INTRODUCTION TO DATABASE
SEARCHING
 What is a database?
• Types
• Providers
 ETH-Bibliothek
• Access to databases
• Database information
 SFX functionality
 Search strategies
 Search rules
 Contact
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TYPES OF DATABASES
A database contains:
 Primary information (= direct “condensed” information)
• Fact databases (statistical, numerical, lexical datasets)
•Superweb (Swiss statistics)
•Beilstein, Gmelin (chemical data and formulae)
•Kompass, LexisNexis (market and company information)
•Publicus (Swiss yearbook of public life)
•Journal Citation Report JCR (citation data on journals, statistics)
 Secondary information (= metadata, bibliographic information)
• Subject bibliographies Web of Science, Agricola, Agris, GeoREF, Biotechnology
Abstracts, FSTA
and many more
(Food Science and Technology Abstracts), Medline ®, Transport, SciFinder
• Library and network catalogues NEBIS, KVK, WorldCat
• Book retailers' directories VLB, Global books in print
 Primary and secondary information
• Full-text databases LexisNexis Press, reference works, encyclopaedias, JSTOR (digital
journal
archive)
Image databases, multimedia databases…. and all kinds of combinations!
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Sources: http://is.uni-sb.de/diskussion/reader/it/it2/ , http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fachdatenbank (12.04.2010)
PROVIDERS OF DATABASES
 Institute for Scientific Information – Web of Knowledge
(ISI Thomson-Reuters)
Web of Science with Conference Proc. and Chemical Databases, JCR,
BIOSIS,
Previews, Derwent Innovations Index (patents), INSPEC
 SciVerse SCOPUS (Elsevier)
multidisciplinary database
 OVID SP
Agris, Agricola, CAB Abstracts, FSTA, GeoRef, Geobase, OVID Medline,
PSYNDEX, Transport, etc.
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ETH-BIBLIOTHEK: ACCESS TO
DATABASES
 Searching the Knowledge Portal /
the NEBIS recherche
by database title
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 Access by subject
 Access by alphabetical list
DATABASE INFORMATION
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SFX FUNCTIONALITY
Context-sensitive service, enabling you to access the document you
require (possible from almost all DBs)
 Link to the full text
 Link to the library catalogue
 Link to the table of contents of a journal
 Link to an interlibrary loan service (ILL)
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SEARCH STRATEGIES
 Formulate the search query (type of information, topic)
 Subject: general overview ↔ selected information?
• Initial (term) search in Wikipedia, encyclopaedias, including reference
works
• Advanced search in subject databases
 Synonyms, truncation, links, phrase search, alternative spellings,
singular/plural forms, time coverage, etc.
 The more precise the query, the more accurate the hits but, equally,
the
more often documents fall through the net
 Document and save your search history!
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SEARCH RULES I:
BOOLEAN OPERATORS, PHRASE
SEARCH
AND
Switzerland AND tourism - both terms must occur in the document
(intersection)
OR
bicycle OR bike - at least one of the terms must occur in the document (union)
NOT Asia NOT India - the document contains the first term but excludes the second
(subset)
SAME
Clinton SAME Obama - both terms must occur within the same sentence
NEAR climate NEAR/3 change – between both terms are zero to three other words
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()
Search order precedence: operators are weighted differently depending on the
database, e.g. AND > OR > NOT – or the other way round!
This weighting can be changed using brackets. Tip: Consult the Help pages!
" "
"hybrid car" - keeps terms together, or searches for them in the document in that
exact order (phrase search)
SEARCH RULES II: TRUNCATION /
WILDCARDS
Truncation (T)
Unlimited truncation calls up all the possible
From no characters to many. Example:
“plants", “plantation”, “planting", etc.
NEBIS
Recherche /
Wissensporta
l
*
not applicable
with just one
WoS
Scopu
s
OVID
SP
LexisNexi
s
Pub Med
*
: or
$ or
*
! to be
* (Please note:
placed before
and/or after a
root word
Truncation in the
multi-word search
can lead to a
phrase search!)
$n
*n
Limited truncation (n = number of characters)
The obligatory wildcard character is used for
forms; it requires exactly ONE character to be
will find "dogs", but not "dog"!
The optional wildcard character replaces ONE
Example: "coloTr" finds results containing the
?
?
#
$ (only
? not
WoS)
applicable
just one
character
Tipp: Consult the Help pages! - often there is a context-specific Help function available (OVID SP, Web of Science,
Scopus)
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CONTACT
ETH-Bibliothek – Grüne Bibliothek
Manuela Schneider
Universitätstr. 16
8092 Zurich
manuela.schneider@library.ethz.ch
ETH-Bibliothek - Information
Rämistr. 101
8092 Zurich
info@library.ethz.ch
October 2012
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