Monday, September 10, 2007

EDotW part 4 Worldcat

One of the OhioLINK databases I find most useful is Worldcat. UTMOST searches the UT library catalog, OhioLINK library catalog searches all the libraries in the OhioLINK consortium, the next level up is Worldcat. Worldcat is the OCLC (Online Computer Library Center) catalog of books and other materials, such as articles and sound recordings, in libraries around the world. Worldcat is a great way to find out if an item exists. In addition to letting you know if an item exists, it will also list which libraries have the item.
Worldcat is accessible from our Legal Research Links page > to OhioLink Databases > to Listed by Name U-Z
Worldcat is also available via its own website as well, at Worldcat.org. Either way will highlight University of Toledo's collection, if we have the item. And if we don't have it, clicking on the "libraries world wide that own item" will start off with OhioLINK libraries that have the item. If one of these OhioLINK libraries does have the item, it is easy to use OhioLINK to ask for an interlibrary loan. If none of them do, we will be able to ILL it for you.

All UT students and faculty can access either OhioLINK or Worldcat at any UT computer or with their student/faculty ID number.

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

EDotW part 3 OhioLINK Databases

OhioLINK is much more than a super catalog of Ohio colleges & universities library holdings. It also features many databases. You can search via Subject, Type or Name or just do a Quick Search.

Quick Search allows the user to search for articles in all databases, or predefined areas, such as political science, law and government (as one database) or business.

Subject searching allows one to bring up various databases on a single subject. For instance the Law and Legislation subject heading brings up databases such as Criminal Justice Abstracts.

Type searching allows one to search for books or articles. There is also Facts and Stats, which takes a user to various encyclopedias and dictionaries.

Name will take you directly to a single database which is handy once you are familiar with the databases and you know which one you want to search.

Later on, I'll delve more deeply into specific databases.