Search here to find books, online books, videos, DVDs, CDs.
The online catalogue is the Library's computerized list of the books, online books, videos, and other materials owned by the Portage College Library. It is available online. You can locate material on specific topics by performing subject, title, and author searches. The online catalogue does not list newspapers or journal articles. These can be found by searching the Library's databases.
The Library uses the Dewey Decimal Classification System to group books and videos together by subject on the library shelves. The call number on the corresponds to the number on the label on the spine of the book (e.g. 155.4 BEE).
e-library Quick Search Guide
This guide provides basic instruction for performing a basic Quick Search of catalogued material. The Quick Search option will be suitable for most searches. If you need additional assistance or want to try more complex searches, please ask Library staff.
Search the online catalogue from any computer with Internet access.
Keyword
With the Keyword selection, you can view records containing the words or phrase you enter. Keyword refers to significant words or phrases in the title, author and/or subject headings of library materials,which can be used in a search to retrieve records containing that word or phrase.
Click in the search box.
Type a word or words you want to search.
Click on the circle next to Keyword to select it.
Click on Search Everything,
Author, Title, or Subject.
Pressing enter will default to Search Everything.
Search Everything
This option allows you to search under author, title, subject, and series title all at the same time. It's especially useful when searching for works by an author and works about that author written by someone else, e.g. Search Everything on Tomson Highway finds two videos that profile him and five novels that he wrote.
Author
If you know the author of a particular book or video, type it in the search box to see if the library owns it, and where it is on the shelf. This search looks for a match of your search term. Enter the author's last name. If the last name is common, type the complete last name followed by the author's first name or initial (e.g., Smith, A). If the online catalogue cannot find a match it will display a 'browse list' of the closest matches. A book or video may have one or more persons as the creator or a corporate body such as an association, institution, commercial company, or government agency.
Title
If you know the title of a book or video, type it in the search box and click on "Title". This search looks for a match of your search term(s). If the online catalogue cannot find a match, it will display a "browse list" of the closest matches. Omit initial articles (e.g., a, an, the, etc.)
Subject
Most searches are subject searches. An item's subject is the main topic or theme. Library materials are assigned one or more subject headings based on what the work is about, to help users find library material by subject. Portage College Library uses Library of Congress Subject Headings.
General Searching Tips:
You may use UPPER (CAPITAL) or lower case letters.
Correct typing errors with the backspace key.
When you press enter, this is the same as clicking on whatever option is on the left.
You can't search for words of less than 3 letters because they are not indexed.
Articles such as "The" or "A" are not indexed for the beginning of titles, so use the first keyword or significant term.
Avoid common terms such as "history" or "introduction." Use instead unique words to determine your search term(s).
Truncate (shorten) a search term and add a dollar sign to search for variations of a term e.g. market$ retrieves records containing "market" "markets" and "marketing".
Advanced searching techniques exist on the online catalogue Ask Library Staff for help if you are interested in using them.
