CATALOG

To search the TRL catalog, we can go to the library website (trl.org) and type in what we're looking for in the search bar on the top right and hit the Go button. At this date and time this is the most convenient way to access it, unfortunately. Once we’ve done that, the catalog will show us all the results found that contain our search terms. Let's try learning this by way of example: We'll search for an item, then explore all of the tools we have to manipulate the results. After adjusting some settings, we will be able to narrow down our results only to what is relevant to what we want.

Let's say we are looking for Henry James’ enduring classic The Portrait of a Lady. Oh, what exquisite taste we have! After typing our search and hitting enter, we should be presented with this results screen. We got 118 results, splendid! Now, as you've probably already guessed, not every single title that popped up on the search relates to the actual novel, so at this point it might be a good idea narrow our search using filters.

We've decided we only want to see physical book versions. We can filter out all of the other results by clicking on the blue Books text under the Format section. That will narrow down our search to only include physical books. Then, if we only want to see results found in the Elma library, we can click on Elma under the Library section, and so on. Keep in mind, each time you add a filter, your selection becomes smaller, to the point where you might end up with a single result. Be advised, if you accidentally click on a filter you didn't want, you don’t have to start your search from scratch. You can just scroll up to the top left of the sidebar to the “Narrowed by” section and remove the filters by clicking on the blue x icon on the left side of each condition.

Maybe we got curious and want to see if we have a movie version of the book or an audiobook. We definitely don't want an eBook or an mp3, because maybe we are a little wary that the government's spying on us so we don't want to download anything. That's totally cool, no problem. We can just scroll down to the Format section and click the check-boxes next to the formats we don't want (for this example, we'll select eBook and eAudiobook) and click on the box that says "Exclude." After we've done so, we will only see all other results minus the formats we've chosen to exclude. No digital paper trails here! 👍

Alternatively, we can use the drop-down menu left of the search bar to narrow down our search. Rather than conducting a broad general search, it will search only within what you specifically tell it to. So if we select Title and search for the term Portrait of a Lady, we'll only see results with the words "portrait of a lady" in the title. This could cause problems too. If we're searching for books on french macarons and we select Title on the drop down, we'll only see books containing the words "french macarons" in the title. If there's a book on many different kinds of confections including french macarons, it might not come up on the results, since the title does not contain the search terms in its title.

Once we’ve finally found the item we want, we can click on the title to see more information, such as a description, subject, and publisher, to name a few. I’ve settled on the audiobook since I’m too lazy to read a 500 page book. Never underestimate the power of exploration! At that point we can either hunt it down ourselves or place a hold on that item, which is what we’ll be covering next!