Library of Congress Online Catalog: Help Pages

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  SEARCHING:
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  Keyword Searches:
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  Guided Search


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Use Guided Search to retrieve materials by keyword, present anywhere in the catalog record, or only in specific fields (e.g., author, title, publisher, etc.).

Guided Search

A Guided Keyword search is especially helpful when you are looking for specific items but do not know the initial words of a title or a person's complete name; or when you wish to create a precise search strategy, combining or excluding search words or phrases.

The Guided Keyword search screen consists of two sets of Search/Attribute sets, and the ability to tie them together with Boolean operators:

  • Set Search Limits (if desired) before constructing the search.
  • Enter search word or phrase in the Search: box
  • Select all of these, any of these, or as a phrase from the drop-down list
  • Select an index name from the As: drop-down list (Keyword Anywhere is the default index and performs the broadest search)
  • Select Begin Search to get results, or
  • Select AND, OR, or NOT and fill in the next set of Search: boxes.
    * Search results sort order varies with index choice.

Guided Search Examples:

The Guided Search is very flexible, allowing for a wide variety of search word and phrase combinations, as illustrated in the examples below (for more examples and details, see the Help Screen on Guided Search Index Codes):

Example 1:

Example of a search for saint louis  as a subject

Example 2:

Example screen of a search for shakespeare as a personal names and harcourt at the publisher

Example 3:

Example screen of a search for politics or elections as a keyword and puerto rico as a subject phrase

Use the browser's [Back] button to resume searching.

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June 25, 2008