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World Cat

World Cat is available through NCLive.  A password is required to access this database from outisde the library.

Go to World Cat here.

Basic Searching

Type one or more key search terms in a box given here. If searching for an exact phrase, enclose the phrase in quotes.

Click "Search".

"Clear" will reset everything back to the blank defaults.

Review the list of search results and refine the search as needed. The limitors to narrow a search are few here. For more limit options, try the advanced or expert search levels.

 

Advanced Searching

The Advanced Search screen allows constructing complex search statements that can be combined using Boolean operators such as AND, OR, and NOT. Use them if so desired.

Enclose terms in parentheses if necessary. If searching for an exact phrase, enclose the phrase in quotes.

Click the drop down menu list to see all available options/limitors. Then, select the one desired.

Type search terms in the second and third Search for: boxes as needed. Choose the appropriate index choices for the second and third search strings.

Browse the indexes if you would like to verify the correct spelling and format for any search term. To access the Browse Indexes feature, click "Index" to the right of each drop-down index box.

Select the appropriate Boolean operator to combine the search strings entered in the second or third boxes with the first one. These are found on the left of the boxes you enter terms into.

Select limits to narrow your search.

To rank results, choose an option from the Rank by clicking the drop-down menu.

Click "Search".

Review the list of search results and refine the search as needed.

 

Expert Searching

The Expert Search screen is designed for entering logical search strings. Logical search strings are made up of specific labels and search terms combined with special characters and Boolean operators. Subsets of the search strings are grouped using parentheses. A list of valid indexes is provided in the Index drop-down menu.

Type your search string in the "Search For" box. If searching for an exact phrase, enclose the phrase in quotes. Other operators and special characters are listed at the bottom of the screen for quick reference. Then select an index for any unlabeled search term from the "Indexed In" menu.

The indexes can be browsed to verify the correct spelling and format for search terms. To access Browse Indexes, click "Index" at the top of the screen. Select limits to narrow a search.

To rank results, choose an option from the "Rank" drop-down menu.

Click "Search".

Review the list of search results and refine the search as needed.

 

Stopwords

These are common words that have little informational value and are ignored when processing a keyword search. These words can be included as part of an exact phrase however. Examples of stopwords would be: has, its, than, were, if, she, their, when, into, so, there, and would.

 

Plurals, Truncation And Wildcards

 

Plurals

To search for a word and its plural form, add a plus sign + to the singular form. This will search for any plural formed with either -s or -es. For example, dog+ retrieves dog and dogs. To search for the plural of words that have different word roots, search for both forms and combine them with OR.

 

Truncation

Truncation allows searching for a term and its variations by entering a minimum of the first three letters of the term followed by an asterisk . For example, cont* searches for continent, continental, contigent, etc. Truncation is set to read a limit of 50 index entries in WorldCat.

 

Wildcards

Wildcards can represent zero to nine additional characters in a search term. WorldCat recognizes two wildcards: A pound sign # represents a single character. A question mark ?, alone or with a number, represents from zero to nine additional characters. Include a number if you know the maximum number of characters the wildcard will replace. Otherwise, use the question mark ? alone to represent any number of characters within a single term, including no additional characters. For example, colo?r  finds color, colour, etc.

 

Boolean Searching

Use the Boolean operators to combine search terms to expand or narrow a search. Use parentheses ( ) to specify the order terms will be combined.

AND

AND retrieves only records with all search terms. Use this to narrow a search.

OR

OR retrieves all records with one or both search terms. Use this to expand a search.

NOT

NOT eliminates records that include a search term(s). Use this to limit a search.

Parentheses

Put terms in parentheses to specify the order they will be combined.

Proximity Operators (W or N)

To find terms within a certain distance of other terms, use the proximity operators w or n followed by a number. Multiple terms and proximity operators can be joined together. Example: dog n2 care w3 diet.

 W (With)

Type "W" between two terms to search for records containing both terms, in the order typed, with no words between them. Type "W" and a number between two terms to search for both terms, as typed, with no more than that number of other words between them. Examples: "kierkegaard w5 regine". "kierkegaard w angst".

 N (Near)

Type "N" between two terms to search for records containing both terms, in any order, with no words between them. Type "N" and a number between two terms to search for records containing both terms, in any order, with no more than that number of other words between them.

 Phrase Searching

To search for an exact phrase, enclose the entire phrase in quotes. Example: "bad dog".

 Limit Search By Library Holdings

Search results can be limited to items held in a particular library from any search screen. To limit to your library, click "Items In My Library". To limit to another library, type the library symbol in "Library Code".

 Rank Option

The Default rank option for a WorldCat search is "Number Of Libraries". This lists the number of libraries holding the item in descending order. Commonly held items are displayed first in the results list. All records are displayed when the default option is used.  For other ranking options, only the top thousand records are displayed. To change the rank option, select this from the drop-down menu.

 Rank Description

Number of Libraries Records are listed by the number of libraries that own the item. Items held by the most libraries display first. For items held by 5 or more libraries, records are listed in exact number order. Records held by 4 or fewer libraries appear at the bottom of the results in random order. Relevance Records are scored and listed by relevance rank. The most relevant records display first.

 Date Records are listed by year of publication. The most recently published records display first.

 

Refining A Search

If you do not get the desired results, try one or more of the following:

 

Browse Indexes

An index is a list of words that point to library resources. Browse the indexes to check the spelling or format of search terms and phrases. The indexes give the number of records in which your terms and its variations appear. Click "Browse Index" to use this.

Limits

Select from the limits displayed if your search produced too many records. Remove previously selected limits if your search produced too few or no records

 Ranking

Results can be ranked by relevance or publication date. Records with the highest relevance rank are displayed at the top. To organize results list by rank, choose a rank option from the drop down menu. The default is no ranking. Only the top thousand records will be displayed.

 

Overview Of The WorldCat Home Page

These are the options and links on the home page. Here is a brief explanation of their purpose.

 

WorldCat Hot Topics

Hot Topics are pre-formed searches on current and popular subjects. You can view the list of topics from a drop-down menu on the Basic Search and Advanced Search screens. Select any of the topics from the menu to generate a search on that topic. The terms used in your search will be displayed with the search results.

Hot Topics will be updated regularly to provide you with a quick way to retrieve relevant results on these topics. 

 

Home - Goes to the WorldCat home page.

 Databases - Lists available databases.

 Searching - Do a search.

 Options  - For the advanced searcher, set the following options as desired:

• Record List Size
• Email Address
• JavaScript: Off, On
• Screen Size: Small, Medium, Large
• Framed Links: Off, On
• Character Set: Standard, Unicode
• Colors: Blue, Green, Gray, Classic, Initial

 Search Pages - The default WorldCat home page starts with Basic Search. Below, a quick summarization of the Basic, Advanced, and Expert search pages is given.

 Basic Search Page

Search In Database - Choose which database to use.

Keyword - Enter key terms here.

Author - Enter all or part of the authors name.

Title - Enter all or part of the title.

ISBN - Enter the ISBN number.

Year - Enter the publication year.

 

Advanced Search Page

 Search In Database - Choose which database to use.

 Search For: Use the dropdown menus to choose one of the following options.

Access Method -

Accession Number -

Author - Enter all or part of the authors name.

Author Phrase - Search for the name as a literal phrase.

Corporate And Conference Name -

Corporate And Conference Name Phrase -

Descriptor -

Genre/Form - List the genre.

Geographic Coverage -

ISBN - International Standard Book Number.

ISSN - International Standard Serial Number.

Keyword - Enter the keywords to search for.

Language - Desired language to search. Default is All.

Material Type -

Material Type Phrase -

Musical Composition -

Musical Composition Phrase -

Named Corporation and Conference -

Named Person -

Notes/Comments -

Personal Name -

Personal Name Phrase -

Phrase -

Publisher - Enter part or all of the publishers name.

Publisher Location - Enter the city, state, or country a publisher is located within.

Series Title -

Standard Number -

Subject - Enter part or all of a standard Subject Heading.

Subject Phrase - Enter a phrase in entirety or part from a Subject Heading.

Title - Enter words from the title.

Title Phrase - Enter a literal title phrase.

 

Limit To:

Year - Limit by publication year.

Language: 

• All
• Arabic
• Bulgarian
• Chinese
• Croatian
• Czech
• Danish
• Dutch
• English
• French
• German
• Greek
• Hebrew
• Hindi
• Hungarian
• Indonesian
• Italian
• Japanese
• Korean
• Latin
• Norwegian
• Persian
• Polish
• Portuguese
• Romanian
• Russian
• Spanish
• Swedish
• Thai
• Turkish
• Ukrainian
• Other
• Show All Languages

 

Number of Libraries:

• All
• 5 or more
• 50 or more
• 500 or more

 

Limit Type To:

Match Any Of The Following:

• Archival Materials
• Articles
• Books
• Computer Files
• Internet Resources
• Maps
• Musical Scores
• Serial Publications
• Sound Recordings
• Visual Materials

 

Subtype Limits: This consists of three drop down menus. You can limit the reading audience, material genre, and material type.

 

• Any Audience - Searches all audience categories.
• Juvenile - Searches only Juvenile literature.
• Not Juvenile - Excludes Juvenile literature.

 

• Any Content
• Biography
• Fiction
• Musical Recording
• Non-musical Recording
• Not Fiction
• Thesis/Dissertation

 

• Any Format
• Braille
• Cassette Recording
• CD Audio
• DVD Video/Videodisc
• Large Print
• LP Recording
• Manuscript
• Microform
• Not Microform
• VHS tape
• Videocassette

 

Limit Availability To:

• Match Any Of The Following:
• Items In My Library
• Library Code

 

Rank by:

• Date
• Number Of Libraries
• Relevance

 

Expert Search Page

 Search In Database -

 Search For: Has a box to type in the following advanced search operators.

 

Indexed In:

• Keyword (kw:) -
• Access Method (am:) -
• Accession Number (no:) -
• Author (au:) -
• Author Phrase (au=) -
• Corporate and Conference Name (cn:) -
• Corporate and Conference Name Phrase -
• (cn=) Descriptor (de:) -
• Descriptor Phrase (de=) -
• Dewey Class Number (dd:) -
• Dewey Class Edition (d2:) -
• Genre/Form (ge:) -
• Genre/Form Phrase (ge=) -
• Geographic Coverage (gc:) -
• Geographic Coverage Phrase (gc=) -
• Gov Doc Number (gn:) -
• ISBN (nb:) -
• ISSN (ns:) -
• Language Phrase (ln=) -
• LC Control Number (nl:) -
• Library of Congress Call No. (lc:) -
• Material Type (mt:) -
• Material Type Phrase (mt=) -
• Music Number (mu:) -
• Musical Composition (mc:) -
• Musical Composition Phrase (mc=) -
• Named Corporation and Conference (nc:) -
• Named Corporation and Conference Phrase (nc=) -
• Named Person (na:) -
• Named Person Phrase (na=) -
• Natl Ag Lib Call No. (ag:) -
• Natl Lib. of Canada Call No. (ca:) -
• NLM Call Number (lm:) -
• NLM Call Number Phrase (lm=) -
• Notes/Comments (nt:) -
• Personal Name (pn:) -
• Personal Name Phrase (pn=) -
• Publisher (pb:) -
• Publisher Phrase (pb=) -
• Publisher Location (pl:) -
• Report Number (rn:) -
• Serial Decade (sd:) -
• Series Title (se:) -
• Series Title Phrase (se=) -
• Standard Number (sn:) -
• Subject (su:) -
• Subject All (sa =) -
• Subject Phrase (su=) -
• Subject Headings, LC (hl:) -
• Subject Headings, LC Phrase (hl=) -
• Subject Headings, LC Children's Lit (hc:) -
• Subject Headings, LC Children's Lit Phrase (hc=) -
• Subject Headings, MESH (hm:) -
• Subject Headings, MESH Phrase (hm=) -
• Subject Headings, NAL (ha:) -
• Subject Headings, NAL Phrase (ha=) -
• Subject Headings, NLC (he:) -
• Subject Headings, NLC Phrase (he=) -
• Subject Headings, Other (ho:) -
• Subject Headings, Other Phrase (ho=) -
• Subject Headings, RVM (hr:) -
• Subject Headings, RVM Phrase (hr=) -
• Subject Headings, Sears (hs:) -
• Subject Headings, Sears Phrase (hs=) -
• Title (ti:) -
• Title Phrase (ti=) -
• Uniform Title (ut:) -
• Uniform Title Phrase (ut=) -
• Unique Serial Title (tk:) -
• Unique Serial Title Phrase (tk=) -
• Universal Decimal Class No. (ud:) -
• Update Date (up:) -
• Vendor (vn:) -
• Year 2 (yy:) -

 

Limit To: Year -

 

Language: Same languages as listed above.

 

Number of Libraries:

• All
• 5 or more
• 50 or more
• 500 or more

 

Limit Type To:

Match Any Of The Following:

• Archival Materials
• Articles
• Books
• Computer Files
• Internet Resources
• Maps
• Musical Scores
• Serial Publications
• Sound Recordings
• Visual Materials

 

Subtype Limits:

• Any Audience
• Any Content
• Any Format
• Audio
• Biography
• Braille
• Cassette Recording
• CD
• DVD Video/Videodisc
• Fiction
• Juvenile
• Large Print
• LP Recording
• Manuscript
• Microform
• Musical Recording
• Non-musical Recording
• Not Fiction
• Not Juvenile
• Not Microform
• Thesis/Dissertation
• VHS Tape/Videocassette

 

Limit Availability To:

Match Any Of The Following:

• Items In My Library
• Library Code

 

Rank by:

• Date
• Number Of Libraries
• Relevance