USING THE PLS ONLINE CATALOG
The Peninsula Library
System (PLS), which is made up of all the public (city and county) libraries in
San Mateo County in addition to the three community college libraries (Skyline,
CSM and Canada), has an online catalog which lists all of the books, audio and
video materials and other materials available in all of the libraries in the
System. This catalog is available on the World Wide Web from a link on the
Skyline Library homepage (on the left column) or by clicking here (a new window will
open, but this page will still be accessible by clicking on the tab for this
page at the bottom of your screen).
To search for books on a
specific topic:
+ Type search
words (keep your search words broad) in the first search box & click Submit.
+ The search results will show books
and other materials in all libraries in the PLS system. *
+ To Limit your results to materials at Skyline
College Library, scroll down to Limit to: Location: pull-down menu below the search boxes, scroll down in the Location: pull-down menu, select
*
Important Note: If no
records are found that match all of your search words, the
catalog will display those records that match just some of your search words and the following message will be displayed at
the top of your results: Tried: ((word1 and word2)) no records
found... Tried: ((word1 or word2)) x results found. Sorted by
Relevance. (In this example word1 and word2 represent the search
words that were entered and x represents the number of
results found containing any of the search
words.) If no records are found
that match all of your search words, you
should revise your search with broader search words in order to find books more
directly related to your complete search.
Optional advanced features: Before clicking Submit, you may also:
-
change the
search type pull-down menu from Any Field to: Author, Title, Subject or Note
-
limit your results to a specific
“material type” (such as books, CDs or DVDs) by scrolling down to Limit
to: Material type: pull-down menu below the search
boxes, scroll down in the Material type: pull-down menu, select Books (or
any other material type), & then click the Submit button.
- add additional search words in
additional search boxes
Ordering books from other libraries: Books from other libraries may be ordered to be sent to
Skyline (or any other library) by clicking on the Place Request
link for any book. (A library card is required to make the request and $.75 is
charged when picking up the book.)
last revised: 10-18-05 by
These materials may be
used for educational purposes if you inform and credit the author and cite the
source as: LSCI 106: Introduction to Online Research. All commercial
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