Behind every online library catalog, article index, or information service is a database, a digitized collection of information stored on a digital storage medium such as disk or tape. Databases are most commonly thought of as containing text and numbers, but they are not limited just to alphanumeric data and can also contain images, videos, and sound files in a variety of formats.

Library Catalogs

The Library's Online Catalog provides users with a system for retrieving information from the library's database of items collected in its print, media, and microformat collections. The library's database has been built over many years and continues to be added to as the library receives additional materials for its collections. As each item is received, it is examined by catalogers, compared to a national database of item descriptions (cataloging records), and then added to the library's database.

ALEPH is the name of the system software that allows catalogers to add items to the database and that sits behind the libraries Catalog. Like most systems, it has a variety of access points by which users can query the system for information, including author, title, subject, and keywords anywhere. These are only a few of the access points, though.

The catalog's initial search screen offers users several approaches for beginning a search for library materials: Basic Search, Search Begins With, and Advanced Search. The Anywhere option allows searching for keywords anywhere in an item description, in author keywords, in title keywords, or in subject keywords. The Search Begins With option allows a searcher to browse alphabetical lists of Titles and Authors. Figure 1 below shows the initial search screen and the available options.

Figure 1

Figure 2 shows search options for the Basic Search. Anywhere is a basic keyword search of all information in the catalog. A researcher can also limit a search to Title, Journal Title, Author, Subject Heading, Series, Standard Number (ISBN, ISSN, etc.), and to Call Number. Tips immediately underneath the search entry box recommend enclosing exact phrases inside quotation marks. By default, if a string of words is entered into the search box, the system searches for items that match all of the words entered.

Figure 2

Figure 3 shows options for the Search Begins With or Browse search. While the Basic Search brings back a list of items organized according to relevance to the entered terms, the Browse search brings back alphabetical lists of items that begin with a word or phrase entered into the search box. Currently, library users can browse alphabetical lists of authors and alphabetical lists of titles.

Figure 3

The Advanced search offers access to the same types of searches shown in Figure 2: Anywhere, Title, Journal Title, Author, Subject Heading, Series, Standard Number (ISBN, ISSN, etc.), and Call Number. Additional means for limiting a search include in the Advanced screen limiting by Location, by Format, by Language, and by Publication Date. Tables 1 -2 provide all the options for limiting by location and by format. A researcher can also select to limit by any of over 120 languages.

Figure 4

 

Table 1 -- Location Limits
ALL		Reference
General Collections		Reserves
Government Documents		Special Collections
Media		Technical Services
Periodicals

 

Table 2 -- Format Limits
ALL		Manuscript
2D Nonprojectable Graphic		Map
3D Artifact		Media
Analytic		Microform
Archival Control		Mixed Material
Auidiocassette		Music
Biography, Autobiography		Musical Score
book		Newspaper
Braille		Online Resource
CD		Projected Medium
Collection		Serial
Fiction		Slide
Film		Software
Globe		Sound Recording
Govt Publication		Video (Beta)
Integrating Resource		Video (DVD)
Journal		Video (Laserdisc)
Kit		Video (Umatic)
LP		Video (VHS_
Large Print		Video (all formats)
Looseleaf

Without the library's database, finding out specific information on library materials would be tedious, if not next to impossible, without actually going to the shelves and retrieving the material. Herein lies the real beauty of databases: a user of the database can have access to hundreds and thousands of bits of information in a matter of seconds.

Article Indexes/Abstracts/Databases

Article Indexing/Abstracting Systems provide users access to databases containing information about literally thousands of articles published in magazines, journals, newspapers, and sometimes books. At work are the same principles that are used in providing access to library materials housed in the UNF Library's collections. For every article covered in an indexing system, a cataloger has painstakingly described access points (author, title, subject, etc.) and, in many cases, even provided a summary of the article's content. Imagine trying to wander through this much information in a print only indexing/abstracting system. Researchers used to have to do things in print only, and the result was a laborious, time-consuming process that could take weeks.

In short, article indexes also allow users to access databases of information through a variety of access points. In this case, the information provided may be available in a library's print collections or through online articles collections. We'll cover more on these services later.

Other Systems

Other Types of Database Systems include digital image and sound collections and directories of information on people, places, and organizations. A prime example of a digital image collection available in the state of Florida is the Florida Heritage Collection. The images themselves can't be directly searched, but users can locate information about the images through a descriptive database and then link to the images directly.

So, databases provide researchers with powerful query tools that allow for precision searching of huge amounts of data. In many cases the information retrieved may describe source materials and provide information for locating the materials, but in some cases the information may also lead directly to the information itself. Whatever the end result, databases greatly simplify the researcher's task of gathering information.

Page updated 09/09