3 Advanced Search Limit Changes

This Sunday I added a new mp3 format to the advaced search page as well as making it possible to limit to non-fiction TV series. In addition, I renamed Audio eBooks to say Books - Audio eBooks.

Limiting by MP3 CD
Our district has started buying audio books in an MP3 CD format. Typically, CDs come in two varieties: audio and data. Audio CDs were specifically designed to play in a normal CD player. By constrast, data CDs were designed to be read by computers. MP3 CDs are techincally data CDs so while newer cd players likely can play them, older CD players will not. For example, the CD player that came with my 2003 Toyota cannot play MP3 CD audio books but the car stereo we bought several years later can.

There are a couple advantages of MP3 CDs that, depending on your circumstances, can outweight their disadvantages. First, an entire audio book is often on one MP3 CD. This means if your car can play MP3 files, you won't have to try switching CDs while going 75 mph down I-25. Second, MP3 files are easier to transfer from a CD to your portable music player, such as an iPod. If you do transfer library audio books to your iPod, you should delete them when your check-up period is over. However, unlike Overdrive audio books, your computer will not prompt you to delete them.

To see a list of all the MP3 CD audio books we own:

• Click on the Advanced Search link in our catalog
• Next to Title Keyword type an *
• In the Format section scroll down and click on Books - MP3 CD
• Click the Red Arrow to begin your search

Here are the results. This limit also works with the Audience Adult - Fiction and Adult - Non-Fiction limits.

Limiting by Non-Fiction TV Series
We've been able to search for TV Series for a while. However, we now have a non-fiction TV series collection code so we can limit specifically to non-fiction TV series also. This is how you do it:

• Click on the Advanced Search link in our catalog
• Next to Title Keyword type an *
• In the Format section scroll down and click on Video Recording - TV Series
• In the Audience section highlight Adult - Non-Fiction
• Click the Red Arrow to begin your search

Here are the results.

Audio eBooks
As I mentioned above, I renamed Audio eBooks to say Books - Audio eBooks. I did this in order to have a consistent naming scheme for all our audio book labels. To find all audio ebooks that are currently in our catalog:

• Click on the Advanced Search link in our catalog
• Next to Title Keyword type an *
• In the Format section scroll down and click on Books - Audio eBook
• Click the Red Arrow to begin your search

Here are the results.

A couple of notes about Overdrive Audio eBooks. First, many of the Overdrive books do not have catalog records that we can download from other places easily. This means that each record has to be painstakenly created by our catalogers, which takes time. As a result, for now, if you are looking specifically for Overdrive books, it's best to go directly to our Overdrive Website. Second, there's only one collection code for Audio eBooks, regardless of whether they are fiction or non-fiction. So, the Adult - Fiction and Adult - Non-Fiction limits won't work.

Databases and Paperback Books

I'm hoping to start writing regular posts again soon. Until then, two quick notes:

First, our cataloging department has started to catalog some of our databases. You can see examples here.

Second, the cataloging department is also putting a "paperbacks" designation in the MARC record. This means that you can now use our Subject Keyword catalog search to find many of our paperbacks. In addition, when viewing multiple editions, it's easier to see which edition of a book is the paperback version. For an example, do a Title Keyword search for Water for Elephants.

Searching for a CD

A while back, I checked out a CD from Carbon Valley that I really enjoyed. In fact, I decided to return the CD and buy a copy for myself. However, I returned the CD before writing down the title of the artist. Over the weekend, I visited Carbon Valley with Calvin, my son, and decided I should try to hunt down the CD. I remembered that it was in the classical section so I started flipping through CDs. However, Calvin was getting impatient and I didn't feel like flipping through all of the CDs. Plus, I'd never find it if someone else had it checked out. I decided to try searching for it via our catalog.

Being the catalog sys admin, you'd think I would immediately have the perfect search strategy to find what I'm looking for. I remembered that one of the songs on the CD was "My Funny Valentine" which I'd also heard on Lullaby for my favorite insomniac by Ahn Trio. I knew that our catalogers usually include the individual songs on a CD in the "contents note" of the catalog record. So, I decided to try a Title Keyword search for "My Funny Valentine." I retrieved no relevant results, not even the CD by Ahn Trio. I decided that I must have remember the name of the song wrong so I went and looked up the Ahn Trio record. I had remembered the name of the song correctly. Suddenly, I realized that I had used the wrong search index. I felt kind of sheepish.

Originally, the Title Keyword for our public catalog would search the content notes of a record. However, searching this field can more than double the results for a simple keyword search. We decided that since most people are looking for the main title of a resource, it made sense to seperate out the content note from the main Title Keyword search index. We made this change several years ago. Now if people want to search the content note of a record, they need to use the Title and Content Keyword search. This search index will retrieve both title and content keyword matches. As a result, this is the index that I should have used.

Once I realized my mistake, I redid my search using the correct index. Even though I enclosed my search query in quotation marks, which forces it to search for the entire phrase, I still retrieved 36 results. I realized that if I used our adavanced search, I could narrow down this number significantly. Here's the steps I took:

• On the advanced search page, I clicked the drop down box and chose Title and Content Keyword.
• In the text box next to that index, I entered "My funny valentine", including the quotes.
• Under Location, I chose Carbon Valley Regional Library.
• Under Format, I selected "Music."
• I clicked the red arrow to start my search.

My search returned 9 results which was a much smaller number to scan. I scrolled down until I saw a title that sounded familar, Music from a farther room by Lucia Micarelli. Luckily, it was checked in so I quickly flipped through the "m" CDs in the classical music section and happily confirmed that this was the CD I had been searching for.

New Advanced Search Limits

Two new formats have been added to our advanced search page. You can now specifically search for both board books and ebooks.

Limiting by Board Books
My baby loves Sheep in a Jeep by Nancy Shaw. At the moment, we're limited to board books because I don't want to have to pay replacement fees for torn pages :) To find a list of other board books Nancy Shaw has written, I would do the following:

1. Navigate to the Advanced page in our catalog.
2. Next to Author Keyword enter Nancy Shaw. Note, since this is a keyword index, I can enter the author's name in any order I want instead of having to enter last name, first name.
3. In the Format box, highlight Books - Board Books.
4. Click the Red Arrow
to start the search.

Here are the results.

Limiting by eBooks
The eBook limit will retrieve results from our eBook collections which include books from Overdrive, Safari Tech Books Select, and Netlibrary. Let's say I was interested in finding eBooks about using my iPhone. This is how I would create my search:

1. Navigate to the Advanced page in our catalog.
2. Next to Subject Keyword enter iPhone.
3. In the Format box, highlight Books - eBooks.
4. Click the Red Arrow
to start the search.

Here are my results.