OPAC (Online Public Access Catalog)
The online catalog provides access to books, local periodical articles, CD-ROMs,  AV materials and vertical files available in the library. The online catalog indicates if the library owns a particular item and gives information for locating the item. It also provides an easy way to determine what materials are available in a particular subject area.

How to use the OPAC 

Types of Searching

Our OPAC provides you with two different ways to find the materials/items you need :

Ø Quick Search . Use this method when you want to search for an author, a title, or a subject.  Quick Search can also be used to perform general, all-category searches.
Ø Advanced Search. Use this method when you want to fine-tune your searches. You can limit a search to any type of catalog information – publisher, call number, publication date or anything else. You can also perform AND, OR, and NOT searches.

Quick Search

From the Welcome screen  click  the quick search tab. You will see the Quick Search screen and it has these buttons:

BUTTON  DESCRIPTION

Search Enter any valid search term. Then click Search to perform a broad all-category Search.  Athena (name of the software being used in the library) will locate any items related to this search term.

Author Enter an author’s entire last name or the  first part of the last name then  click author to locate any items written by someone with that name.

Title Enter an entire title, the first part of a title, any word or partial word in a title. Then click title to locate any items with that search term in the title.

Subject Enter a subject. Then click Subject to locate any terms with that search term in the subject.

Advanced Search

From the Search screen click  Advanced Search and you will see the Advanced Search screen and it has the following buttons:

BUTTON  DESCRIPTION

Search After you have entered/typed in the box what to search, click Search to  perform the search.

Bar Code # To search for a particular barcode number, enter the number in the first box and click Bar Code #.

Call Number To search for a particular call number, enter the entire call number or the first part of the call number in the first box and click Call Number. Make sure that you enter any leading zeros and embedded spaces.  For example, enter 031 instead of 31. 

The Search Results Screen

After a search you find a list of all items that match the search criteria on the Search Results screen. This screen has the following buttons and tabs:

BUTTON  DESCRIPTION

Previous  Click Previous to scroll backwards through the search results.

Next   Click Next to scroll forwards through the search results.

Go To Click Go To to move to a particular position in the search results. (When you see the Go to search result # dialog box type number of the desired title.  Ex. Go to the screen containing the eleventh title, type 11 then click OK)

Sort   Click Sort to reorder the search results.

TAB   DESCRIPTION

Search  Click this to return to the Search screen.

Bibliography  Click this to create, modify, print or delete a bibliography.

Print   Click this to print the search results.

Menu   Click this to return to the most recently used menu.

The Search Results screen provides you with basic information about each title. Just click the bar or the title and you will see the full information about the item. The Search Results screen will also include an icon showing the item’s format and a thermometer showing the item’s relevancy. This icon can be found on the left side of each bar/title.

Example:

 ICON ITEM FORMAT
  Book
  CD-ROM  
  Pamphlet     
  Periodical
  Vertical file
  VHS

Navigating the Search Results Screen

Sometimes you will find more titles than will fit on one screen. Moving up and down through the screen is easy. To display the next screen of search results just click NEXT and click  PREVIOUS to go back to the previous screen of search results.