Searching in Unicorn WorkFlows

June 2003

KINDS OF SEARCHES

WorkFlows offers three basic types of searches: Search, Browse, and Exact.

SEARCH LOOKUP

The search lookup is a Keyword search. Keyword searches result in a list of titles of materials in the library collection that match the search words.

Search Options:

  • General: Will find words entered into search box in any area of the bibliographic record (keywords anywhere) as defined in the keyword index.
  • Author, Title, Periodical Title, Subject, Medical Subject, and Series: Will find words entered into search box within a specific and related group of fields (i.e., author only, title only, periodical title only, subject only, etc.) as defined in the headings index for these fields.

Operators may be used in the search box to find words related to one another, using Boolean logic (and, or, not, xor) or using their position (adj, same, with, near). If you do not type an operator in your search, "same" is inserted as the default operator. Keywords may be truncated by using the $ to fill in for many letters, or the ? to take the place of a single letter. Complex searches can be created using nesting techniques.

Other Helpful Hints:

  • Usage of quotations marks in a keyword search puts things together as a phrase.
  • Paired Single Quotes: Used to enclose a phrase to search for it exactly as it is typed. The words must all appear in the order entered and adjacent to each other.

For example: ‘free trade’

‘multicultural education’

  • Paired Double Quotes: To search for stop words and Boolean or positional operators as search terms.

For example: “the” (French word for tea)

“not” by bread alone

  • Slashes and decimals are not indexed – they need to be removed from your search text string and replaced with a space.
  • Hyphens are indexed.
  • If you use the term ‘not’ in a keyword search, you will “… absolutely not find your title.” The usage of the term ‘not’ negates the word that follows the search term.

(Cf. Paired Double Quotes solution above)

SET OPTIONS FOR ITEM LOOK-UP HELPER

General (or Keyword) searches may be further limited by pubyear, format, item type, home location, item cat1 and cat2, and language, by using theItem Look-Up Helper.

Modifications to the above are retained until you select another wizard. If your search does not return results, a message will suggest that your lookup options are too restrictive.

  • For more information on keyword searching using Boolean logic, truncation, and nesting techniques go to the Web OPAC Introduction Tutorialavailable at:

BROWSE LOOKUP

Browse searches try to match your search terms with words at the beginning of headings or in titles. A browse search results in a list of headings or titles whose first words match the search terms entered. The browse option produces a list in the alphabetic vicinity of the term you entered, which you may then scroll backward to headings beginning with A or forward to headings beginning with Z.

Author:Browses last name only

General:Browses only subject indexes

Periodical Title:Browses only periodical index

Call Number:Browses only one library at a time

CALL NUMBER SEARCH

A call number search is a browse search of the call number index. Call number searches must be limited by library on the search lookup screen and may be further limited on the Item Look-Up Helper by item type, home location, item cat1 and cat2, and call number shelving scheme.

EXACT LOOKUP

An Exact search is a type of browse search that results in a list of headings that match the words exactly as typed—in that order and in precise letter-for-letter match. The exact term search inserts a space directly after your term, therefore, plurals of the term are returned in alphabetical order.

When to use the exact search:

  • To find term(s) exactly as typed—in that order and in a precise letter-for-letter match
  • Find known authors and titles
  • Very effective for one-word periodical/journal/newspaper titles

CURRENT TITLE LOOKUP

This lookup option displays the record that was most recently displayed or modified. The “current” record that is displayed depends on the specific function of the wizard. If you have multiple wizards running and many different screens up on your workstation care must be taken. What you think is the “current” record may not be what Unicorn thinks is the “current” record!

ITEM LOOK-UP HELPER – DISPLAY TAB

Used to limit the display of records for any type of search.

PROBLEM:

A title browse will display a record on the index that you want to display. However, when you click on the entry you get the message “heading keys need to be indexed first” and you can’t get to the record. Why does this happen?

REASON:

This is an indication that the headings indexing was done, but not the keyword indexing. Headings support the browse indexes: author, title, various subject schemes, series, etc. When the headings are indexed, a standardized form of the appropriate entry, the "heading" (notice they are in all-caps without diacritics/special characters, etc., very like NOTIS), is entered into the browse index.

The browse index, however, does not point to the record directly. The entry in the browse index has an internal pointer from a given heading to the bibliographic records, but that pointer (the "headings key") must be entered into the keyword index. Thus every browse search starts in the browse index, but the last step, in order to get the record(s), is actually a keyword search!

Thus if the headings indexing is done on records, but something goes wrong with the keyword indexing, records will not be accessible by direct keyword searches, or by browse searches, which also rely on keyword. Also like NOTIS, the title control number, call number, and item ID (barcode) numbers are all handled differently, and are not affected by problems with keyword indexing.

SOLUTION:

1)Report this to the UITS Help Desk immediately.

2)When a browse search doesn't work (the only time you get the headings key error), do a keyword search. You should have no problem pulling up this record with a keyword search.

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