Search Tips & Tricks

We have a new tool for searching our collection of books, videos, journal articles, databases and more. (Although this search encompasses many items in our collection, you may also want to contact our expert librarians to find exactly what you are looking for.)

BASIC SEARCH TIPS
The following are some search tips to get you started. Note: operators (AND, OR, NOT) should be capitalized when used.

Keyword search economic disparity
Search for a specific phrase – use quotes "synthetic environments"
Search for any specific words or phrases ideology OR propaganda
Exclude words or phrases artificial NOT intelligence
Use parentheses for more specificity Twain AND (biography OR works)

Find more basic search tips and details on the PrimoVE website.

REFINING SEARCH RESULTS
After performing a search, the left column of the results page offers a number of facets (or filters), to further refine your results according to: format, author, source, subject, date, journal, language and more.

Click ADVANCED SEARCH and refine your search to include multiple filters by title, author, subject, call numbers, ISBN/ISSN numbers, material type, language or publishing dates.


FINDING JUST BOOKS
You can limit your search to only the books in our collection by using the facets (mentioned above) or by using the "Books" search tab on our homepage. See more instructions.
 

FINDING JOURNALS AND DATABASES

ACCOUNT TOOLS
To access your account and additional features of the system, click "Sign in" in the upper right corner of the screen. 

  • Dartmouth faculty, students & staff should click the "Dartmouth students & staff" link and login with your Dartmouth credentials.
  • Alumni, DHMC & Guests should use the "Alumni, DHMC & Guests" link and login with your barcode number and password. (You may be prompted to create a new PIN.)

After logging in here are few things you can do:

  1. Click your name in the upper right corner to access your account, favorites and search history.
  2. In your account you'll find a summary of loans, requests, fines/fees and messages.
  3. You can quickly renew all checked-out items or renew individual items via the loans tab.
  4. When looking at the item detail page, you will be able to request the item via a Request link in the Get It section of the page.
  5. You can save items to your favorites list by clicking the push pin icon next to an item in a search list or in the upper right corner of the item detail page.
  6. You can save your search results by clicking the "Save query" push pin link at the top of the results list.

VOICE SEARCH ASSISTANT
For browsers that support it, the search tool includes a Voice Search Assistant. To use it, simply click on the microphone icon, near the search button (magnifying glass icon).

This tool uses the Google Web Speech API. Clicking it will trigger a pop-up message asking if you will allow it to access your device's microphone. If you choose to allow it, the browser then records audio, listening for a long enough break in the audio and then converting the voice command you have given to a textual search and submitting it. The library and the search tool vendor do not have access to these recordings, but they have to be transmitted to Google in order for the tool to work. To opt out of the tool after allowing it, simply close your browser - the next time you return to the page, you will be asked again if you want to allow the service to work.