Combined general search
The General Search on the home page and the Search Options page will search all the fields of all records (Archives & Local Studies combined). It will search for all elements of the enquiry both together and separately. A phrase search will be conducted for any phrase in “quotation marks”.
Search options for Local Studies collections
Click the ‘Show search options’ link in the top bar, which will expand to show you detailed options. This will close if you click the link again. If it is open you can scroll down to your results page as it does not close this page to open the search options.
- The General Search will search all fields of all records and phrase searching is active.
- The two date boxes allow you to search a range of dates, from the earliest to the latest, if you are uncertain of a publication date. If you wish to specify just one year (e.g. a specific edition of a book) then put the same date in both boxes.
- ISBN – this searches only the ISBN field. Use the general search for any other manufacturer’s number that might be included in a record.
- Title – this will search all the title fields in the records, including the Main Title, Variant Title, and Added Title fields. It will not search for a title in any non-title fields (e.g. notes fields) – please use the General Search.
- Name – this will search all the author fields (personal or organisational) and biographical fields.
General search rules
- To return to your search parameters, click the ‘Show search options’ in the top bar and the search screen will open. Clear the boxes manually before starting a new search as they will not clear between searches automatically.
- You can also choose what order to show your results in or whether to include records with images only whilst in the search options. These can be refined on the results page.
- Click ‘Hide search options’ to return to Home page or last results page.
- String searching is available by using the * (asterisk), e.g. fish* will find everything with fish, fishing, fished, fishy etc.
Results
These will automatically display in a ‘relevance’ order unless you have chosen otherwise in the search options. There is an option to choose the sorting order whilst on the results pages by Name, Title, or Dewey classification at the top right of the page.
If you wish the images (or their placemarkers) to show, choose to see the results in a grid formation. If you return to the search options box, you can click this option and re-run the search. There are very few of these at present.
Item result
Each item result will show shelfmark, author, title and publication details where recorded. Click on the box with the relevant details to open full record.
Any images attached to a record will show on the right of the page.
- Click on each available thumbnail to view.
- Use the buttons above the main image to pop out a larger image (middle button), zoom in and out, or rotate the image.
- NB you cannot move from one image to the next without returning to the main item page (click the X at the top of the screen or press ESC), and choose the next thumbnail.
Requesting items
To request an item, please include the copy information (at the bottom of the record) for the specific item required (there may be more than one copy on a record, some of which may have a specific attribute noted in the record above). Also include the author and title for clarity. There is no direct request button, so please email your request to [email protected].