Searching Our Patron Catalog: Fun with Special Characters!

Sometimes our patron catalog makes me question my sanity. Today, I was reading an interview on Public Libraries Online with Joshilyn Jackson about her newest book, Someone Else’s Love Story. It looked interesting so I copied the title, from the website, and then pasted it into our catalog. Our catalog claimed we didn't have it which I thought was odd. I went to Amazon, found the ISBN, came back to our search, and pasted the ISBN into the ISBN index. This time our catalog did find the book. Why?

I examined the title again. It looked the same as what I had typed in. I came up with a hypothesis: perhaps our catalog had trouble searching single quotes. I pasted the title in again and substituted an asterisk instead of a single quote like this: Someone Else*s Love Story . This time it worked! I erased the asterisk and typed a single quote in just to make sure I wasn't imagining things. Wait, it worked with the single quote also. I copied the title again, and once again it didn't work. I stared at the screen in frustration.

Finally, I found the problem. It turns out that our catalog has absolutely no problem searching for titles where you use the single quote that appears on your keyboard ('). What it can't do is use right single quotes (’). Look closely, can you see the difference?

Single Quote	Right Single Quote
'	’

So the moral of the story is, if you copy and paste something into our catalog and retrieve no results, makes sure your copy source didn't use special single/double quotes. If it did, erase that part and retype it using your keyboard.

As an aside, we're hoping to move to a new ILS system next year. I double checked and this particular problem should not be an issue in our new system.

New Language Limits

I've just made a change to our catalog's advanced search page that allows better limits by language.

Originally, our language limits were based on collection codes. Collection codes are designed to let you know where a particular item is located. For instance, you would expect an item with a "Large Print Fiction" collection code to be shelved in the large print area. However, the only language that has its own collection code is Spanish. While Spanish is currently the dominent non-English language within our district, other languages are also becoming more common. As a result, we decided it was time to look at a better way to search by language.

The new language limits I have just implemented are based on MARC, the underlying data for every bib record. This allows us to limit based on a much wider range of languages. For the sake of simplicity, I have decided to only provide limits for languages where we have at least 20 works in that language. Currently, this list includes:

• Arabic
• Chinese
• Danish
• English
• French
• German
• Hebrew
• Hindi
• Italian
• Japanese
• Latin
• Persian
• Portuguese
• Russian
• Somali
• Spanish
• Swedish

Let me know if you feel any specific language should be added to this list and I'll research it.

An Example:
With the old language limits based on collection codes, you couldn't search for Spanish music. While we have collection codes for many Spanish items, we don't have one specifically for music. However, using the new language limits, this search is now possible.

1. Go to our catalog, http://catalog.mylibrary.us/
2. Click on the Advanced search page
3. Type an * next to Title Keyword
4. Under Format, choose Music
5. Under Language choose Spanish
6. Click the red arrow to start your search

You should now see a list of all music in Spanish within the district.

Quirk Alert:
While limiting by MARC tags instead of collection codes is generally more precise, there is a bug in HIP that does prevent all matching records from being displayed. For those that remember their cataloging lessons, it searches the 008 field but only the first 041 $a subfield. What this means is that the limit should return results for all records in the original language but it may miss some titles that are either multilingual works or the language is available as a subtitle for a movie.

For example, look at the movie Walk on Water. This movie's original language is Hebrew which is reflected by appearing in the 008 tag. However, it is also available to watch in English or German. Because English is listed as the first language in the 041 field, if I limit by English, the movie will appear. However, since German is the third language listed, it will not appear when I limit by German.

Thanks go to Clara M for suggesting the original idea of using MARC language codes instead of collection codes and Eric P for later testing and patiently explaining the intricacies of the MARC codes to me.

Author Alphabetical Searches

I think it's time to take a break from talking about the new patron catalog. Instead, let's talk about the Author Alphabetical search index results.

One of the many confusing aspects of our catalog is how it displays author results when using an Author Alphabetical search index. For example, take a look at the author results for Janet Evanovich. We see something like this:

1.	Evanovich, Janet	230
2.	Evanovich, Janet. High five. Spanish	1
3.	Evanovich, Janet. Ivan takes a wife	5
4.	Evanovich, Janet. One for the money.	2
5.	Evanovich, Janet. Plum lovin'.	1
6.	Evanovich, Janet. Plum lucky.	1
7.	Evanovich, Janet. Three to get deadly.	2
8.	Evanovich, Janet. Two for the dough.	2
9.	Evanovich, Janet. Visions of sugar plums.	1

Why are there so many Janet Evanovich entries? A couple of weeks ago, Eric Petersen, our Technical Services Supervisor, answered this question. So, with his permission, I'm copying it below.

Author/title’s in the “author” indexes are generally of these purposes:

1. The author/title heading represents an instance of that work in a collection. For example, in a collection of short stories. “One for the money” is part of the collection Three plums in one.
2. To indicate what the original title of a work was. For example, ”Ivan takes a wife” is the original title of Love overboard. This can also be seen on items that are translations. “High five. Spanish” means that this item, High five, is in Spanish.
3. The author/title is related to the item cataloged. This is seen most in our catalog for movie adaptions of books. For example: Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the goblet of fire. lists the movies, not the books.

However, if you've used a lot of other library systems, you'll have seen that many of their author results are not as confusing. Basically, this is because our particular ILS processes author entries a little differently than other systems. It does not have the ability to just show the author's name. Instead, it shows the entire entry for the author/work combination. Theoretically, we could kludge something together that would fix the display problem. However, this would likely result in our catalog records no longer meeting common cataloging standards. This, in turn, would complicate any ILS changes we made in the future.

So, which author entry should I pick when faced with multiple authors that look the similar? I usually click whichever entry has the most titles attached to it. In the case of Janet Evanovich, it would be the first entry.

Requesting Books Without Any Items

Ideally, every bib record in our catalog would list items that borrowers could request or checkout. However, sometimes a search will return a bib record that doesn't show any items. This occurs for one of two reasons:

1. "Lost" or "missing" items are hidden from the public catalog. Thus, if all items for a particular record are lost or missing, no items will be shown.
2. We no longer own any items for that particular resource. This happens when the library deletes items either because they have been lost or missing long enough they are unlikely to be returned or because the items are old or damaged and should be removed from the collection.

In the first situation, when a borrower tries to request the resource, the catalog will say, "This title is not available for requests." While this may not be the clearest message, it at least says that the item can't be requested.

However, in the second situation the catalog will say, "Visit the full bib page: All the items in this bib are bookable¹. Book a copy of this bib from the full bib page." This is due to a bug in our catalog. These items no longer exist in our system and so they cannot be requested or checked out.

In both cases, the best way to borrower the resource is by submitting an interlibrary loan request in order to borrow the item from another library outside our district.

¹What is a "bookable item?" This is a catalog module that allows borrowers to reserve library materials for a specific date and time. It is most often used in an academic library setting for resources located in closed stacks. None of the High Plains Library District's collections are bookable.

Suspend a Request

It's really nice to be able to put a request on books that are either currently checked out or are owned by another library. I'm always so excited by the vast number of books available within our district. However, sometimes the books become available when I'm on vacation or wouldn't have time to read them. This is where the "Suspend Request" feature is useful. This feature allows me to temporarily prevent a request from being put on the hold shelf for me. Instead, it goes to the next person in line. Once I reactivate the request, the system goes back to normal.

Reasons to suspend a request

• You're going on vacation and want to make sure the books don't expire on the hold shelf before you get back
• You have too many things checked out already and don't want items to be put on hold until you can check them out
• You've requested a TV Series but don't want it to come in until the weekend (Note, this is kind of like timing the stock market. It's not an exact science but it's worth a try.)

How to suspend a request

1. Go to our catalog and click on the My Account tab.
2. Enter your barcode and PIN and click Login
3. Click on the Holds link under My Account
4. Scroll down to the section labeled Requested items not yet available
5. Place a check mark next to every request you wish to suspend
6. Looks for the section that says, Suspend until: MM-DD-YYYY. Change the date to when you wish the requests to reactivate
7. Click the Change Status button

If our catalog successfully suspended the request, you should see the status next to the item change from "Active" to "Suspended."
Quirk Alert: Many people mistakenly believe that the date in the Expires column is the date your hold will reactivate. This is not correct. The "Expires" date is the date that your request will be deleted if you have not already received the requested item. Usually this will only occur if all copies of the resource have been lost.
Note: Once an item has an "In Transit" status, you can no longer suspend the request. It is too late to prevent it from being put on the hold shelf for you.

How to Reactivate a Request By default, requests will automatically reactivate on the date you specified when suspending the item. This date is not visible in our catalog but staff can look it up in our Horizon staff interface. However, you also have the option to manually reactivate your request.

1. Go to our catalog and click on the My Account tab.
2. Enter your barcode and PIN and click Login
3. Click on the Holds link under My Account
4. Scroll down to the section labeled Requested items not yet available
5. Place a check mark next to every request you wish to reactivate
6. Click the Change Status button. The requested item should now show a status of "Active."

Note: The Change Status button is a toggle button. If a request is suspended when you click it, the request will reactivate. However, if the request is currently active, clicking the Change Status button will suspend it until the date specified.

The order of search results - Keyword Indexes

Unfortunately, our library catalog isn't able to sort by relevancy. Instead, keyword search results show the newest resources first. For instance, if you do a Title Keyword search for Harry Potter, the catalog shows books such as The unofficial Harry Potter vocabulary builder and Political issues in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series before the actual Harry Potter books. This is because these other books also have the words "Harry Potter" in the title and are newer than the books from the Harry Potter series.

While publication date is the default sort for keyword indexes, the catalog also has the ability to sort by author, title, and media. The Author sort orders results by the author's last name. The Media sort attempts to order the search results by showing books first, followed by electronic resources, large print books, audio books, and videos. To change the default sort for a basic search, click the drop down menu labeled Sort by on the right side of the screen, choose the way you wish to sort, and click the arrow to re-order your results.

Quirk Alert: If you are using the Advanced Search, you must click Refine Search to change your sort order. If you forget and use the Sort by drop down menu on the same screen as your results, it will forget all the limits you specified on the advanced screen and change your results.

The Order of Search Results - Alphabetical Indexes

Not surpringly, alphabetical search indexes return your search results ordered alphabetically. So, if I choose a Title - Alphabetical search for minority report, I will see a list of results that are alphabetically close to my search term. In this case, I see results such as Minority report, The minority report and other stories, and Minority vendors.

When sorting results, our catalog ignores the first word if it is a definite or indefinite article. This includes words such as a, an, and the. Thus, in the example above, our catalog ignores the the in The minority report and other stories and instead alphabtizes this resource by the next word, minority. The catalog also ignores any initial articles in the search query. As a result, searching for minority report and the minority report returns the same results.

Quirk Alert: Normally, ignoring the first word if it is an article doesn't create a problem for the searcher. However, let's say you are searching for a book about the letter A called A Book. Since A is referring to the letter A, it isn't an article. However, our catalog isn't smart enough to realize this so if you try searching for a book, it will return results for book. The easiest way to fix this when searching is to place another article in front of your search like this. Our catalog only ignores the first word it sees so adding two articles in front gives us our desired result.