SEARCHING STELLA: BASIC

This guide outlines basic searching in the online library catalog, which is named STELLA, an acronym for South Texas Electronic Law Library Access. The guide will cover searches by author, title, keyword, subject, and call number. The online library catalog indexes all of the titles in the library. Although some volume contents are included in these records, the online library catalog does not index law review or other journal articles. You must use the print indexes, including Index to Legal Periodicals; Current Law Index; or the web-based InfoTrac/LegalTrac to locate law review or journal articles. Alternatively, students and faculty may use the LEXIS and WESTLAW databases to locate articles.

Our online library catalog is web-based and may be accessed from home by visiting http://www.stcl.edu/library/libhome.html. Of course, patrons may consult the catalog via the Web within the law library as well.

AUTHOR SEARCH & RESERVE SEARCH

Search by author if the author is an individual person, a corporate entity, or a conference. A personal name is entered last name first followed by a comma and a space and then the first name or initial. See the examples under the search box on the author search help screen. Corporate or conference names are typed as they appear. Authors of recent (2004-) and some earlier Continuing Legal Education (CLE) presentations and other volume chapters can be found using an author search. Authors of other earlier CLE presentations and volume chapters should be searched using a keyword search. Course reserve materials may be located by an author search using "Professor's name reserve," e.g., "Smith reserve." More easily, you may click on two other options: Course Reserves by Professor's Name or on Course Reserves by Course Name.

TITLE SEARCH

The title index includes main titles, series titles, and journal names, as well as other titles (spine titles, cover titles, etc). The title index does not include The Bluebook citation forms of titles. You must type the title from the beginning, but you can stop at any time, even in the middle of the word. Again, if you are looking for the title of a CLE presentation or other volume chapter, recent (2004-) and some earlier ones can be found using a title search but to find other earlier works, you should use a keyword search.

ADVANCED KEYWORD SEARCH

If you are not sure of a title, are just looking for a subject in general, or are looking for earlier (pre-2004) CLE presentations or other volume chapters, you should use a keyword search. The keyword index contains all words in titles, contents notes, conference names, corporate names, etc. The Keyword Search dialog box is followed by detailed instructions for using Boolean operators, truncation and other options. A string of words without an operator is processed as a phrase search (e.g., united states supreme court; internet law). If you type a phrase not found in the online catalog, the system will perform the search as an "and" search. For example, if the phrase "cat dog" is not in the online catalog, the system will search "cat and dog" and display those results. Similarly, if you type an "and" search that produces no results, the system will try an "or" search. So our "cat and dog" search that produces no results will be further searched as "cat or dog". Some common Boolean operators are:

AND - the more words you type, the fewer records you will retrieve, as the online catalog will only show you records with all of your words.

OR - resulting records will have at least one of the words. The search "cat or dog" will return records with either the word "cat" or the word "dog" in them.

AND NOT - to eliminate words. For example, "Mexico and not New" will eliminate all of the records on New Mexico, but also might eliminate a book on Mexico that has the word "new" in the title.

NEAR - to find words close to each other. For example, "nternet near online"

WITHIN # - to find words within so many words of another. For example, "divorce within 3 mediation"

NOTE: * - use the asterisk to truncate words. Use a single asterisk to truncate from 1-5 letters. Use a double asterisk for open-ended truncation. For example, "cat*" will retrieve records with words such as "cat," "cats," "catch," "catalog," as well as many others that have up to 5 additional letters. "Cat**" will retrieve those words, plus longer words such as "cataloging." Remember that personal author names are not in the keyword index.

GENERAL CONVENTIONS FOR ALL TYPES OF SEARCHES

Capitalization does not matter; you can enter a name in upper and/or lower case. Apostrophes are ignored (O’dell and Odell are the same.). All other punctuation marks, spaces, or combination of marks and spaces, are treated like a space (U.S.A., USA, and U. S. A, are treated all the same.). "And" and "&" are treated the same, so you can enter either and get the same results.

SEARCHING STELLA: ADVANCED TECHNIQUES

SUBJECT SEARCH

The subject index in the online catalog is the index created by the Library of Congress (LC). The Library of Congress Subject Headings is available in print form in the reference area and in the Government Documents stacks at SuDoc L. 26.7. The index lists the approved form and choice of words to describe various subjects. Some of the choices may be uncommon words or phrases. For example, materials on family law use the subject "domestic relations." If you are not familiar with LC subject headings, you may wish to use a keyword search. Once you have found a record or records that you want, you may look further at the bibliographic record and see what LC subject headings are assigned. (When looking at an individual item record, scroll to the bottom of the screen to see a list of the subject headings under which the item was cataloged.) Then, using the assigned headings, do a subject search to collect more records on that subject.

CALL NUMBER SEARCH

If you have found a useful volume and want to search for other items in our online catalog with a similar call number, utilize the call number search. You will be offered a choice of "Library of Congress" or "Local" call numbers. The entire library collection uses Library of Congress (LC) call numbers except for a few collections such as our Government Documents and our South Texas faculty writings. Thus, you probably will choose the "Library of Congress" option.

The parts of an LC call number indicate its subject. When searching by LC call number, you will want to enter only the first letter(s) and set of numbers. The remaining letters and numbers are specific to that volume. For example, if your volume has call number KF 245 C45 1992, you will search only for KF245 to find other materials on that subject (in this case, legal research).

LIMITING A SEARCH

One of the most powerful but underused features of our online library catalog is the ability to limit. If you have executed a search (other than a keyword search) that produces many results, you will have the option to click a button "Limit this Search." You may limit your search by year of publication; material type (such as periodical, loose-leaf, computer file); language, publisher, location (such as main stacks or reserve); and by words in the title, author, or subject. Utilize the pull-down menus to refine your search. When you have completed the boxes to your satisfaction, click the button "Limit/Sort Items Retrieved Using the Above Data."

The Keyword Search utilizes a dialog box for limiting rather than a pull-down menu. For example, a keyword search for "torts" may produce 500+ results. By using the dialog box options, you may narrow the results to works published after 1999; to works with "West" as the publisher; to works that are periodicals. Remember that you can use corporate or conference names as part of your keyword search to further limit your results. For example, "torts and American and Bar and Association".

Limiting also is helpful to locate a book placed on reserve by a professor. Execute a keyword search using the words you remember and then limit the results by location (reserve).

ANOTHER SEARCH TIP: TRUNCATION

In title searches, you can stop the right truncation by using the vertical bar on the keyboard | . This strategy is useful for one-word titles. For example, a book called "The Law" exists in our online library catalog. If you conduct a title search for "Law," you will retrieve a list of more than 2700 titles. If you search for "Law|" you reduce that choice to just a couple of titles. This feature cannot be used in a keyword search or in an author search.