Navigation Notes

If the web browser you are using is Internet Explorer 4 or above, you may use the following shortcuts to move quickly to a particular type of search:

• Press Alt and A to move to the Author search field.
• Press Alt and T to move to the Title search field.
• Press Alt and W to move to the Word in Title search field.
• Press Alt and S to move to the Subject search field.
• Press Alt and N to move to the Narrator search field.

You may also use Alt and O to move to the OK button, and Alt and C to move to the Clear button which clears the search form.

Currently, these shortcuts are not recognized by any version of Netscape, but they may operate with other web browsers.

Searching Methods

Format Types
You will begin each search by selecting the format. You may choose one option from the list of available formats:

• CASSETTE - Cassette books, including cassettes produced by the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (with the prefix RC) and local volunteer-produced cassettes (with the prefix CS).
• DESCRIBED VIDEO - VHS videos with added narration describing the visual elements of the film. The prefix for described videos is DV.
• DISC - Disc books, including both rigid discs (prefix RD) and flexible discs (prefix FD).
• LARGE PRINT - Print books with type sizes of 14 point or greater. The book number prefix for large print books is CL.
• All - All formats.

The All option is selected by default. With this option, the OPAC will list all materials matching your search, regardless of the format. You may reduce the results list by specifying the format you prefer. Conversely, you may increase the number of results by not specifying any media.

Author Search Tips

Often, however, readers don't remember the author's full name or are unsure of the spelling. Here are some suggestions to fully maximize the capabilities of an Author search.

1. You do not need to enter a full name. You may leave off the author's first name if you are not sure what it might be or how it is spelled. For example, is the horror author Stephen King or Steven King? In this case, simply type in King. The OPAC will generate a list of all books authored by anyone whose last name is "King".

2. You may replace part of the name with an asterisk. For example, if you don't know whether an author's last name is spelled Anderson or Andersen, type Anders*n.

You may not enter a last name with an asterisk and a first name. However you may enter a last name and then a first name with an asterisk. For example, Anderson, Jo*n will find books by Joan Anderson and John Anderson, but not Joy Anderson.

3. Do not type the author's middle initial or middle name, even if you know it. This will usually get false search results of 0 titles found.

Title Search Tips

1. Do not enter the words "A", "An", or "The" when these words appear at the beginning of a title.

2. You may enter any number of consecutive beginning words in a title.
For example, to find The Case of the Beautiful Beggar, you could type CASE OF THE BEAUTIFUL or CASE OF THE BEAUTIFUL BEGGAR. (However, searching for BEAUTIFUL BEGGAR will result in no hits, or search results.)

3. The last word you enter is assumed to be incomplete.
For example, a search for LITTLE PRINCE will retrieve both A Little Princess and The Little Prince.

4. The asterisk (*) may be used as a wild card in a variety of ways.
For example, if you are uncertain of the spelling of several words, you may use the asterisk to substitute for the letters you don't know. Perhaps you are looking for a book whose title is pronounced "The mammer zap and the donkey voo." A search for that spelling will not retrieve any records. However, a search for MAM*DON will result in the entry for The Mamur Zapt and the Donkey-Vous.

You may also use the asterisk at the beginning of a title. For example, a search for *MARK TWAIN will retrieve 24 titles, while searching MARK TWAIN will locate only 10 titles.

5. Do NOT use punctuation in a title search. Searching for WHERE'S JULIUS? will not retrieve any entries. To locate the book, simply enter WHERES JULIUS without the apostrophe and question mark.

Word in Title Search Tips

1. You may search for any ONE word in title. Perhaps you heard about a book where there is a murder in a cathedral. A search for the word CATHEDRAL will find Nelson De Mille's Cathedral, as well as Margaret Truman's Murder at the National Cathedral and a variety of other books that have the word "cathedral" in the title.

2. Any word that you enter in the Word in Title search is assumed to be incomplete. A search for the word DREAM will locate titles with Dream, Dreamer, and Dreaming.

3. If a word appears more than once in the title, the title will be listed in the search results more than once. A search using the word ANGELS will display a variety of titles. The book Angels, Angels Everywhere is listed twice, once for each time "angels" appears in the title.

4. An asterisk (*) may be used if you are uncertain about the spelling of a word. For example, many of our titles use the British spelling of honor - honour. A search for HON*R will display titles with both spellings.

Subject Search Tips

Here are some tips for searching by subject.

1. To move through the list of subjects quickly, you may type the first letter of the subject you are searching for. For example, typing a W will move you to WAR-CIVIL/USA. If you are looking for Westerns, you may then down arrow past the additional war headings until you reach the Westerns categories.

2. There are specific subjects for younger readers. When JUV appears in the name of a subject, it refers to juvenile books written at reading levels ranging from Preschool to Middle School. YA indicates books written for young adults or high school readers.

3. Some subject groupings are very broad. A search may result in thousands of hits. Currently, the only way to narrow the results is to limit the search to a specific format. For example, a search for MYSTERY-OTHER and ALL FORMATS retrieves more than 5,000 titles. Restricting the format to CA (cassettes) results in 3,000 titles.

4. Some subject searches may take a long time to finish. The time it takes for the OPAC to find and display a list of results depends on your search criteria and the speed of your Internet connection. You may experience several minutes of delay before your search results appear. The subject groupings that result in the largest number of hits (and so, will take the longest amount of time to appear) are:

• Bestsellers
• Entertainment-Books into Movies
• Family-Other
• Mystery-British
• Mystery-Other
• Romance-Other
• Science Fiction-Other
• Westerns-Fiction

Narrator Search Tips

If you don't remember the narrator's full name or are unsure of the spelling, you may use the following tips. (Note: Searching by narrator vaires in some ways from an author search.)

1. You do not need to enter a full name. Leave off the narrator's first name if you don't know it.

2. You may replace part of the name with an asterisk. If you're not sure whether a narrator's last name is Pederson or Peterson, you may enter PE*ERSON.

Working with Search Results

Once you have entered your search criteria, the OPAC will generate a list of books in the library's collection matching your criteria. The results will appear on the Results Page. The Results Page may list only a few books or many. You may obtain more information about a particular book by selecting it. A Bibliographic Page will appear with details about the selected book.

About the Results Page. After you enter search criteria and choose the OK button on the Search Page, a Results Page will appear. This page displays the number of hits, a results list, and an OK button. Below are details about this page.

• Number Found. The Number Found refers to the number of book titles that matched your search criteria.
• Results List. The Results List displays each book entry that matches your search criteria. Each entry consists of four parts: radio button, Title ID, Author, and Title. The list is sorted alphabetically by author, then title. The parts of the results list are described below.

  Radio Button. The radio button is a small circle in front of the book entry. The radio button for the selected book entry is darkened. Only one book may be selected at a time. You may select a different book entry by placing the mouse pointer on top of its associated radio button, then clicking the left mouse button. To select an entry using keystrokes, press the Up or Down arrow until the appropriate radio button is selected.

  Title ID. The Title ID is the letter-number combination that the library uses for book identification purposes.

  Author. The author's name is displayed as last name, first name, then middle initial. Some longer names may not be displayed completely. For example, Laura Ingalls Wilder may appear as Wilder, Laura I.

  Title. Long titles may not display completely. For example, The title Chicken Soup for the Soul, 101 Stories to Open the Heart and Rekindle the Spirit will be shortened to CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE SOUL, 101 STORIES TO OPEN THE HEART AND.

About the Bibliographic Page. Once you have selected a book entry from the results list by marking the radio button and choosing the OK button, the Bibliographic page for that book entry will appear.

The Bibliographic page displays information about the book and a Send button. Below is a description of the Bibliographic Information.

• Title ID. The Title ID is the letter-number combination that the library uses for book identification purposes.

• Media. The Media field lists the format of the book: cassette, disc, large print, or descriptive video.

• Author. The full author's name is displayed as last name, first name and middle initial.

• Title. The Title field displays the book's full title.

• Annotation. The Annotation field briefly describes the content of the book.

• Volumes. For recorded books (cassettes and discs), the Volume Number refers to the number of physical containers used to send or to store the tapes or records. For large print books and described videos, the number of volumes reflects the number of books or videotapes that make up the complete book.

• Number of Tapes or Records. For recorded books, the Number of Tapes or Records refers to the total number of tapes or records that make up the entire book.

• Language. Indicates whether the book is in English or another language.

• Fiction or Nonfiction. Fiction titles are indicated by the codes FIC or JFIC for adult or juvenile, respectively. Nonfiction titles are indicated by a Dewey Decimal classification number.

• Recommended Reading Level. The Recommended Reading Level will indicate a suggested range of reading levels for the book. For example, the recommended reading level for most books by Dr. Seuss is "Preschool to Second Grade".

• Status. The Status indicates the book's availability as Present in the collection, On Order, or Removed from the collection.

• Copies on Hand. Copies on Hand refers to the number of copies of the book currently available for circulation.

• Unfilled Request. Refers to the number of people who have this book on their request lists for future shipments.

• Unfilled Reserve. Refers to the number of people who have this book on reserve. Reserved books are sent as soon as copies become available.

• Explicit sex. If a book is known to contain sexual descriptions, the word "Yes" is displayed in this field.

• Violence. If a book is known to contain descriptions of violence, the word "Yes" is displayed in this field.

• Strong Language. If a book is known to contain strong language, the word "Yes" is displayed in this field.

• Classification. Refers to the book's classification number based on the Dewey Decimal classification system. Fiction books will have FIC (for adult and young adult fiction) or JFIC (for juvenile fiction) in this field.

• Publisher. For recorded books, this field refers to the publisher of the original print book. For large print books, this publisher of the large print edition is displayed. Some older titles do not have information in this field.

• Publication year. For recorded books, this field refers to the publication date of the original print book. For large print books, the publication date of the large print edition is displayed here. Some older titles do not have information in this field.

• Narrator. For recorded books, the name of the person who reads the book aloud appears in this field.

• Narrator Gender. Lists whether the narrator is male or female. Readers with hearing impairments sometimes find that they are able to hear male narrators better than female narrators.

• Narrator Accent. This field is marked "Yes" when the narrator has a British or other accent.

• Recorded Speed and Tracks Per Tape. These fields are not used at the present.

• Length. Indicates whether a book is long or short. Books that have more than 2 cassettes, or 4 records, or 400 pages are considered "Long".

• Cover. For large print books, the Cover field indicates whether the book is a hardback ("Hard") or a paperback ("Soft").

• Size. For large print books, the Size field indicates whether the book is a "Quarto" or tall book. "Regular" indicates a standard size book.

At the bottom of the Bibliographic Page, there is a Order button. If you decide you would like to borrow the book, you may use this button to begin the ordering process.

To return to the Results Page, use the Back button of your web browser.

When you choose the Order button on the Bibliographic Page, the Login to Send Page will appear.

You must enter your User ID and your password on this page. To obtain your your User ID and password, contact the library.

Once you've entered your User ID and password, choose the OK button. You should receive a message stating "Item Placed on Send List".

The library processes this list each workday morning. Generally, if the book is available, it will be sent right away. If the book is not available, it will be reserved for you, so that a copy will be sent to you as soon as one becomes available. However, readers who have a three-month supply of books already checked out will not receive their orders immediately. Instead, their requests will be kept on file to be sent after some books are returned.

You may receive the message "Not a valid patron." This indicates that the computer was unable to verify that you are an active LBPH reader. If you get this message, return to the Login to Send screen, and re-type both your PID and your PIN. If you continue to get this message, please contact the library.

When You Can't Find a Book

If you do not locate the book in the NLS catalog, our staff may be able to suggest similar books. You may contact us at: