in the Sort by box.
Click on Date (latest first).

To look at the details of any of these books you can click on the highlighted title in the Full Title section.  

In the 'live' catalogue Click on the Full  title (or the number in brackets to the left) to look at the catalogue record for the 2009 edition of this book. Return to this tutorial.

 

The graphic displays details of the copies of this book and its supplement.
You would normally now write down the Location (e.g. Barr Smith Main Collection) as well as the Call Number (e.g.612 T12p.12).

Location
The section in the Library where the book is located.

Call Number
Where (exactly) on the shelves to find the book.

Status
Whether the book is On Loan, On Order, In Process, or Just Returned ... (a particular recent date) etc.

Available - the book is in the Library, not out on loan.

In Process means the item is in the Library but not yet ready to go on the shelves.

On loan - Due on gives the date the item is due back from loan.

On Order - the library has ordered the item but it hasn't arrived yet.

Overdue - Due on gives the date the item was due back from loan

Renewed - Due on gives the new date the item is due back from loan

Just returned - the item was returned from loan recently, but may not be back on the shelves yet.

Due Time      Applies to Reserve items only.
 
 

Return to the live catalogue session. Click on next to look at The Catalogue record for the 11th edition of this book. If the catalogue session has closed (after 10 minutes of inactivity) you'll need to repeat the previous steps. Return to this tutorial.

To start another Catalogue search scroll up to the top of the Catalogue screen and click on the yellow New Search button, 

or down to the bottom of the Catalogue screen and click on the New Search link.

Catalogue Time Out
If you don't use an open catalogue session for 10 minutes the computer will return you to the Library Home.

Here is a movie of how to use the catalogue to search for a book by its title.

Using Summon
More than 1 million catalogue items and more than 500 million other items are available through Summon.

Click on Summon Advanced Search

Enter the book title enclosed in double quotes in the With these words in the title box.

Summon isn't case sensitive, and it ignores punctuation.
Don't include subtitles of books (subtitles usually follow a full colon :)
If the title is long you can truncate it by leaving out whole words at the start or the end of the title.
Click on the Search button or press the Enter key.
You may have to scroll down the screen to find the Search button.

This search will find both books and book reviews.
To limit your search to just books click in the box to the left of Book under Content Type in the Refine Your Search column on the left of the screen.

Wait for Summon to update the results.
All the remaining items will be books (3 editions of the same title)

You can hover your cursor over the title to get a few extra details, but clicking on the title will take you to the detailed Catalogue record for a book.

 

You should now know

How to search for a book (or other item) by its title

Find the collection, call number, and status from The Catalogue or Summon

Distinguish between different editions of the same title

Logon to MyUni to answer Question 2.
Click on the right pointing arrow in the top right of the screen.
Move to Page 2.

Click on the link for Question 2.

Go to MyUni

Go to the next part of the tutorial Book Locations

Back to the previous section of the tutorial called Library Catalogue Login

Back to the Tutorial Table of Contents