It's me again, for my second Nashua Public Library blog post. Did you miss me? Or were you busy reading about Bigfoot?

I used the library before I started working here, and I considered myself a relatively savvy user of the website and the online catalog. But there are aspects of it and neat little tricks that I didn't discover until later on. Did you know about these already?

1. Hold Request

   If you're browsing the catalog and find a book you like, but it's checked out, you can hit the button to place a hold on it. But here's where it gets cool. If you want a specific item - say the 2008 edition of the Guinness Book of World Records, or the third disc of Doctor Who Series 2 -- you can put a hold on that one particularly. Look at the Copy/Holding Information and over to the right next to the due date column, there's a link for "Request Copy".

   
   
   

2. Title versus Title Only Keyword Search

   Have you ever noticed how a Title Keyword Search turns up items that don't have your search terms in the title? That's because it's actually searching the title and a couple of other fields. If you want to narrow that down to just items with your terms in the title, you need to select Title Only Keyword. You can get to it under Advanced Keyword on the Search tab.
   
   

3. Browsing the Deweys

   Ever get a craving to browse the library shelves without actually being at the library? Never know if your search is actually turning up everything that might be useful or interesting to you? You can browse by Dewey number. A search for vampires will show you a number of nonfiction books about vampires are 398.45. Go to Browse and then select "Dewey Call Numbers", type in 398.45, and find not only the vampire books you saw previously, but other related books that might interest you. It's almost as good as browsing in person. (Note: When it pulls up the list for you, click on the call number rather than the title. For some reason, the title links don't go anywhere.)
   
   

   
   

4. Maximum Requests Have been Exceeded?

   Ever get the error message "Unable to place a request on this item. The maximum requests for this item type has been exceeded."? Once upon a time, I thought that meant I had too many DVD requests at the same time. What it actually means it that it's a Hot DVD, so new that hold requests aren't yet allowed on it. You'll have to come in to the library and find it on the shelf, or wait until it says 'Hot DVDs (requests allowed)'. What I tend to do is save it in a List that I've named 'Movies'. Then every couple of weeks, I see if any of the DVDs in my list have become requestable yet.
   
   

5. What's that in my List?

   Ever get a weird item showing up in your saved List that you're pretty sure you didn't put there? What probably happened is that you used one of the catalog computers in the library to search for something. If there are items saved in a list on one of those computers by a previous user, then when you log into your account, those items will get added to your list. If you've found this problem happening to you, just make sure the list is clear before you log in to your account on one of the library computers.
   
   

I'm learning the quirks of this catalog all the time. Have you noticed something I haven't? Is there anything about the system that still confuses you? Please leave a comment! (Note: The comments are moderated to weed out spam, so your comment won't show up immediately. Check back the next day, Monday through Friday, and I should have spotted it and fished it out by then.)