Using SearchWorks: Searching the library catalog and articles+: Articles+ search tips
This guide provides general tips on using SearchWorks and the articles+ search feature to find materials in the Stanford Libraries catalog and across a wide range of subscribed databases.
Article search tips
1 | For a known article, type author name and title in the main search box - or copy/paste from a citation. | Example : block bioenergetics of captive yellowfin tuna |
2 | Start with keywords in the "All fields" search; add more keywords to refine. | In articles+, adding more keywords to your search is often more effective than using facets. |
3 | Enter your search in lower case or mixed case, never in ALL CAPS | Some upper-case words in your search may be interpreted as Boolean operators or field codes and will cause the search to fail. |
4 | For authors with common names, searching last name, first name brings the most relevant results to the top. | Example : cornell, eric rather than eric cornell |
5 | Combine specific field searches using field codes: AU = Author; TI = Title; SU = Subject; SO = Journal/Source |
Example : AU block, barbara SO science Also available : AB = Abstract; IS = ISSN; IB = ISBN |
6 | Stopwords are disregarded, even in quotes. | Searching for a title that contains only stopwords ("to be or not to be") is not possible. Try another approach: by author, subject, or by going directly to a topic-specific database. |
7 | Not every source provides values for every facet; Geography in particular. | Selecting facets (e.g., “Mexico” in the “Geography” facet) can exclude relevant items from your results simply because the items are from a source that doesn't provide that metadata. |
8 | Result counts are approximate; exact duplicates are removed from search results. | A facet or result count may indicate there are more articles on a topic than the final result list actually delivers after de-duplication. |
9 | Boolean operators AND, OR, and NOT (upper-case) can be combined with parentheses. | Example : tuna (yellowfin OR bluefin) |
10 | Search for non-English titles in quotation marks. | This helps ensure that non-English words like "su" and "de" are not interpreted as search codes. |
11 |
Use wildcards to search for spelling or word variations
|
Example : comput* (finds computer, computing, computation) Example : colo#r (finds color, colour) Example : ne?t (finds next, nest, neat... but not net) |
12 |
Remove "et al" and year+vol+issue+pages from citation searches. |
Copy/pasted citation searches are very effective, but some details can make them fail. Most commonly:
Example : Monllor Hurtado, Alberto, et al. "Shift in tuna catches due to ocean warming." fails |
- Last Updated: Nov 27, 2023 12:18 PM
- URL: https://guides.library.stanford.edu/searchworks
- Print Page