How does truncation work when searching the online catalog?
Truncating is taking a short cut when you search. Although you have to be exact when you search the online catalog (or a periodical database, for that matter), you do not have to be complete. As long as the beginning of the search statement matches exactly, you don’t have to finish it to make a match. The online catalog is tricky about truncation, because Author, Title, and Subject searches employ automatic right truncation. For example, if you want to locate a book titled Short History Of Mediaeval Peoples From The Dawn Of The Christian Era To The Fall Of Constantinople, instead of typing out the title in full, possibly misspelling mediaeval, you could truncate your search to short history of medi In the online catalog for basic keyword searching or any advanced searching, truncation is not automatic. The online catalog uses a question mark after the last letter. [Just to make things more complicated, most periodical databases require an asterisk (*) after the last letter to truncate
Related Questions
- When I use Find-it-Fast for searching or to find databases it only searches a few e-resources, like the online catalog but not much else. How can I access the rest of the Libraries e-resources?
- Where are the Librarys computer workstations for searching OVID, the online catalog, and other electronic resources?
- Is correct punctuation necessary when searching the online catalog?
