E-MAIL ORIENTATION TO LIBRARY RESOURCES ***DATE*** InfoTrac -- Full Text Database ****************************** Description: InfoTrac is a multidisciplinary database containing many full text articles. This one resource includes five databases as described below. Expanded Academic: An index to over 1500 journals, Expanded Academic includes full text from 1000 journals, including many scholarly journals. This resource is very good in the social sciences and includes some coverage of all other disciplines including math, science, and the humanities. General Reference Center: An index to 1100 general interest magazines and newspapers, as well as 15 reference books, General Reference Center includes full text from 800 journals. This is a good resource for non-scholarly information. Health Reference Center: Health Reference Center indexes 180 consumer health magazines and medical journals as well as medical reference books and pamphlets. Full text is included for all pamphlets and reference books as well as for 142 of the journals. This resource is good for only basic level health information. General Business File: index to 1300 business and trade journals, full text from 650 journals is included. InfoTrac also includes National Newspaper Index. However, this database does not include access to full text articles. I recommend LexisNexis Academic for access to newspaper articles. ************************** Access: InfoTrac is available from the Libraries' web page at http://www.lib.lsu.edu. Click on "Indexes and Databases" and then choose InfoTrac from the "Frequently Used Databases" menu. If you are off campus, you can access InfoTrac by using your TigerCard id number and your PIN (which is changeme until you change it). Once you access InfoTrac you must choose a database to search. The menu includes the databases mentioned above as well as a number of other databases published by the Gale company. You may choose OneFile to search all the InfoTrac databases at once. ************************** General Search Techniques: There are four search options in InfoTrac: Subject, Keyword, Advanced, and Relevance. Results lists generally include citations, citations with abstracts, or citations with abstracts and full text. Access to the full text is only available when citations are followed by a "Text" or a "PDF" link. ************************** Subject searching: This is the default search page that opens when a database is accessed. Searching can be as easy as entering a word or a phrase in the search box and hitting search. Subject searches are generally restricted to single concept type searches such as "gun control" or "eating disorders." If no subject terms match your search, the search defaults to a keyword search. The results list, using the subject search, may include related subjects and a choice of subject subdivisions, or if only a few articles are returned, it may be a list of citations. ************************** Keyword Searching: To access the keyword search mode, select "keyword search" from the blue menu on the left. Here you can enter multi-concept searches such as "gun control and second amendment" or "eating disorders and men". Words will be searched as a phrase if a Boolean operator (AND, OR, NOT) is not used. Words that are not phrases should be connected with "and," "or," or "not." Example: eating disorders and teenagers ************************** Advanced Searching: To access the advanced search mode, select "Advanced search" from the blue menu on the left. Advanced searching allows you to combine searches in specific fields to produce a very precise search. There are two ways of searching using advanced search. You can either put all desired terms in one search statement, or you can combine a series of separate searches. To search using one search statement: 1. Select a field to search in the box on the left by clicking on the arrow, then clicking on a field. 2. In the box on the right, enter a term to be searched after the field code (for example, to search for Smith as the author's name, the box on the right should include au Smith). 3. Use a Boolean operator such as "and," "or," or "not" after the first search term, and repeat steps one and two (for example, au Smith and da 1998). These steps can be repeated as necessary 4. Click on search ************************** To search using a series of search statements: 1. Select a field from the box on the left by clicking on the arrow and clicking on a field. 2. Enter the term to be searched in the box to the right. 3. Click on search. Repeat the steps above for each search statement, deleting any text that remains in the box on the right before entering your search terms. To combine search statements: Above the search box a search history will be recorded. Any of the searches in the search history can be combined by leaving the field code box on the left at "Select index" and entering the search numbers in the box on the right using a Boolean operator between each number (for example R1 and R2 not R3) The most useful part of the advanced search mode is the ability to search by article author. Most of the other "advanced" search options are also available in the other search modes. All search modes include the ability to limit to a specific journal title, publication date, to full text or to refereed journals. ************************** Relevance searching: To access the relevance search mode, select "Relevance search" from the blue menu on the left. Relevance searching is very similar to keyword searching but produces a results list that is sorted by relevance. Keyword searching produces a chronological results list. Search commands are more complex using relevance searching. To search for phrases, the phrase must be surrounded by quotation marks (for example "civil war"). + and - symbols must be used to require or exclude words in a search For example, to search for articles about civil war in Central America enter the following: +"civil war" +"Central America" To exclude article about Mexico enter the following: +"civil war" +"Central America" -Mexico ************************** Special Search Tips: In all search modes searches can be limited to refereed publications, full text articles, to a specific journal or by date, use the limit options below the search box before clicking on the search button. Truncation and Wild Cards: InfoTrac allows the use of three wild card operators: * can stand for zero or any number of letters (for example to find any form of psychiatry, psychology, psychotherapy, etc use psych*) ? can stand for exactly one letter (for example to find men or man use m?n) ! can stand for zero or one letter (for example to find book and books but not bookstore use book!) ************************** More Help More help for searching can be found by clicking on the "Help" link while in the database. The Libraries also has an online tutorial at http://www.lib.lsu.edu/instruction/infotrac/InfoTrac00.html As always, if you have questions about this database feel free to email me directly.