To export to Endnote Basic
- Select Endnote Basic from the drop down Send to menu
- You will be redirected to Endnote Basic and will need to login
- The reference will automatically be imported
Library Search – Use your E-Shelf
Library Search provides a personal space where you can save records of interest, save searches and create alerts. This is called the e-shelf.
Use the Sign in to login with your IT username and password
Once logged in, you can save records of interest by selecting the star symbol by the book and details:
If you go to the e-shelf you can view all the records you have saved.
From here you can create folders and sort references into folders using the symbols on the left
You can also Cut, Copy, Past, Delete, Email, Print and Save Results
To save you can export the records you have selected to Endnote Basic, RefWorks and as an RIS feed (for Endnote Desktop).
You can also make notes for each of the references
Library Search – Save your query
You can save queries to run them again at a later date.
To do this you will need to sign in
Scroll to the bottom left of the page and the options below are there:
You can save the query by selecting save query
You then have the option to name your query
You can also select Save & Alert.
Enter your email address and Library Search will email you when new results are added.
When you have saved your query this screen appears
Now go to e-shelf and select the queries tab
To view the results click on the query name.
Library Search – Find a Book
To find a book in Library Search you can use the search box on the main Library home page or the one on Library search:
- In the search box enter one or two key words from the title and the surname of the author
e.g. for Study Skills Connected by Stella Cottrell, type: Cottrell study skills
- Click the Search button
- Click the Books, Music and Films tab to narrow the results to just books
- When the search results appear you can also narrow to just e-book results, by clicking Electronic Books in the Collection menu or the Full Text Online option under Show Only
- Check that the search result matches yours i.e. the author, title and year of publication is correct.
One or more of these links are displayed under each result
- Find & Request – there are one or more printed copies of this book
- View Online – this book is available as an e-book
- Both Find & Request AND View Online – this book is available in print and as an e-book
- View all versions of this title – there are multiple editions of this title and/or it is available in print and as an e-book
Library Search just got better!
Today we launched the upgrade to Library Search
Here are some top tips to get the best out of it:
- To do a basic search, just type one or more words and click the Search button.
- Remember that Library Search assumes that you are searching for all the words you type, for example: ‘the”, “of”, “an”,”for” would be included in a search.
- Library Search’s new Advanced Search menu allows you to mix various search elements to create a focused or specialised search of all Libraries materials.The drop down boxes allow you to search for words in Title, Author, Subject or User tags.You can also focus your search by selecting Publication Date, Material Type, Language, and Start & End dates.
Example: Search for books written in English with the word history in the title, London in the subject description.
- Once you are familiar with doing a Basic search, you might want to try doing more with the Search box.
From the Search box you can:- Search for phrases
- Include words or phrases
- Exclude words or phrases
- Search using wildcard characters
- Group terms
- Export references from within the item to RefWorks or Endnote Basic
- The Brief results display all the items that match your search query.The following information displays for each item on your results page:
- Content Type:the format of the item, such as book, article, journal, and so forth.
- Title:Click the title to display either the item’s information or go to the online version.
- Author, creator, and date:the item’s author, creator, and publication date
- Star icon:click the Star icon next to the title to add or remove the item from your e-Shelf. A highlighted star indicates that you have already added it to your e-Shelf.
- If you would like to see more information on an item, you can use the following:
- Locations link
- Details link
- Recommendations (Shows similar items)
- View online
- The View Versions tab on the Brief results page groups together all items that are similar, for example – all copies of the same edition of a book.
A shipmate needs help. They remember borrowing a book:
The Pirates ‘who’s who’.
Can you help them find it on the shelf?
You also need to answer the following two questions on your answer sheet:
5. If you borrowed a short loan book on a Tuesday at 4pm, when would it be due back?
6. What subject do you study, and who is your Information Consultant?
Library Search is getting better – Journals A-Z
Over the next few weeks you will find that library search will be getting better. The first change you may notice is that the journals A-Z looks different. Here are some key features that have been upgraded:
1. Simple search box, defaulting to “Contains” with option of “Starts with” and “Exact” – the same set up as existing A-Z but a radio button instead of a drop-down.
2. The results are listed with Starts with: instead of page numbers for easier browsing.
3. Access options listed on screen – no need to click on Find it@Royal Holloway
4. Provides additional information for related titles.
Top 5 tips for getting ahead with your Dissertation this summer
1. Master search techniques
Plan your search strategy at the start and you will be able to find lots of relevant resources which will save you time in the long run.
- What exactly is the topic you are searching for?
- What are the main concepts or keywords for your topic?
- Are there any similar words that describe each of these concepts?
- How might you combine these keywords together to search?
- Use tricks like Wildcards and Truncation to search effectively. There is more information on this here.
- Look at the Cited by and Cited references for what you have found – save time by using the references in good research to find more good research.
There is lots of help in the Library Space on Moodle about this.
This video shows you how to Search Smarter and Search Faster:
2. Evaluate your resources
You have mastered your search techniques but you now you need to think whether your results are good enough. This presentation will give you some guidance in how to evaluate information.
http://prezi.com/q5jglgamre6c/copy-of-evaluating-information/
3. Check Senate House
You have access to all the eresources provided by Senate House Library along with those provide by RHUL. You need to register but this is easy to do and instructions are here.
You can search through their websites or you can connect to Senate House through Google Scholar. There is more information on this in this post.
4. Use the library
The library is your best friend at dissertation time. You can come in or use our virtual enquiry services to ask questions. Keep an eye on the Blog and Moodle for new training being offered. But most importantly use the Library Subject pages to find out which resources are best for your subject.
5. Manage your references and Get organised
Managing your references using RefWorks
RefWorks is an online bibliographic management program which enables you to capture, save and organize references into your own personal database. As a member of RHUL you can access it via the library homepage link to E-resources A-Z. It enables you to:
Capture and save references generated from online databases
Automatically generate a bibliography in your document
Insert citations directly into your research (i.e. word document)
Format your references in a wide range of citation styles
RefWorks includes a comprehensive set of online self-help tutorials, or you may wish to sign up for the one of the RefWorks sessions that the Library regularly runs or try the self-study start up guide:
http://www.rhul.ac.uk/library/helpandsupport/findinginformation.aspx
Search Techniques
Truncation / wildcard searching
> Use to: widen your search and ensure you don’t miss relevant search results
Most databases are not intelligent, they will just search for exactly what you type in. Truncation and wildcard symbols enable you to overcome this limitation. These search techniques find information on similar words by replacing part of the word with a symbol usually a * or ?.
In truncation the end of the word is replaced. For example theat* will find results including the words theatre, theater, theatric, theatrical and so on.
In wildcard searching, single letters from inside the word are replaced with a symbol. For example wom?n will retrieve the terms woman and women.
Please note! Different databases use different symbols for truncation and wildcard searching, so use the online help option to check what is used.
Search operators
> Use to: combine your search words and include synonyms
Also known as Boolean operators, search operators allow you to join terms together, widen a search or exclude terms from your search results. This means you can be more precise in locating your information. Not all databases support Boolean searching.
- AND – Narrows your search by combining words. The results found must contain all the words which you have joined by using AND.
- OR – Broadens your search to include resources which contain any or all of the terms connected by OR.
- NOT – Narrows your search by excluding a term. Beware! By using this operator you might exclude relevant records because you will lose those records which include both words.
Please note! Check the online help screens for details of the search operators recognized by the database you are searching; some use symbols instead of words, e.g. + or &.
Phrase searching
> Use to: make your search more specific
Phrase searching is a technique that narrows your search down by searching for an exact phrase or sentence. It is particularly useful when searching for a title or a quotation. Usually speech marks are used to connect the words together. For example “Power transition theory” will find results which contain that phrase. Some search tools may use (brackets) or ‘single quote marks’ rather than speech marks so check the online help.
Focusing a search by date, language or document type
There are many ways to focus your search and all databases offer different ways of doing this. Check the help facilities if the options are not immediately obvious. Some of the ways of limiting your search are as follows:
Date of publication
Language
Place of publication
Publication type
Age groups
Type of material e.g. chapters in books, review articles, book reviews
“Cited reference” / “cited by” / “times cited” search
When you find a useful article or book, looking at its bibliography will give you information about other, older, books and articles on your research topic. Some databases also allow you to search for literature which has cited the article or book you have found. This can give you useful leads on more recent research on the same topic. There is no standard name for this type of search; depending on which database you are searching it may be referred to as “Cited reference” or “cited by” or “times cited”.
3.8 Saving your search results
You usually have the option to select specific search results to keep by marking or tagging them. Most databases will offer the following methods of saving your search results:
Email search results to yourself.
Save to your PC or memory stick.
Create your own account within certain databases to save your searches to re-run later or set up alerts
Print out
Export to bibliographic management software such as RefWorks or Endnote
You can use alerting services such as Zetoc Alerts to receive regular e-mails to update you on new publications. Once the alert is set up, it happens automatically, so you do not need to re-run literature searches at a later stage, unless you wish to – http://zetoc.mimas.ac.uk/
It is good practice to keep a record of which database you used and the search query you used.
How to find past exam papers
It’s that time of year where you will want to access past exam papers to help you prepare for exams.
You can link to past exam papers through Moodle or through our online repository. If you are trying to access them off campus then you will need to use the VPN CampusAnywhere and then log into the page above where it says “Login (with a CC username). It’s really simple, take a look at the video to see how!