What's New
August 17, 2006 - Session Timeout Alert Implemented
The Library of Congress Online Catalog is currently set to timeout after 5 minutes
of inactivity. Timeouts are necessary due to simultaneous user
limits that must be in place in order to assure an acceptable level
of system performance. Previously, users received no warning prior
to session timeout.
The new "Session Timeout Alert" provides
the user with a continuous count down clock displayed
in the lower left-hand corner of your browser window in the status
bar, as well as a pop-up window alert that appears 1 minute
prior to timeout. From the pop-up box, users can easily refresh
the session and restart the 5 minute clock. In addition, if a
timeout does occur, the user will have the
option of restarting their session and returning immediately to
the most recent search conducted.
Special Note to Users of Screen Readers: The current
implementation of this feature is not currently recognized by screen
readers like "Window-Eyes." The Library is aware of this problem and is in the process of rewriting the
script for this feature so that it will be fully accessible to
all users in the near future.
Special Instructions for Firefox Users: In order to get the full
benefit of this new timeout warning feature, you will need to enable
the browser's status bar, which is generally off by default. To
do this, open the Firefox browser, select Tools, then Options and a pop-up window will appear (see below).
Make sure that the "Globe" icon (Content) is selected (shown above). Next, select
the "Advanced" button (found to the right of the "Enable Javascipt" line). In the resulting window, select the box next to "Change status bar text" (a check mark should appear).
Select OK twice in
order to close both windows and save the update.
Special instructions for Opera Users: In order to get the full benefit of this
new timeout warning feature, you will need to enable the browser's
status bar, which is generally off by default. To do this, open
the Opera browser, select Tools, then Appearance, and a pop-up
window will appear (see below):
then select the Toolbars tab, enter a check in the Status Bar box, then select OK to accept the change.
Please report any problems to ils@loc.gov November 12, 2005 - Display of Non-Roman Characters
The Library of Congress Online Catalog has been upgraded to a new version. The
most notable feature of the upgraded online catalog is the ability
to view and search using non-Roman (Unicode) characters in the
JACKPHY languages (Japanese, Arabic,
Chinese, Korean, Persian, Hebrew and Yiddish).
Sample of Catalog Record with Arabic Characters:
For information on how to display or search in non-Roman characters (Unicode),
please view our new help screen:
Displaying and Searching Non-Roman Characters in the Online Catalog (Unicode)
More Ways to Print and Save
There are now more formats available for printing and saving records from the
online catalog:
TEXT FORMATS:
Text (Brief Information) provides a brief labeled display for saving or printing (corresponding to the
, while Text (Full Information) provides a labeled display showing all fields present in each
record.
MARC FORMATS:
The MARC formats can ONLY be saved. MARC (non-Unicode/MARC-8) is the most compatible format. However, if you need
to save non-Roman characters in "unicode" you will need to use
MARC (Unicode/UTF-8).
Problems with Emailing Records
There is a current known problems regarding the emailing of records non-Roman
characters and words containing any diacritic marks. If either
of these conditions exist, the emailed catalog record will not
contain the lines of text containing these elements. Therefore,
we recommend that you print or save instead.
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