How to use the Library Catalogue
Introduction for students
To find any item held in the library you need to use the catalogue. The catalogue
contains the records of most items held by the John Rylands University Library.
It includes material held at the Main Library, site libraries and Special
Collections.
The library catalogue can be accessed via the library homepage
www.manchester.ac.uk/library and from dedicated catalogue (OPAC) machines
located in all the libraries.
How to search for a book if you know the author but don’t know the exact
title
You are looking for a book on crime. You know it was written by Ainsworth. If
you type Ainsworth in the
Author Box and Crime in the
Keyword Box, you will get
a pop-up window with different book titles to choose from. To see them all you
can scroll down the page.
How to search for a book if you know the author and exact title
Your tutor may have given you a reading list with the exact details of a book you
are required to read and you want to check the library catalogue to see if the
library has it.
The most effective way of using the catalogue is by not entering too much
information. For example only enter the author’s surname and the first few words
of the title.
How to locate a book once you have found it on the catalogue
There are several headings to look at in order to determine where the book is, if
it’s available and for how long you can borrow it.
Location - The majority of law and criminology books will be held in the Main
Library; many will have copies in the Short Loan Collection which is located on
the Ground Floor of the Main Library.
Shelf mark – This tells you which area and floor the book is located and its
classification number. For example, Green Area, Floor 3, 343.95 A10.
Loan Type - This indicates whether it is a normal loan, seven day loan or a one
or two night loan in the Short Loan Collection.
How to locate periodicals
Most reading lists contain journal articles you need to read. To find if the library
subscribes to a particular periodical, you need to search the library catalogue.
When searching the library catalogue for journals, you should choose journals
from the collection menu.
Important: you cannot search the catalogue for an article title. You must search
for the title of the journal. You can do this in either the
Title Search Box or the
Keyword Search Box.
A title search has to contain the exact title. A keyword search can contain any
words from the title.
The catalogue says Offsite store, can I still access the journal?
In many cases, when you look at the details for the hard copy, it will say that it is
Offsite. This is because where the library has both print and electronic versions
of a journal, the print copies have been put into storage. In such cases you will
have to look at the electronic copy.
Reservations
If you wish to reserve a book when all copies are out on loan, you can do this via
the library catalogue. When you have searched for a book and gone into
show
details, click on the request button beside the book record and follow the
instructions.
http://www.manchester.ac.uk/library, 2009
