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Catalogue help

One Search is State Library’s catalogue. It provides access to all of State Library's collections. It allows searching across physical items and online resources at the same time. You can add your own tags to the records of any State Library resources and save your favourite records and searches.

The catalogue can be accessed at onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au

Introduction to One Search (4.17 minutes)

How to request material from One Search (2.42 minutes)

There are many ways to search the online catalogue.

Performing a simple search

  • enter your keyword(s) in the search box by typing them in, or selecting the microphone icon and saying the keywords aloud.
  • click the Search icon (magnifying glass) or press the Enter key to quickly find material in the Library's collections.

This will search for all the searched terms in everything available in One Search.

To limit your search to a particular collection, click on the scope name to make an alternative selection.

See the table below for more information about each scope option.

Search scopes in One Search

Search scope Description
Everything The entire SLQ collection as well as journal articles and other online content. 
SLQ collections All of SLQ's published and unpublished collections, in print and online, newspapers, music scores, artists books, manuscripts, video, photographs and more.
SLQ digital collections Contains material that we have digitised or is born digital. Includes photographs, maps, artwork, manuscripts and illustrations from books and ebooks.
SLQ Family History Indexes Contains index records created by State Library including convict registers, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander family records, Queenslanders involved in mining accidents and portraits of soldiers involved in the South African (Boer) and First World Wars.
Articles etc. Articles in journals, magazines and newspapers, book chapters, conference proceedings and reports. 


Searching for a phrase

Use double quotation marks to search for your string of words as a phrase. This will ensure that your searched words are located next to each other in the order specified. Without quotation marks, your search results will contain individual words in the phrase, regardless of whether these words are located next to each other in the order specified.

You can combine both words and phrases in a single search.
For example, to search for global warming as one term, type "global warming" in the search box.

Searching for similar words - OR

You can search for items that contain at least one of the words or phrases you type in the search box. To do so, type OR between the words or phrases.

For example, to search for items with the word Irish or the word Celtic, type irish OR celtic in the search box. Make sure you type the OR or NOT in uppercase.

Note: If you search for words or phrases without specifying OR or NOT, it is assumed that you are searching for all the specified words or phrases.

Excluding words or phrases - NOT

You can exclude items that contain specific words or phrases. To do so, type NOT and then type the word or phrase to exclude.

For example, to search for items with the word Celtic and exclude any of these items with the word Irish, type the following in the search box: celtic NOT irish.

Note: If you search for words or phrases without specifying OR or NOT, the system assumes that you are searching for all the specified words or phrases.

Search using wildcard characters

You can include the following wildcard characters in your searches:

  • ?—enter a question mark to replace one character wildcard. For example, type wom?n to search for records that contain the terms woman and women
  • *—enter an asterisk at the end of or within a word to replace a number of characters. For example, type cultur* to search for records that contain strings, such as culture, cultural, and culturally.

Grouping terms within a query

You can use parentheses to group terms within a query.

For example, to search for Queensland and either sugar or cane, type the following in the search box Queensland (sugar OR cane).

Advanced Search

Advanced Search lets you determine which fields to search, how to search for your terms (i.e. contains, (is) exact, starts with), and how to combine your search terms. It also gives you other options for limiting the scope of your search.

Browse search

Use Browse search in the catalogue to return an alphabetical listing of items beginning with the searched term(s). You can select to browse by subject, author, title or call number. Browse search for an author name searches by the author’s surname or an organisation name. To conduct a browse search:

  • click BROWSE from the top menu
  • select either subjectauthortitle or call number from the drop-down menu
  • enter your term(s) in the search box
  • click the magnifying glass or press Enter key to search.

The results list displays all the items that match your search query. Your results are usually sorted by relevance. To change the sorting to either RelevanceDate newestDate oldestAuthor or Title:

Each item in the list includes:

  • Resource type—the icon beside each item and the text above indicates the format such as a book, article, or website
  • Title—clicking the title displays more bibliographic information (the full record)
  • Author/creator and publication details—the item’s author/creator, publisher and publication date
  • Availability—displays information about how to get the item, for example Online Access takes you directly to the item online.

Refining your results

You can refine your search results using a variety of limits on the right-hand side, such as by Resource typeSubjectDate, and Language.

Click on the arrows to expand or collapse the options available.

By clicking on the orange strike through tick icon that appears when you hover over a facet name you can exclude this from your search results.

You can also lock facets for searches in the current session by clicking on Remember all filters under the Active Filters (top right of screen).

From the breif results, click the item's title to get more information about the item.

In the full record view, you can view the following information. The format of the item will determine what you see in each record.

Share

This section provides various options for sharing or referencing the item:

  • QR Code allows you to link to a record by taking a photograph of the QR Code image
  • Permalink provides a permanent link to this record
  • Email allows you to send information about the item to yourself or another email address
  • Print provides a printable text summary of the record
  • Citation allows you to choose from various standard citation styles and copy the text for referencing the item
  • If you use EasyBib, BibTex, Endnote, RefWorks, or reference manager software that uses RIS format (for example Mendeley or Zotero), you can export the record to your reference manager.

Locate / Request

Lists all of the locations where an item is held and allows you to request an item if it is held in storage. Much of the collection material is held in storage.

When you request an item, library staff will retrieve it for you. Delivery times apply.

Note: You need to Log in to your account with your State Library membership to make a request for items in storage. Not a member? Register here.

View it

Lists all of the links to the item if available online.

Some online items have access restricted to library members only. You can access these items by logging in to your account. If you do not have an account, apply for SLQ membership.

To close the full record view, either:

Details

The Full Details section displays the item’s full record and links to further information. You can click on the Author or Subjects links to quickly find related material.

Links

Find links to Trove, table of contents if available, author information in WorldCat, order forms to purchase high resolution copies of copyright free images and the ability to provide feedback on the item.

More like this

You can use the More like this to quickly find related material.

To browse through the list click or <.

Click on the cover image of the material for the full record view.

Tags

You can add tags to a record to help you find the item again, or help other people to discover it. The tags can be a word or phrase which provides useful information of the item content. These tags can then be viewed publicly by clicking on TAGS in the main menu or by searching in Advanced Search by selecting User tags from the Any field drop-down menu.

You must be logged in to add the tags. To add a tag:

  • click ADD YOUR OWN TAGS (you will be prompted to log in if you haven’t already done so)
  • type in your term and press the Enter key
  • the tag is displayed in the record, and can be searched by anyone using One Search.

Explore (Syndetics Unbound)

You can view further information about the item such as a summary, author information, book excerpts and reviews. This information comes from outside sources. It is not available in all records.

Note: To close the full record view, either:

  • click on the teal  on the left of the full record where the is, or
  • press the ESC key.

You can sign into the catalogue using the Login link located on the top right of the screen, or from within a catalogue record.

When you are signed in, you can request collection items from onsite repositories, save searches, and organise your favourite records.

Not a member? Register here.

Why should I log in

When you log into your account, you're able to:

  • request items
  • renew your loans
  • add items and searches to My Favourites - you can save items from your results to My Favourites or save your searches to use them at another time
  • set alerts - you can request an email notification when there are new items answering your search criteria.

To login to your library account:

  • click on Login in the top right-hand corner
  • enter your State Library username and password
  • click on your username
  • click on Library Card

You can check the status of your requests and renew your loans.

Note: Remember to sign out so that your searches remain private and your personal settings and basket are not accessible by anyone else.

Checking your loans and requests

Login to your account.

  • To see the full list of your loans, click on your username, then click My Loans.
  • To see the full list of your requests, click on your username, then click My Requests.
  • To see the full list of your saved items, click on your username, then click Saved items, or click the Pin icon at the top of the page.
  • To see the full list of your saved items, click on your username, then click Saved searches, or click the Pin icon at the top of the page.

Saving items to My Favourites

Click the Pin icon next to a title to add to My Favourites.

Note: You must sign in to save items in My Favourites for future sessions.

Removing items from My Favourites

Click the Unpin icon next to a title to remove from My Favourites.

Viewing items saved in My Favourites

Click the Pin icon at the top right-hand side of the page to view items you've saved to My Favourites.

Managing items

You can organise your pinned items into groups using Labels, which can then be accessed for future use. You can add multiple labels to an item.

To add labels to your pinned item(s)/records:

  • click Add labels or the pencil icon from the record
  • type in your label(s) eg. history
  • press the Enter key.

You can access your items in each label by clicking on the labels listed on the right-hand side.

What is a query?

A query is a word or phrase you specify in the search box to find information. You can do the following with queries:

  • view the current session's queries and results
  • save a query from the current session to use it later
  • set alerts on your saved queries to have them run automatically at scheduled times to provide you with updated results from queries.

Viewing and saving queries

If you are signed in, you can save a query by clicking the Save query link, which appears next to the results count on the brief results page.

To access your saved session queries:

  • click the Pin icon on the top right corner
  • click Saved Searches in My Favourites.

Under My Favourites, you will find:

  • a list of all the queries and alerts that you have saved (under SAVED SEARCHES)
  • a list of all the queries that you have performed in the current session (under SEARCH HISTORY).

You can run a saved query by clicking on the search term in the list, or you can set an alert.

Note: If you are not signed in, your search history is only available during the current session.

What is an alert?

An alert sends you an email when there are new items in One Search that match your search criteria.

To create an alert:

  • Click on the bell icon to the right of your saved search
  • A message will display at the top of the screen stating what email address the alerts will be sent to and giving you the option to change it.