Thousand Oaks, CA
Home MenuSearch Encore Catalog
1. Quick Search
Use the search box at the top of most library Web pages to search for books, DVDs, CDs, and more. You can search for the title, author, subject, or other keywords. This will search all fields in library records for your entered search terms. (example: harry potter rowling)
You can use quotation marks around your keywords if you would like to search for the words as a phrase (example: "birthday cake"). You can also use asterisks as wild cards within a word or at the end of a string - helpful if you are not sure of the spelling, if you want to search for both singular and plural, or if you want to search for all words that start the same way. (example: wom*n, results for both woman and women; environment*, results for environment, environments, environmental, environmentalist, etc)
The initial Encore search is an "and" keyword search. You do not need to add the word AND.
- Use "quotation marks" to search for words together as one phrase.
- Parentheses, OR, and NEAR are not recognized as search operators.
2. Card Catalog limiters
- title:moby dick or t:moby dick
- author:didion, joan or a:didion joan
- subject:friendship or s:friendship
3. Truncation
- enviro* pol* will yield books on environment, environment politics, environment policy, etc.
4. Advanced Search
Use the search box at the top of most library pages to begin your search. Select Advanced Search or use the Advanced Search link if you are already in the catalog.
Use the dropdown menus to specify which fields in the library record to search for your terms: Author, Title, Subject, or Keyword (all). The Author field can be used with author first name, last name, or the reverse. Subject searches are not limited to exact subject headings, but exact ones will return better results.
Combine multiple search terms by using the Boolean operators And, Or, and Not. Using And will return search results that contain both search terms. Or will provide you with search results for one or both of your search terms. Not will exclude items containing that term that would otherwise have been returned with your other search term.
6. Facets
Facets are located on the left hand side of the screen. Encore works like an inverted pyramid. It allows the searcher to drill down from broad topics and eliminate items that are not relevant. It does this with the use of facets which allow the searcher to drill down in the results. Multiple facets can be used at the same time to help refine the results. All facet choices are arranged by frequency in the search results, with a number in parentheses that indicates the matching results. Here is a list of the facets available in Encore:
- Availability - Shows whether an item currently has the status of “Available.” This allows the searcher to only see items that are (hopefully) on shelf at that given moment. If the user is looking for only online materials, the results can be limited to that as well.
- Search Found In - Allows searchers to see where the search term was found and drill down. For instance, a search for J.K. Rowling might mean someone is looking for a biography or for Harry Potter. Select results where Rowling is the author to find the Harry Potter works, or select results where Rowling is the subject to find works about J.K. Rowling.
- Format - Choose the desired format and click on it. To only see the search results for that format!
- Collection - Limits the search results to resources from a specific collection of materials. Collections can include physical locations as well as digital collections of harvested records.
- Location - Use this facet to select a specific library to search.
- Language - Looking for a foreign language book? Pick your chosen language to easily find titles.
- Tag - Pulled from the subject field, this shows subjects pulled from the records in the search results. Refine the search results by selecting the subject that most closely matches the intended search.
- Place - Identifies the setting of the book. For instance, use this to find mysteries set in England.
- Publish Date - Use this facet to limit by a specific publication date.