You can search Auckland Libraries' collection from any computer with access to the internet.
How do I find what I'm looking for?
How do I understand the results?
I've found the right item...now what?
Tips and tricks
How do I find what I'm looking for?
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Type the title, author, keyword, or subject of the item into a search box.
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The search box can be found in the top right corner of any website page or at the top of the catalogue.
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I have used pride and prejudice as an example. Click on the Search button to start searching.
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How do I understand the results?
The results page is made up of three parts:
The word cloud
This presents your original search terms surrounded by associated words and alternative spellings.
This is useful if you are not sure exactly what word to use or if you have spelt it incorrectly. You can click on any of the associate words to search again using that term.
The words are colour-coded according to the following:
orange: spelling variations
black: associated words
green: alternative thesaurus meanings
blue: previous search terms.
Result list
Each underlined blue title represents an item in Manukau Libraries' collection.
The orange icon to the left of each listing tells you the material type, eg Book, DVD, Music CD.
If you have found what you are looking for, you can click on an underlined blue title to view more details. Otherwise, try refining your search using the refinement links on the right side of the page.
Refine results
Click on these links to limit your results to make it easier to find what you're looking for.
The Select Location drop-down menu will allow you to choose a particular library to show results from. For example, if you only wish to view items at Papatoetoe Library, click on the drop down arrow and select Papatoetoe.
The Refine links allow you to restrict results to a certain material type, author, language, publication date etc
The number in brackets after each blue link tells you how many items will show in your list after you restrict your search. For example, I can see from these results that Manukau Libraries has 5 DVDs matching 'pride and prejudice'.
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I've found the right item ...now what?
Click on the title to view the item availability or to place a request.
Place a request by clicking on the blue place request link under the book cover image.
You can also see the availability information on this page. This table tells you which branches have the book currently available to borrow.
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Tips and tricks
You can save time on searches by putting in author, title, or keywords before your search term.
For example, if I wanted to find books with Jane Austen as the author, I can type in
author: "Austen, Jane"
This will automatically restrict your search to author only. Note that you must put quotes around your search term.
title: "Pride and Prejudice"
Will find items with the title pride and prejudice only. Note that all searches are case insensitive.
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