Searching in Alma
Any user role that can access Alma's repository search can perform a search in Alma except for the restrictions on certain kinds of searches as noted in the User Roles for Search Types table.
Searching Alma is available from the persistent search box located at the top of every page [the persistent search box does not appear at the top of the Portfolio List page; this is a known issue]. You can also save search queries and reuse them at any time (see Saving and Reusing Search Queries).
Also see Secondary Search.
What You Can Search For
Depending on your user role(s), you can search many items in Alma's repository, including:
- Metadata records compiled by Ex Libris or local to your institution or collaborative network (see Metadata Management and Inventory). These records include:
- Local inventory, including holdings for physical items, electronic portfolios, and digital representations and files
- Bibliographic titles, including top-level collections, physical titles, electronic collection and portfolio titles, and digital titles
- Authority records
The results appear on the page; see Repository Search Results, below. - Depending on your role, you can also search for:
- Patron requests; the results appear on the Resource Request Monitoring page (see Requests in Alma)
- Courses; the results appear on the Courses page (see Managing Courses).
- Deposits; the results appear on the Deposits page (see Deposit).
- Users; the results appear in the Find and Manage Users page (see Managing Users).
- Acquisitions information, including PO lines, funds, invoices, vendors, and licenses (see Acquisitions). The results appear in the relevant acquisitions page.
- Reading lists; the results appear in the Reading Lists Task List page (see Managing Reading Lists).
- Reading list citations; the results appear in the Edit Citations page (see Managing Citations).
- Borrowing Requests; the results appear in the Borrowing Resource Sharing task list
- Lending Requests; the results appear in the Lending Resource Sharing task list
- If your institution is working with Esploro, you can search for research assets, deposits, and files, and for researchers; see Searching in Esploro.
The searchable fields depend on the search type. For example, when you search All Titles, the searchable fields are based on metadata that is common to all record formats, but do not include fields that are specific to physical, electronic, or digital inventory. You can search on these specific fields when searching the relevant format (Physical Titles, etc.).
Searching Physical Titles, Items, and Holdings indices with a permanent physical location equals "empty" does not work because it cannot retrieve real results since a holdings record cannot be created without "852$c". It is recommended not to use it.
In the persistent search, when searching for Physical Items by the beginning of a barcode, it is advisable not to use the “Start with” search because it will not return the desired result. Instead, the “Contains exact phrase starting with” option should be used. This requires at least two characters to be used. For example, search for the initial characters “7L” or “Z0” and not just “7” or “Z”.
Every physical item, electronic portfolio/collection, and digital file is indexed with the bibliographic metadata to which it is linked, in addition to its inventory (institution/network) specific data. See Search Indexes for more information. Searching is the same regardless of the format of the catalog records (for example, MARC21, BIBFRAME or Dublin Core).
The persistent search box offers you the following methods of searching:
- Simple Search – Search using a single search field (see Performing a Simple Search).
- Advanced Search – Create search criteria, including search conditions, to refine your search (see Performing an Advanced Search). Advanced search is not available for citations, requests, borrowing requests, lending requests, funds, vendors, and invoices.
Only simple, free-text indexes can be active for Simple Search, whereas complex, rigid, or fixed-value indexes, such as those that are defined in code tables, are supported only for Advanced Search.
When searching for a call number like I106.4 /4 that ends with a number preceded by a slash, the system ignores the slash and number, such as /4 in this example, and returns search results for I106.4. This is a known issue. This happens only when there is a digit after the slash. A search for I106.4 /E, for example, returns the correct set of results. To work around this issue, use the Permanent call number type index and criteria similar to the following example:
Performing a Simple Search
The persistent search box appears at the top of each page. This tool initially provides a simple search interface for searching the repository (books, articles, authorities, and so forth) and other areas of Alma (PO lines, vendors, and so forth). For a list of the keyword indexes searched during a repository search, see Search Indexes. The default search is a repository search for All titles.
Users can quickly select the type of search (entity type) they are searching by starting to type its name in the Search field, for example "Electronic collection", and having it auto-complete in the field.
To rerun a simple repository search, see Rerunning a Previous Search.
To perform a simple search:
- Select the search type from the drop-down list. (Note that this is a fixed list of options and cannot be modified).
Persistent Search Drop-Down List of OptionsUsers with the following roles can perform each type of search. - Select the field on which to search in the second drop-down list, or select Keywords or All (depending on the selection in the first drop-down list) for a general search on multiple fields. You can select the default field name and enter part or all of a field name to filter the list of fields. For more information, see Searchable Fields; for PO lines, see PO Line Search Fields; for vendors, see Vendor Search Fields; for reading lists, see Reading List Search Fields; for citations, see Citation Search Fields. To configure the available search fields, see Configuring What Search Indexes Are Available.
- Enter a search string in the text box.
To jump to this text field on any page that does not have any other kind of search box, press / (forward slash) on your keyboard.
- Articles (such as the, a, an) in your search are ignored.
Leading articles are not ignored when 'Title' is selected from the second drop-down list for All titles, Physical titles, or Electronic titles search types.
- Special characters, such as hyphen, dash, slash, and so forth, finds strings both with and without the special characters. For example, searching for a-b finds records that include either a-b or ab. Spaces separate search terms, so searching for a<space>b finds records that include both a and b anywhere (not as an exact phrase), but does not return ab. For additional special characters, see Searching for Special Characters. The exception to this is a search for course code/name or reading list code/name. See Reading List Search Fields and Citation Search Fields.
- All variants of apostrophe characters are normalized to the standard ASCII apostrophe \u0027 in various textual fields such as Subject and Title. This means that, if text in a bibliographic record contains one of the following UNICODE apostrophe characters, this text can be retrieved by searching with either the original apostrophe character or the ASCII standard one \u0027:
Note that this functionality is supported for only the default searching language configured for your system.
- \u02BB - MODIFIER LETTER TURNED COMMA
- \u02BC - MODIFIER LETTER APOSTROPHE
- \u02B9 - MODIFIER LETTER PRIME
- \u2018 - SINGLE QUOTATION MARK
- To use the asterisk ( * ) wildcard character in your search string, place it at the end of the search string. Asterisk may be used at the end of the string with Contains Keywords and Not Contains Keywords.
- The asterisk is not supported when the string contains a special character, for example dash (-), period, quote or double quote, parentheses, slash, or space, for example: $a (Aleph)003858461UCD01-Aleph.
- The question mark (?) is not supported as a wildcard character.
- Asterisk is applicable to find ALL the inventories. For example, using asterisk as a keyword to search for ALL titles finds all the resources in Alma.
- When using an asterisk instead of the entire search string, it is recommended using "Title is not Empty" or "MMS ID > 0" to find all records in the repository in an efficient way. Note: Using an asterisk is not recommended, because it is less efficient and more time consuming.
-
You may enter a phrase search by surrounding your search phrase with double quotation marks. This can be done for all search entities and index types that have the option to use phrase search in Alma's advanced search such as titles and portfolios searches.If you add other text in the search box before or after a set of words with double quotation marks around them, the text in quotation marks is not be treated as a phrase search. The phrase search functionality is limited to a single phrase in double quotation marks.When you use the phrase search capability, the words contains phrase precede the search terms in your search results to indicate the type of search that you performed. The recent searches list shows the quotation marks where you did a phrase search in the simple search box. When you enter a simple search with quotation marks and subsequently switch to the advanced search function, Alma automatically selects the Contains Phrase option.
- Alma finds characters with diacritics when you search using standard English characters.
If the users in your institution search using characters with diacritics, ensure that Ex Libris has configured that searches return matches for diacritics. Search language configuration is available for German, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Korean, Chinese, and Hong Kong TSVCC.
- Contact Ex Libris to enable the following enhanced search options:
- Search in traditional Chinese/Kanji or simplified Chinese/Kanji and return results in both traditional Chinese/Kanji and simplified Chinese/Kanj.
- Search in Hangul (Korean) and return results in both Hangul and Hanja.
- Search in Hiragana (Japanese) and return results in both Hiragana and Katakana.
- An administrator can configure several additional items regarding search. For more information, see Configuring Search.
- Alma saves the last 10 searches in search history for title or inventory entity searches. This list is saved indefinitely. There is currently no way to clear the list (other than to perform new searches).
- Optionally select the initial results tab using the search scope drop-down list to the left of the magnifying glass:
Institution, 
Community, or 
Network (when available). Note that searching in the institution is not an option when searching for authorities, if your institution does not manage authorities locally. For more information on these options, see Institution, Community, and Network Tabs. - Select the magnifying glass
or press Return or Enter on the keyboard to perform the search. The items that match your search query appear on the page.
For locations that have RFID (see RFID Support), select the RFID read icon to enter content (barcode), and select the magnifying glass.Users can erase entire text content in search fields by selecting an "X" rather than selecting the text and deleting it. This feature is only enabled for Next Generation UI.
RFID Read IconSearching for physical items when RFID is enabled displays the Security Status when it is available. The field contains either Checked Out or Available. Checked out indicates that the item is on loan and may leave the library. An item that is available cannot leave the library.- For more information about the results, see:
- Order lines - Searching for PO Lines
- Invoices - Searching for Invoices
- Requests - Resource Request Monitoring
- Borrowing Requests - Managing Resource Sharing Borrowing Requests
- Lending Requests - Managing Resource Sharing Lending Requests
- Vendors - Managing Vendors
- Licenses - Managing Licenses and Amendments
- Users - Managing Users
- Deposits - Approving Deposits
- Market - Searching the Rialto Marketplace
- All other results (repository): Repository Search Results
- To perform an advanced search, see Performing an Advanced Search.
- To save your search, see Saving and Reusing Search Queries.
- For more information about the results, see:
- Articles (such as the, a, an) in your search are ignored.
Customizing the Search Results Record Fields
After a search has been conducted in Alma, users can customize the record fields that are visible in the search results. For example, if you didn't want to include the "Fulfillment Note" in the search results, it can be removed using the customization icon.
To customize the search results record fields:
- After searching in Alma, select the gear icon (
).
The Customize view drop-down option menu is displayed.
Customize View Drop Menu - Select (
) the record field(s) you want to remove from appearing in the search results, for example, Fulfillment Note. - Select Save.
All the selected record fields are displayed in the search results (if they exist).
Customize Records Display in Search Results
Performing an Advanced Search
See Performing a Simple Search for search information that pertains to both types of searches. An advanced search supports a more powerful, refined search, including multiple fields and search fields of other resource types. For example, when searching physical titles, you can search for a bibliographic title in a particular holdings location.
To rerun an advanced repository search, see Rerunning a Previous Search.
Using Advanced Search
Use one of the following procedures to perform an advanced search, depending on the type of the search you are performing.
- Advanced search is not available for citations, requests, borrowing requests, lending requests, funds, vendors, and invoices.
- OR is not available for advanced searches for PO lines, licenses, and reading lists.
To perform an advanced search:
- Select the repository to search: local (Institution Zone), Alma (Community Zone), or your collaborative network (Network Zone).
- In the persistent search box, select
Advanced. The persistent search box expands to include the option to add additional rows of search criteria (additional fields and values).
Search Type Description All search types, besides Physical Holdings search 
The search starts with a single row. Each row contains a search field drop-down list (you can enter text to filter the options), a comparison drop-down list, a search criteria text box/selection list, and some icons. Fields in the field drop-down list may be grouped by the entity to which they apply. For example, when searching electronic titles, the fields in each row are grouped into title, electronic collection, and electronic portfolio fields. To configure the available search fields, see Configuring What Search Indexes Are Available.- To add additional rows, select the duplicate row icon or add row icon. For information, see Searchable Fields. By default, each row represents additional search criteria that must also match (AND).
- Select OR in any row (other than the first) to change the combination type to OR. Implied parentheses are added around all search rows connected by ANDs.
- To remove a row (other than the first), select the delete row icon.
When search results are displayed, if Advanced search was used, the + on the Advanced Search icon turns green:
. Click on the icon to display your advanced search and to modify it, if needed. Market search
To work with these searches:
Searching for Library code in Physical holdings/Library field is not supported. In Simple search, Library code can be searched as Keywords. In Advanced search, Library name will appear in a drop-down for Library/Library(Holdings) field.
Option Description To add additional search condition - Select
above the condition to add another condition. - Select
to the right of the condition and duplicate this condition; then edit the new condition as necessary.
To add a group of search conditions Select 
above the search query and add as many conditions as necessary. However, note that you can only add up to 3 nested levels of conditions.To change the relationship between groups of search conditions Baseline conditions default to an AND relationship, meaning that each condition must be true to retrieve the searched item. When adding a group of conditions, you can change the relationship within the group to OR. In this case, the search item will be retrieved when either of these conditions is true.
Click on any Boolean operator between the conditions. Flags for AND and OR will appear at the top of the list. Click a flag to select this type of relationship. To stop displaying these flags, click again on the Boolean operator.
While it is permissible to include multiple Boolean Operators, when many Boolean operators are selected, slower performance is likely to result. Thus, each search query should include no more than 200 Boolean operators.
To remove a search condition Select the X right of the search condition to remove it from the query. - Select the match type in the comparison drop-down box. Comparators vary depending on the field you select. Typical match types include Contains Keywords (words in any order, separated by spaces, disregarding all punctuation including quotes), Contains Phrase (the phrase entered is searched in its entirety), Is Empty (see Searching for Items Without Specific Information), Starts With (also known as a "left anchored" or "left match" search), Equals, Not Equals, Greater Than, Greater Than or Equal To, Less Than, Less Than or Equal To, Not In, Not Contains Keywords, Not Contains Phrase, Is Not Empty, and Contains exact phrase starting with (see Search with Exact Phrase).
- Currently, there is a known issue with conditions for Electronic Collection field searches: Not Contains, Is Not Empty, and Not Equals are not available for: CDI Search Rights, CDI Fulltext Rights, CDI Fulltext Link, CDI Types, CDI Newspapers, CDI Collection ID.
- Currently, there is a known issue with the Holdings Advanced Search. When searching using multiple search rules for the Library (Holdings) and the Permanent physical location indexes. In order to search for multiple values in these indexes, add a single search rule and use multi-select to select all desired values.
- Currently there is a known issue when doing a Contains Keywords search where the value contains a period (.). In this case, Alma will match the value if you search using the complete value, a search term matching the start of the value up to the first period (with or without the first period), or search that does not include a period. For example, if the value is aaa.bbb.ccc, searching for:
- aaa.bbb.ccc matches
- aaa bbb ccc matches (no periods in search)
- bbb matches (no periods in search)
- aaa. matches (matches the value up to and including the first period)
- aaa.bbb does not match (search includes a period but is not the full value)
- bbb.ccc does not match (search includes a period but is not the full value)
- The Starts With search does not work as expected with special characters (for example dash (-), period, quote or double quote, parentheses, slash, or space). The Contains Keywords search should be used instead in such cases. For example, instead of Starts With "Hallermann–Streiff syndrome", use Contains Keywords "Hallermann Streiff syndrome".
The Starts With operator, when used for parts of strings, works only if what follows after the string is a stop character (such as "." or "_"), or a character of a different type (letter or number). For example, when searching for a holdings record that has the following info in $852: "0_ |b CPSLO_MAIN |c stacks |h E184.M5 |i M5496 2018", starts with "E" will retrieve the record because "E" is a letter followed by digits, but starts with "E1" or "E18" will not retrieve the record, because "E1" is followed by "84", and "1" is a digit, and "84" are also digits.
The Starts with operator is more useful for entire words and for title search than for call numbers and call number string parts (because when searching for 'E184', you will get results where E184 is located in $h and also in $i, and you may not necessary need that). If accurate call number ranges are important, the recommended best practice is to use the range operators <, >, <=, >=. When using range operators, search for entire phrase and not for phrase parts (for example, search for E184, and not for E1, nor for E18).
- For institutions that have the CJK (Chinese, Hong Kong, or Korean) searching setup, there is a known issue that searches will not work properly when the Starts With and Contains Phrase operators are used and the search terms contain punctuation characters.
- The Not clauses may be counterintuitive. For example, if a title has holdings in library A and library B, and a title or item search contains the clause Holdings - Not in - Library A, the title or item is returned by this search because there exists an item for the title that is not in library A (you might have expected that it would not be returned because the title has an item in library A). Ex Libris will be adding additional comparisons to account for these cases in an upcoming release.
- For information on enabling repository searches to include matches to non-preferred terms in any associated authority records, see Non-Preferred Terms in Repository Search.
- For searching call numbers, see Searching for an Exact Phrase below.
- Depending on the match type you select, enter or select the full or partial value(s) in the last field in the row. This field may be a text field to enter free text, a drop-down list, or a calendar selection tool. For certain drop-down lists, such as library and permanent physical location, you can select multiple matching values (see the example for Library above).
- Select Search or press Return on your keyboard. The results of an advanced search appear below the advanced search form. You can edit the advanced search and run a new search from the results page. Your current search logic appears at the top of the results.
All Titles and standard authority searches extract text from a field's subfields according to the alphabetical order of the subfields.
Searching for an Exact Phrase
The Contains exact phrase starting with operator is available under for Physical Titles and Holdings searches with the following indexes:
- Dewey decimal class number
- Other Classification Number
- Other System Number
- Permanent call number (holdings)
- LC Call Number
- Local call numbers
- NLM-type Call Number
Note: When searching for call numbers, you must add to the advanced search conditions the "Permanent call number type" condition. Otherwise you might not get the correct results. Permanent call number is not indexed for keywords search.
The search value Exact phrase starting with operator for the "Heading Information" index refers to the first (approximately) 55 characters of the search term. It is not a permanent number, as the system's internal, calculated search query contains more information based on the other parameters specified in the Heading Information search component.
In this case, a phrase is a block of contiguous non-space characters. For example, a call number E184.M5 M5496 2018 contains the three phrases E184.M5 and M5496 and 2018. Use Contains exact phrase starting with to search for terms that occur at the start of any of these phrases. You can search using a minimum of two characters and up to 15 characters.
For example, consider the record that contains the call number E184.M5 M5496 2018 in the relevant index. The below searches using Contains exact phrase starting with will find this record:
- Search for E184.M5 or E184.M or E184., etc.
- Search for M5496 or M549 for M54, etc.
- Search for 2018 or 201, etc.
By default, a phrase does not contain space characters. However, you can ask Ex Libris to configure your institution so that space is considered to be part of your phrases. In this case, any space within the search string is considered to be part of the string. In this case, the below searches using Contains exact phrase starting with will find this record:
- Search for E184.M5 M5496 2 (note that this search string contains 15 characters, which is the maximum length of search string for this operator)
- Search for E184.M5 M5496
- Search for M5496 2018
- After asking Ex Libris to enable (or disable) this alternative feature, Ex Libris must perform a full re-indexing for your institution.
- When enabled, spaces are considered against the length limit of 2 to 15 characters.
- This alternative feature, when enabled, does not apply to the Other System Number index.
- The Equal operator does not support special characters in call numbers.
Search Fields
Most of the fields are self-explanatory. See the following table for additional information. For a list of search indexes for BIBFRAME, MARC, and non-MARC bibliographic tag mappings, see Search Indexes.
| Option | Description | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Activation Date (electronic collections, portfolios) | Locate electronic resources based on the date on which they were activated. | ||||||||||||
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Search
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Select the inventory management group to which this resource is restricted. See the list below for a comparative description of the available for advanced search options:
The selectable criteria vary depending on how the available for settings are defined.
View the video below to see a demonstration of how this advanced search capability is implemented.
For more information, see Search Results with Restricted Access. For information on restricting availability for electronic resources, see Configuring Distributed Access to Electronic Resources.
For more information about searching for electronic resources by inventory management groups, see the Search by Available For Groups video (4:11 mins).
|
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| Binding Note | Search the 563 $a | ||||||||||||
| Brief Level | Select a specific brief level to search for. For more information, see Working with Brief Record Levels. | ||||||||||||
| Collection (Digital titles) | Search for a collection by collection ID. | ||||||||||||
| Collection Access Type | Select Current or Perpetual. | ||||||||||||
| Content Related Data | Search the 580 $a, 773 $t | ||||||||||||
| Contributed By (for electronic collections and electronic portfolios) | Use in the Community Zone tab to locate electronic resources that were contributed. | ||||||||||||
| Coverage In Use | Select Only Local, Global AND Local, Global OR Local, or Only Global.
Locate electronic resources based on the type of coverage used.
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| Current location | Search for items in the current location. | ||||||||||||
| Date Information Override | Select No or Yes | ||||||||||||
| DOI - Digital Object Identifier | Stored in $a of the 024 if $2 contains doi. | ||||||||||||
|
The Free advanced search option for electronic collections is implemented for both the electronic collection level and the electronic service level advanced searches. It is possible to search for electronic collections whose Free (service) or Free (electronic collection) is not defined using the Is Empty qualifying option. Note that when an electronic collection is not set as Free or Not Free but all of its services are set to Free, the Is free? parameter on the Additional tab of the Electronic Collection Editor is identified as Free; and if there is at least one service that is defined as Not Free, the electronic collection is shown as Not Free. |
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| General retention policy | When searching for physical titles, search for position 12 of the 008 field in the holdings record. | ||||||||||||
|
Has inventory (All titles) |
Select No or Yes to search for bibliographic titles without or with inventory.
Note that searching "Has Inventory = No" shows results with Related inventory. This is expected. |
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| Has Items | Select No or Yes to search for holdings without items or holdings with items, respectively.
The index in the Physical Titles search refers to Physical Titles which have at least one holdings record that answers the condition. |
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| Has Local Coverage Information | Select from date override or embargo.
Locate electronic resources that have local coverage.
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| Heading Information | Search for bibliographic records that are related to a specific heading. For details, see Browsing Bibliographic Headings. Once the results are in the repository search, you can create a set that would include all these results, and work with the set as usual.
In addition, users can search for bibliographic records based on their heading information linked to a specific authority record. When All is selected in the Heading Type drop-down menu, users are prompted to specify the authority record's Originating System and Originating System Id. This functionality enables users to retrieve all bibliographic records with headings linked to the specified authority record, irrespective of the heading type.
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| Is linked | Locate records that are linked (or not) to the Community Zone or Network Zone.
When this index (for All Titles searches) is used in advanced searches from the Institution tab, all bibliographic records that are linked to the Community Zone or Network Zone appear.
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| Is Local (for local electronic collections and local portfolios) | Select No or Yes
Locate locally managed electronic resources.
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| ISNI - International Standard Name Identifier | May be stored in $0 of various fields, especially the 1XX, 6XX, and 7XX. | ||||||||||||
| Item PID | Search the internal, system-generated ID for the item. | ||||||||||||
|
Language of Cataloging |
Use this to locate records based on the language that you select from the drop-down list. Note that the language is cataloged as a three-letter abbreviation. However, the Advanced Search drop-down list shows the full language name. This is sourced from the MARC 21/KORMARC 040 $b and the UNIMARC/CNMARC 100 $a, positions 22-24. |
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| Linked Institution | Use this for retrieving bibliographic records that are linked either to the Community Zone or to the Network Zone (member institutions). The options are Community or Network. | ||||||||||||
| MMS Creation Date | Available when doing an Authorities Advanced Search. You may find this helpful when working with the Authority Control Task List. | ||||||||||||
| Modification Date | From the MMS record’s modification date column | ||||||||||||
| Open access | Search the 506 for a match of the following:
506 0_ $f Unrestricted online access $2 star
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OCLC Control Number (019) OCLC Control Number (035a) OCLC Control Number (035a+z) OCLC Control Number (035z) |
With these indexes, you can locate specific OCLC numbers. These fields are indexed based on the presence of one of the following prefixes and only the number is indexed: ocm, ocn, on, or (OCoLC). So, for example, 035 $$a (OCoLC)ocm232354470 is indexed as 232354470. Note that even though only the number is indexed, you can still search with or without the prefix. These indexes are available for MARC 21, KORMARC, UNIMARC (except for 019), and CNMARC (except for 019). |
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| ORCID - Open Researcher and Contributor ID | This ID may be stored in $0 of various fields, especially the 1XX, 6XX, and 7XX. | ||||||||||||
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Original Cataloging Agency |
Use this to locate records for a certain, original cataloging agency. This is sourced from the MARC 21/KORMARC 040 $a and (under construction) the UNIMARC/CNMARC 801 $b, when the second indicator is 0. |
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| Originating system | Search the name of the system from which the item was imported into Alma. | ||||||||||||
| Originating system ID | Search the record ID created in the system from which the item was imported. | ||||||||||||
| Other Classification Number | Search any classification number from a scheme not covered by one of the other number fields. | ||||||||||||
| Other System Number | Search the 035 fields.
When the 035 contains a prefix, the 035 is indexed with and without the prefix. As a result, searching for the other system number with or without the prefix will find a successful match. See the table below for examples.
By default, Alma removes the trailing zeros from system nuumbers. To have the trailing zeros retained, contact Ex Libris support. Note that this is only possible when there are exactly 7 trailing zeros. |
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| Peer reviewed | Search the 500 for a match of the following:
500 __ $a Refereed/Peer-reviewed
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| Portfolio access type | Select Current or Perpetual. | ||||||||||||
| Provenance code | Search a code, defined by the institution indicating the origin of the material. | ||||||||||||
| Record Format | Select which registry/record format to search (DC=Dublin Core). | ||||||||||||
| Resource Type | This index is constructed from existing bibliographic fields such as the LDR and 008. It supplements, but does not replace, the existing Material Type field. See The Resource Type Field. | ||||||||||||
| Tag sync external catalog | Whether the MMS record must be synchronized with an external catalog such as OCLC WorldCat. | ||||||||||||
| Temporary library | Search based on the actual physical location of the item. | ||||||||||||
| Temporary physical location | Search for items identified in the system’s temporary location field regardless of whether the item is currently in the temporary location (that is, even when Item is in temporary location=No). | ||||||||||||
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URL |
When searching for Electronic titles or Electronic portfolios, URL is an option under Electronic Collection and Electronic Portfolio. With this option, you can search for URLs in order to maintain their accuracy.
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The following Dublin Core (DC) fields are are available as conditions for the Alma advanced search:
- dc:contributor
- dc:coverage
- dc:creator
- dc:date
- dc:description
- dc:format
- dc:identifier
- dc:language
- dc:publisher
- dc:relation
- dc:rights
- dc:source
- dc:subject
- dc:title
- dc:type
Alma supports RDA fields and subfields for systems that use RDA. See the table below for more information.
Bibliographic, authority, and holdings types appear under subheadings in the table below. Repeatable fields are marked "(R)" in the description. Non-repeatable fields are marked "(NR).”
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Bibliographic | |
| 028 | Publisher Number (R) |
| 264 | Production, Publication, Distribution, Manufacture, and Copyright Notice (R) |
| 336 | Content Type (R) |
| 337 | Media Type (R) |
| 338 | Carrier Type (R) |
| 340 | Physical Medium (R) |
| 344 | Sound Characteristics (R) |
| 345 | Projection Characteristics of Moving Image (R) |
| 346 | Video Characteristics (R) |
| 347 | Digital File Characteristics (R) |
| 377 | Associated Language (R) |
| 380 | Form of Work (R) |
| 381 | Other Distinguishing Characteristics of Work or Expression (R) |
| 382 | Medium of Performance (R) |
| 383 | Numeric Designation of Musical Work (R) |
| 384 | Key (R) |
| Authority | |
| 046 | Special Coded Dates (R) |
| 336 | Content type (R) |
| 368 | Other Attributes of Person or Corporate Body (R) |
| 370 | Associated Place (R) |
| 371 | Address (R) |
| 372 | Field of Activity (R) |
| 373 | Associated Group (R) |
| 374 | Occupation (R) |
| 376 | Family Information (R) |
| 378 | Fuller Form of Personal Name (NR) |
| 377 | Associated Language (R) |
| 380 | Form of Work (R) |
| 381 | Other Distinguishing Characteristics of Work or Expression (R) |
| 382 | Medium of Performance (R) |
| 383 | Numeric Designation of Musical Work (R) |
| 384 | Key (R) |
| Holdings | |
| 337 | Media Type (R) |
| 338 | Carrier Type (R) |
Searching for Titles by Call Number Range
The range operators <, >, <=, >= are available in the Advanced search when searching for Titles (All Titles, Physical Titles, Electronic Titles, Digital Titles). These operators can be used to search within the below bib call number indexes:
| Index | MARC 21 fields | UNIMARC fields | CNMARC fields |
|---|---|---|---|
| NLM-type call number | 096 a,z | ||
| Dewey Decimal Class Number | 082 a,b 092 a,b | 676 a | 676 a |
| Other classification number | 084 a,b | 686 a, 69X | 686 a, 69X |
| LC call number | 050 a,b 055 a,b 090 a,b | 680 a | 680 a |
| UDC | 080 a,b | 675 a | 675 a |
| CLC Classification Number | 690 a | ||
| CAS Classification Number | 692 a | ||
| RUC Classification Number | 694 a | ||
| Other Domestic Classification Number | 696 a |
These operators add the ability to search for ranges of call numbers on bibliographic record level. This can be useful, for example, if you want to find all titles belonging to a specific subject or range of subjects. For example, you can search for a range of call numbers across the Dewey Decimal Class Number index:
The below title was retrieved in this search, because its Dewey Decimal Class Number (displayed in 082 field $$ a), is included in the specified range.
Currently, sorting the results of range searches by any type of call number is not supported.
Watch the Search for Titles by Call Number Range video (1:45 minutes).
Order-Line Search Fields
When searching for order lines (PO lines), you can enter the following additional criteria (some of these are described in Manually Creating a PO Line):
When the format of the PO line reference number breaks the search (for example, containing a forward slash), contact the Alma support team for setting a system customer parameter. Thereafter, the PO line reference searches will use 'contains' instead of 'equals' as the search type.
- Access provider (advanced only) - Matches the access provider's code
- Acquisition method (advanced only) - Select from the list
- Additional PO line reference - Enter the other PO line number
- Alert (advanced only)
- Assigned User (advanced only)
- Assignment (advanced only) – Note: When Assigned to me is selected, and the query is then saved as a logical set (see Saving and Reusing Search Queries, below), the user who saved the logical set is saved as the value for Assignment in the query. If a different user makes use of the logical set, the original user will still be used as the value for this field.
- Author name
- Cancellation restriction (advanced only) - Whether the PO line can be canceled, Yes or No.
- Creation Date (advanced only)
- Fund code
- Fund name
- Import job ID - This ID exists if the PO line was imported by a job.
- Interested users (advanced only) - Whether the PO line has interested users, Yes or No
- Internal Notes
- License code (advanced only)
- MMS ID
- Material type - Select the secondary type of the PO line. Note: Use the code of the material type and not the value. You can find the code in the Physical Material Type code table.
- Owning Library - In an institution with multiple libraries, limit the search to an individual library.
- PO line - The PO line number
- PO Line in Claim (advanced only) - Whether the PO line is in claim, Yes or No.
- PO line type - Select the primary type of the PO line (see Enabling/Disabling PO Line Types)
- PO reference number - Enter the purchase order (PO) number, if any
- PO status (advanced only) - The purchase order (PO) status
- Physical location name - based on the ordered item's current physical location
- Publication place
- Publication year
- Publisher
- Receiving notes
- Renewal Date (advanced only) – Note: When Renewal Date is selected, and the query is then saved as a logical set (see Saving and Reusing Search Queries, below), the value of this field at the time the logical set is saved is retained as the value for Renewal Date in the query. This is true even if the selected value was originally a relative value. For example, if the selected value was Earlier than today, PO lines whose renewal date is earlier than the date on which the query was saved will be found, regardless of when the query is run.
- Reporting code - Primary reporting code
- Rush (advanced only) - Whether this was marked as a rush order, Yes or No
- Secondary reporting code
- Sent Date (advanced only)
- SIP ID - This ID exists if the PO line was imported by a job. See Configuring Search Indexes.
- Standard number - See Search Indexes
- Tertiary reporting code
- Title
- Title - starts with
- Vendor account code
- Vendor code - Finds all PO lines whose vendor code contains the search string
- Vendor code - Equals - Finds all PO lines whose vendor code exactly matches the search string
- Vendor invoice number - Finds all PO lines whose vendor invoice number contains the search string (The vendor invoice number is sent from the vendor, if the PO Line is generated by EOD.)
- Vendor name - Finds all PO lines whose vendor name contains the search string
- Vendor name - Equals - Finds all PO lines whose vendor name exactly matches the search string
- Workflow - A workflow step or PO line status
Note that in the advanced search there is a drop down that lists all the possible search values. In the simple search, you can enter the search value manually, and in order to get results, you should use one of the following search terms:- INREVIEW
- MANUAL_PACKAGING
- AUTO_PACKAGING
- READY
- SENT
- CLOSED
- CANCELLED
- WAITING_FOR_MANUAL_RENEWAL
- CYCLIC_RENEWAL
- WAITING_FOR_INVOICE
- TRIAL
- RENEWAL_TRIAL
- DEFERRED
- ALL
When searching for PO lines, the search list is ordered alphabetically to help you find the search value quickly, while the recent history displays the most used fields.
The "All" index can be used to search PO lines by their internal notes. Users can search by the full note description or perform a search by a partial description of the note content. This enables Acquisitions staff to find specific PO lines by searching their notes.
Search PO lines by their notes
Internal notes can also be searched using the new dedicated Internal Notes search index.
Search PO lines by their internal notes
After adding a note, the PO Line itself should also then be saved.
Vendor Search Fields
When searching for vendors, you can enter the following additional criteria (some of these are described in Managing Vendors):
- Code - Vendor code
- Interface Name
- Libraries - Note that this returns all vendors associated with the library that you enter (by name or part of the name), as well as all vendors associated with the institution itself (since a vendor that serves the institution also serves the library).
- Name - Vendor name
- SUSHI Account Name - For more information, see Managing SUSHI Accounts.
Reading List Search Fields
When search for reading lists, you can enter the following additional criteria (for descriptions, see Managing Reading Lists):
- All - Searches for reading lists that match any criteria. When performing a search, you must insert the full code, exact value, or include a wildcard (*) for the search to be successful. Searching for part of the code without a wildcard results in no found records. A wildcard must be inserted immediately after the search parameter with no spaces.
Search by All does not include results by reading list ID.
- Code - The reading list code. Searching for a code by inserting any part of the code results in a successful search.
- Course - The course code or name.
To find reading lists without an associated course, search for EXLIBRIS_DEFAULT_COURSE.
- List ID - The reading list ID.
- Name - The reading list name.
- Owner - The primary ID or name of any of the reading list owners.
- (Advanced only) Course Start / End Date - The course start or end date.
Unlike other searches, a search for course code, course name, reading list code, or reading list name a) also searches for special characters, and b) is limited to a search string of 40 characters, regardless of the size of the entity being searched.
Citation Search Fields (Simple Search Only)
When search for citations, you can enter the following additional criteria (for descriptions, see Managing Citations):
- Keyword (default selection) – When selected, this option searches the following citations' metadata fields for a match:
- Additional Person Name, Author, Book Author, Book Title, Chapter Author,
- Chapter Title, Citation ID, DOI, Edition, Editor,
- ISBN, ISSN, Issue, Journal Title, LCCN,
- MMS ID, OCLC Number, Pages, Place of Publication, Publication Date,
- Publisher, Resource Note, Source, Title, and Volume
-
Keyword searches for citations do not support the use of Boolean operators (such as AND or OR), and if these operators are specified, they will be treated as keywords.
-
When special characters (such as hyphen, dash, slash, and so forth) are specified as search terms, the search will return results that both include and exclude the special characters.
- Citation ID
- Course Code
- Course Name
- Creator - The citation author's name. Note: Additional person names are not included in the search.
- ISBN / ISSN
- MMS ID
- Reading List Name
- Title - Citation name
Unlike other searches, a search for course code, course name, reading list code, or reading list name a) also searches for special characters, and b) is limited to a search string of 40 characters, regardless of the size of the entity being searched.
Borrowing/Lending Search Fields
When searching for resource sharing requests (borrowing or lending), you can enter the following additional criteria:
- External Request ID
- Author
- DOI
- Internal Identifier (for borrowing requests)
- ISBN/ISSN
- Item barcode
- Journal Title
- LCCN
- Notes
- OCLC Number
- Other Standard ID
- PMID
- Remote Record ID
- Requester (for borrowing requests)
- Title
- User Identifier (for borrowing requests)
Users Search Fields
- Birth date
- Campus
- Create date
- Phone number
Since phone numbers are encrypted upon save, a phone search is an exact match search (e.g. if country code is entered in the phone number, use it when searching) on numeric values only (any non-numeric values, e.g. hyphens, spaces or brackets, do not affect the search).
- Expiration date
- Fine/ fee total sum
- First name
- Has block type
- Identifiers
- Job category
- Last activity date
- Last name
- Middle name
- Note
- Primary identifier
- Purge date
- Statistical category
- User group
This feature is not deployed in the sandboxes; it is available only on production environments.
Course Search Fields
When search for courses, you can enter the following additional criteria (for descriptions, see Managing Courses):
- Course Code
- Course Code (include Section)
- Course End Date
- Course ID
- Course Name
- Course Notes
- Course Start Date
- Instructor Name
- Searchable Id
- Section
- Year
Unlike other searches, a search for course code or course name a) also searches for special characters, and b) is limited to a search string of 40 characters, regardless of the size of the entity being searched.
Searching for Items Without Specific Information
You can search for the absence of a field (for records that contain a specific field that is not populated). For example, you can search for physical items without barcodes or other information. Select the Is Empty option after selecting the desired field. See the table below for a sample list of conditions with this option.
| All Titles (Not Present) |
Holdings (Not Present) |
Physical Items (Not Present) |
|---|---|---|
| LC call number | Permanent call number type | Inventory number |
| Dewey decimal class number | Permanent physical location | Public note |
| UDC | Library | Fulfillment note |
| Other classification number | Call number suffix | Internal note 1 |
| Additional publication year | Summary holdings | Internal note 2 |
| Language | Holdings note | Internal note 3 |
| LC control number | Item sequence number | |
| ISBN | PO line | |
| ISSN | Item call number | |
| ISSN link | Item call number type | |
| Other standard ID | Creation date | |
| Government document number | Current library | |
| National bibliography number | Currently location | |
| Publisher number | Due back from temp location date | |
| Standard number | Expected receiving date | |
| Other system number | Inventory date | |
| Notes | Is Magnetic | |
| Local notes | Item policy | |
| MMS SIP ID (a number assigned to a set of records affected by a job) | Material type | |
| Physical description | Modification date | |
| Country of publication | On shelf date | |
| Genre form | On shelf seq | |
| Publisher location | Pages | |
| Material type | Pieces | |
| Medium type | Process type | |
| Originating system ID | ||
| Originating system | ||
| Tag suppressed | ||
| Tag sync external catalog | ||
| Local field 900 | ||
| Relator |
For example, to find physical items without barcodes:
- Open Advanced Search.
- Select Physical Items as the search type.
- For the field to search, select Physical Item > Barcode.
- Select Is Empty from the condition drop-down list.
- Select Search. The search results display all the physical items without barcodes.
Rerunning a Previous Search
To rerun a previous simple or advanced search:
- Select the text box and select a previous search from the drop-down list that appears. All recent repository searches appear when All Titles is selected as your search type; otherwise, only recent searches for the selected type appear. The search runs immediately.
- When no recent searches appear, you may be able to select a previous search string using your browser history.
Searching for Special Characters
When using the Alma repository search (or when searching users, purchase requests, and fulfillment requests), you can search for special characters and characters with diacritics. Search language configuration (set by Ex Libris) is available in Alma for many languages. For most of these languages, Alma uses the standard implementation for working with special characters.
For specific information on each language, see Search Configurations for Different Languages.
- Alma's handling of special characters is relevant for searching in the institution zone only.
- Only one language for special characters search can be defined.
Normalization for these languages is specific to text fields such as title and author. Normalization, however, is not done for numeric fields or fields that contain a normalized value such as a call number.
Searching for Special Symbols
Special symbols are characters, such as @, &, !, that are not alphabetic or numeric. In some types of searches, like "Keywords" simple search or "Contains Keywords" operator for the different indexes, special symbols are omitted from the inputted search term.
Special symbols are treated as fully independent characters for repository search, browse bibliographic headings/F3, and sort, and they are not substituted with words. For example, if you have a record in your inventory titled "Crime and Punishment", all Titles where (Title contains keywords "Crime & Punishment") will not return "Crime and Punishment", because "&" is not substituted by the word "and".
On the other hand, if you have the record "War and Peace" in your inventory, then All Titles where (Title contains keywords "War & Peace") is translated in the Alma search engine to All Titles where (Title contains keywords "War Peace"), and will return the record "War and Peace", because its title contains all the words in the search term. All Titles where (Title starts with "War & Peace") or All Titles where (Title equals "War & Peace") will not return the record, as its title is not equal nor starts with "War Peace".
Repository Search Results
Search results appear in a record list, displayed according to the type of resource chosen for your search. You can configure the fields and actions that appear for each result; for more information see Record Lists.
Saving and Reusing Search Queries
For many search results, you can save searches for later use. Saving a query is another name for creating a logical set. A logical set is dynamic, recalculated each time it is accessed—in other words, the search is rerun and the results are the set. When you save a query (set), you are saving a set of search criteria that can be reused. Each time you run a query, the results may be different if the records have changed since the previous run. In contrast, an itemized set is a fixed collection of items that may have been entered by hand, uploaded from a file, or the result of a previous search (but no longer associated with the query terms). Note that you can turn logical sets into itemized sets.
For more information about sets, see Managing Search Queries and Sets.
To save a query:
- After performing a search, select Save Query on the search results.
The Set Details page appears.
Set Details Page - Follow the procedure in Creating Logical Sets.
Performing a Search Using a Saved Query
To run a saved query; on the Manage Sets page (Administration > Manage Jobs and Sets > Manage Sets), locate the saved query (logical set) and select Results in the row actions list. See Managing Search Queries and Sets.
Your most recent searches (saved or unsaved) can be run by selecting one from the drop-down list that appears when you select in the search text field. To rerun a recent simple or advanced repository search (including the search type, field, and search string), select the text box and select a previous search from the drop-down list that appears; the search runs immediately. This feature is not available for non-repository searches (PO lines, funds, and so forth), but you may be able to select a previous search string using your browser history.
Sorting Search Results
By default, search results are sorted according to an internal ranking mechanism that is based on Apache Solr; for more information, see http://www.solrtutorial.com/solr-search-relevancy.html. Ranking factors include:
- Term Frequency - The higher the term frequency in the document, the higher the document score.
- Inverse Document Frequency - The rarer a term is across all documents in the index, the higher its contribution to the score.
- Coordination Factor - The more query terms found in a document, the higher its score.
- Field Length - The more words a field contains, the lower its score. This factor penalizes documents with longer field values.
For some search types, you can change the sort using the Sort by and Secondary Sort by drop-down lists, using the following options (where Asc=ascending and Desc=descending):
- Rank
- Title – Asc
- Title – Desc
- Creator – Asc
- Creator – Desc
- Publication Date – Asc
- Publication Date – Desc
- Uniform Title – Asc
- Uniform Title – Desc
- Series – Asc
- Series – Desc
These options are available for search types:
- All titles
- Physical titles
- Physical items
- Electronic titles
- Electronic collections (Sort by only)
- Electronic portfolios (Sort by only for titles)
- Digital titles
- Collections (Sort by only)
For information about terminology used on the repository search results list, see the “Managed by Department” Changed to “In Process” video (2:58 mins).
The sort order for holdings displayed within a single search result is configured by the sort_library_by_relevance customer parameter (see sort_library_by_relevance).
Filtering Search Results
You can filter search results using the facets in the left pane of the search results. The available facets depend on the type of search and the items in the search results.
| Search Type | Facets Provided |
|---|---|
| All titles | Material type |
|
Language (determined by the contents in the 008 field positions 35-37 and one or more 041 $a entries) The Language Facets currently take the language name from the MARC Code List for Languages. |
|
| Publication year | |
| Resource Type | |
| Collection | |
| Record format (facet displays only when an institution has more than one record format activated in the Active Registry). | |
| Physical titles | Item Material type |
| Language (determined by the contents in the 008 field positions 35-37 and one or more 041 $a entries). See the note for language facets. |
|
| Publication year | |
| Resource Type | |
| Electronic titles | Material type |
| Language (determined by the contents in the 008 field positions 35-37 and one or more 041 $a entries). See the note for language facets. |
|
| Resource Type | |
| Digital titles | Language (determined by the contents in the 008 field positions 35-37 and one or more 041 $a entries). See the note for language facets. |
| Publication year | |
| Collection | |
| Usage Type | |
| Digital files | Entity type |
| File MIME type | |
| File size bytes | |
| File extension | |
| Resource Type | |
| Physical items | Item material type |
| Library | |
| Process type | |
| Resource Type | |
| Condition | |
| Public note | |
| Fulfillment note | |
| Internal note 1 | |
| Statistics note 1 | |
| Physical Holdings |
The Library Scope - Use to limit the scope of the search to specific libraries. The library scope is available for physical items, holdings search and physical titles search. This reduces the need to define the library in the Advanced search or to use facets for every search.
When you select Save Query to create a set from the search results limited to specific libraries, the set is saved and will not change, even if you change the libraries selection in the future.
The library scope is a persistent filter that applies to all physical searches (items, holdings and titles). |
| Library | |
| Location | |
| Call Number Type | |
| Electronic portfolio | Type |
| Interface | |
| Electronic collection type | |
| Service | |
| Electronic material type | |
| Availability (Electronic Portfolio) | |
|
Available For (For institutions configured for distributed access to electronic resources and for Network Zone member institutions) |
|
Library - displays portfolios with (For details, see Library set on electronic resource):
|
|
| Collection | Library |
| Electronic collection | Type |
| Interface | |
| Electronic collection type | |
| Availability (Electronic Collection)
This facet represents the collection's service availability, such that electronic collections without a service are not considered in the facet count. |
|
|
(Available only when using the Fully Flexible CDI activation model) |
|
|
CDI Search Active For (Shows all campuses via Active for Search, for Electronic Collections but not for Group Settings) |
|
| Library | |
| Authorities |
Heading Usage - determined by the contents as follows:
Names (if LDR pos. 9 equals "a", "b", or "e") Subjects (if LDR pos. 9 equals "c", "d", or "j")
Names (if 008 pos. 14 equals "a") Subjects (if 008 pos. 15 equals "a") Series (if 008 pos. 16 equals "a") Call Number/Classifications (if field 084 exists) |
| Vocabulary - According to the Authority record's registryId in the "Vocabulary" database table; in Alma Configuration > Resources > Metadata Configuration > Authority Vocabularies > Code (see Configuring Controlled Vocabulary Registry). | |
| Authority Search by Subdivisions - Conduct comprehensive searches within authority records enabling users to search for subdivisions across a wide array of fields. This enhances the search process, making it easier to locate specific information within the authority records database by subdivision subfields v/x/y/z. |
For Electronic Collection Type facets, the results are affected by the following considerations:
- Community Zone records are updated with the correct electronic collection type such as Journal, Book, and so forth.
- Locally migrated electronic collections are migrated with the type Journal in all cases (regardless of what type they are).
- New local electronic collections have no electronic collection type.
Counts of Search Results
Facets include a count in parentheses next to the facet label.
Facet Count in Parentheses
The numbers in parentheses are directly related to the total count provided with your search results.
Total Count in Search Results
Exact count is provided only in the total number of results. In all other counts, the count is approximate. To provide reasonable response time with a large number of search results, Alma provides an approximate count for the search results and facet counts. It is assumed that an exact count is not necessary, since with a number of results this high, you are not planning on browsing through all of the results. If necessary, you can determine the exact number of results by saving the results to a set and itemizing (see Converting Logical Sets to Itemized Sets). The number of items displayed for the itemized set (when creating the set, viewing the set creation job report, and viewing the itemized set) is exact. Note that in some cases, the count given may be indicated as approximate, as in the screenshot below, but in other cases it may be not indicated directly as such, but it is approximate in both cases.
Approximate Total Count
Select the facet to narrow the search results. You may select more than one facet when multiple facets are available (see below). To clear your selection of facets that you previously selected, select 
beside the facet. Select Clear all to clear all your facet selections.
beside the facet. Select Clear all to clear all your facet selections.
Multiple Facets
Filtering Electronic Portfolios by ISBN, ISSN, or Title
When viewing results on the Portfolio List page, you can search within the list for a specific ISBN, ISSN, or Title.
ISBN, ISSN, or Title Filter
Thumbnails in Search Results
Alma attempts to display a thumbnail image for titles (either for digital titles only, or for all title types - see Customizing the Thumbnail Display). If the title has a digital file, a thumbnail of that file appears. If the title has no digital inventory, Alma attempts to acquire a thumbnail image of the cover using the title’s ISSN/ISBN/LCCN. If no thumbnail is available, a generic image of the material type (book, video, music, and so forth) appears.
Institution, Community, and Network Tabs
The results from your institution appear in the Institution tab. The Community tab includes results for records in the Community Zone; these are records that are available to all Alma institutions (see Introduction to Resource Management).
If your institution is a member of a collaborative network working with a Network Zone, the Network tab is also available. The Network tab includes results from your Network Zone. For more information regarding the Network tab, see Repository Search in Collaborative Network. You can ask Ex Libris to enable a feature that allows you to display results from your Network Zone in the Institution tab; see Combining Institution and Network Zone Search Results.
An administrator can configure which tab is pre-selected by default for certain simple search types; see Customizing the Repository Search.
Search Result Icons
The following icons may appear beside a search result, depending on the tab you are viewing. Linked records are updated when their target records (in the Community Zone or in the Network Zone) are updated.
| Tab | Icon | Record Condition | Select to Open the Item In |
|---|---|---|---|
| Institution | Record does not appear | NOT defined in the institution | N/A |
| Restricted by an inventory management group | N/A | ||
| No icon | Unlinked, non-electronic resource | N/A | |
 |
Record is suppressed, or digital representation is inactive. When a record is suppressed, only the Library staff can see it. The record does not appears in the Primo search results, and students cannot see and cannot request it. For details, see Suppressing Alma Records from Primo. |
N/A | |
 |
Peer Reviewed
When performing an All titles, Electronic titles, Electronic portfolios, Electronic collection, Physical titles, Physical items, Digital titles, Digital files, or Collections search, this icon appears for MARC 21 bibliographic records that contain the following:
500 __ $a Refereed/Peer-reviewed
|
N/A | |
 |
Open access
When performing an All titles, Electronic titles, Electronic portfolios, or Electronic collection search, this icon appears for MARC 21 bibliographic records that contain the following:
506 0_ $f Unrestricted online access $2 star
|
N/A | |
 |
Unlinked, deactivated electronic resource. This icon appears only in Electronic searches (Electronic Titles/ Electronic Portfolio/ Electronic Collection). It is not applicable in All Titles search and does not appear in this search type. |
N/A | |
 |
Unlinked, activated electronic resource.
|
N/A | |
 |
Linked to a Community Zone record. | Community tab | |
 |
Linked to a Community Zone record, but electronic title, collection, or portfolios are inactive. This icon only appears in Electronic searches (Electronic Titles/ Electronic Portfolio/ Electronic Collection). It is not applicable in All Titles search and does not appear in this search type. |
Community tab | |
 |
Linked to a Network Zone record | Network tab | |
 |
Committed to Retain. Items marked as "Committed to Retain" cannot be withdrawn (removed). | N/A | |
| Community | Record does not appear | NOT defined in the Community Zone | N/A |
|
Peer Reviewed
When performing an All titles, Electronic titles, Electronic portfolios, Electronic collection, Physical titles, Physical items, Digital titles, Digital files, or Collections search, this icon appears for MARC 21 bibliographic records that contain the following:
500 __ $a Refereed/Peer-reviewed
|
N/A | |
|
Open access
When performing an All titles, Electronic titles, Electronic portfolios, or Electronic collection search, this icon appears for MARC 21 bibliographic records that contain the following:
506 0_ $f Unrestricted online access $2 star
|
N/A | |
| No icon | Linked to a record in the Network Zone
AND
Restricted by an inventory management group
|
N/A | |
|
Linked to a record in the Network Zone
AND
NOT linked to a record in the institution
AND
NOT restricted by an inventory management group
Note: This icon also appears if an institution record is linked to the above Network Zone record.
|
Network tab | |
 |
Linked to a record in the institution
The icon is black
if the collection is active but the portfolios in the collection are not.For electronic collections of type 'Database', this icon always appears black
in the Community tab, since a database does not have portfolios. The correct indication for electronic collections of type 'Database' is in the Institution tab. |
Institution tab | |
| Linked to a record in the Network Zone
AND
Linked to a record in the institution
See notes above.
|
Whichever link was added last. | ||
|
Committed to Retain. Items marked as "Committed to Retain" cannot be withdrawn (removed). | N/A | |
| Network | Record does not appear | NOT defined in the Network Zone | N/A |
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Peer Reviewed
When performing an All titles, Electronic titles, Electronic portfolios, Electronic collection, Physical titles, Physical items, Digital titles, Digital files, or Collections search, this icon appears for MARC 21 bibliographic records that contain the following:
500 __ $a Refereed/Peer-reviewed
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N/A | |
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Open access
When performing an All titles, Electronic titles, Electronic portfolios, or Electronic collection search, this icon appears for MARC 21 bibliographic records that contain the following:
506 0_ $f Unrestricted online access $2 star
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N/A | |
| No icon | NOT linked to a Community Zone record
AND
NOT linked to a record in the institution
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N/A | |
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Linked to a Community Zone record
AND
NOT linked to a record in the institution (note that black indicates an inactive electronic title, collection, or portfolio)
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Community tab | |
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Linked to a record in the institution
The icon is black
if the collection is active but the portfolios in the collection are not. |
Institution tab | |
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Committed to Retain.
In the case of network zone records, the retention policy is determined based on the configuration specified in the Network Zone table. When attempting to delete a bibliographic record that is linked to the Community Zone, the removal of the linked record from the local institution is restricted based on the specific configuration set by that institution. Local extension fields cannot be used as retention fields. A field that is used in the Institution Zone without being a local extension may be used as a retention field. |
N/A |
Viewing Inventory/Other Details
For title search results, the inventory tabs (Physical, Electronic, and/or Digital), Available For information (see Search Results with Restricted Access), and the Other Details tab appear below each result (see Search Results Tabs for more information). The number of holdings/portfolios/representations appear in parentheses in the name of the tab. Select a tab to expand or collapse more information about the result. See Record Lists for more options.
Search Results
Additionally, in the Physical Title search results, you can navigate to related items for the specific title and see them as physical items search results. This allows the Inventory Operator would like to check possible availability in holdings and items in its hierarchy, and also in related holdings or items:
Note that when a specific item or volume or issue are being referenced in the related record (the 77X field contains a $g with specific item information, or even when $g is unspecified), only the relevant holding or item record is shown when using these new navigation links.
| Tab | Description |
|---|---|
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Physical |
Displays title holdings and item information with links to the List of Holdings page and to the List of Items page.
A green dot appears in the tab header if there are holdings and, at least, one of the holdings has an item in place. A grey dot appears if there are holdings but none of them has an item in place. The number that appears next to the Physical tab header, identifies the number of holdings records in that tab. Note that the number displayed is a combination of both real holdings, and "virtual" holdings, which represent an aggregation of items in a temporary location.
The Physical tab contains the following columns of information: Library, Location, Call Number, Accession Number, Item Availability, and Related Record. The data that appears in the Item Availability column is determined in the following manner:
In the absence of these conditions, a gray dot appears for Item Availability.
$z is only displayed in the Discovery tool.
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| Electronic | Displays title electronic inventory, including the collection name, service type, availability, and a link (View) to the portfolio in the Electronic Portfolio Editor. Select Portfolio List to open the Portfolio List page (see Working with the Portfolio List).
A green dot appears in the tab header if there is inventory and at least one of the resources is active. A grey dot appears if there is inventory but none of the resources is active.
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| Digital | Displays title digital inventory. For each digital representations, this tab displays the label, usage type, repository, number of files, and (if configured for long term digital loans) digital loan availability; and provides a link to view the representation.
Select All Representations to open the Digital Resource Editor page for all the representations.
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| Collections | Displays title digital collections, including the collection name and a link for each collection to the Collection Resource Editor. |
| Other Details | Displays:
Select the number, name, or ID to access more details.
For portfolios, displays the following information:
For information on displaying the courses associated with a title, see the View Courses Linked to a Title video (2:43 mins).
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Performing Actions on the Repository Search Results Page
See the table below for a description of the actions that you can take while using the repository search results.
The actions that appear depend upon the search type and the roles of the user. Not all actions appear for all users.
| Search Type | Action | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Remove | Remove an item from an itemized set.
This action is available only when managing an itemized set; see Viewing and Removing Members of Itemized Sets.
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| All Titles | The results for an All Titles search include physical, electronic, and digital titles, and the actions for each record vary according to the record type. See the following titles-related sections in this table for the descriptions of the remaining actions. | |
| Add Holdings | Select to add new holdings. The MD Editor opens and you can add a new holdings record related to the bibliographic record from which you selected this option. The attached bibliographic record does not open, so there is no additional step to release the bibliographic record when you finish creating the new holdings record. | |
| Add to Collection |
Add the title to a collection. This action appears only if you have collections configured. For more information refer to Managing Collections. This option only appears in the All Titles search results for customers without Administration roles. |
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| Release Assignment | Release the bibliographic record if it is assigned to another staff user. If you want to remove all bibliographic record assignments for a particular staff user, see MD Editor Menu and Toolbar Options. This action appears only if you have the role Catalog Manager. | |
| Add to Reading List | When reading lists are assigned to you, use this option to add titles to those assigned reading lists. See Managing Reading Lists for more information. | |
| Display in Discovery | Use this option to open the title in Primo’s Full Display page.
This option is only presented when Primo VE is installed.
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|
| Display Services Page | Use this option to open the title in Primo's Services page.
This option is only presented when Summon over Alma is installed.
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| Push to MDE | Use this option to push the record to Metadata Editor to reference and work with it there. See Pushing Records to Metadata Editor. | |
| Physical Titles | Holdings | View holdings information. Opens the MARC simple Record View page (single record) or the List of Holdings page (multiple records). For more information, see Viewing Metadata Read-Only in the Simple Record View Page and Working with the List of Holdings. Also see the parameter display_specific_related_items in Configuring Other Settings. |
| Items | View items information. Opens one of the following pages:
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| Edit Record | Edit the bibliographic record. Opens the MD Editor (see Working with Records).
Search results include records that may be locked due to another staff member editing the record. Locked records appear in the search results without any indication of being locked. A message that the record is locked appears only when you open the record in the MD Editor. Select Edit Record from the search results to open the record in the MD Editor.
This notation indicates that there is an open draft for the record and that someone other than you is working on it. This record cannot be edited until the operator that has it locked does a Release or Save and Release in the MD Editor or the setting for the working_copy_lock_timeout parameter has expired. The default setting for working_copy_lock_timeout is one hour. See working_copy_lock_timeout for more information.
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| Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines). | |
| Request | Initiate a fulfillment request on the title. Opens the Create Request page (see Creating a Request).
From the Create Request page, you can select a Physical titles request such as Move temporarily or Patron digitization request from the Request Type drop-down list.
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| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action appears only if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Publishing Information | View publishing information. Opens the Publishing Information page with the following information (available explicitly for General System, Repository, and Catalog Administrators, and Deposit Managers):
Learn about debugging publishing information in the Debugging Publishing Information video (1:52 mins).
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| Linked Data | View linked data. See Using Linked Data from the Repository Search Results below for more information. | |
| Add Reminder | Create and edit reminders for the bibliographic record by entering the following pieces of information:
For more information, see Working with Reminders.
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| More Info | View more information. Opens the More Info dialog box with the following information:
For information on displaying the courses associated with a title, see the View Courses Linked to a Title video (2:43 mins).
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| Electronic Titles (Institution tab) | Portfolio List | View the list of portfolios associated with this title. Opens the Portfolios List page. For more information see Working with the Portfolio List. |
|
View the electronic service associated with this title. This opens the Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services page. To view more than a maximum of 25 entries, enable the enable_view_it_show_all_results customer parameter to show all entries. With this parameter enabled, the View It feature provides a Show All link to display all the resources. For more information regarding the Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services page, see Link Resolver for Institutions Using Distributed Electronic Resources.
To enable direct linking to electronic services via Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services, see Configuring Direct Linking.
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| Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines).
When you place orders for electronic resources (from bibliographic-/title-level search results) that contain multiple URLs (856 $u fields), Alma creates a portfolio for each URL.
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| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action appears only if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Document Delivery | Initiate a resource request for this title. Opens the Create Request page (see Creating a Request). | |
| Publishing Information | View publishing information for this title. Opens the Publishing Information page that provides the following information (available explicitly for General System, Repository, and Catalog Administrators):
Learn about debugging publishing information in the Debugging Publishing Information video (1:52 mins).
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| Linked Data | View linked data. See Using Linked Data from the Repository Search Results below for more information. | |
| Add Reminder | Create and edit reminders for the bibliographic record by entering the following pieces of information:
For more information, see Working with Reminders.
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| More Info | View more information for this title. Opens the More Info dialog box with the following information:
For information on displaying the courses associated with a title, see the View Courses Linked to a Title video (2:43 mins).
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| Electronic Titles (Community tab) | Electronic Collection List | View the list of portfolios associated with this title. Opens the Portfolios List page. For more information see Working with the Portfolio List. |
| Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines).
When you place orders for electronic resources (from bibliographic-/title-level search results) that contain multiple URLs (856 $u fields), Alma creates a portfolio for each URL.
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| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action only appears if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Edit Record | Edit the bibliographic record. Opens the MD Editor (see Working with Records).
Search results include records that may be locked due to another staff member editing the record. Locked records appear in the search results without any indication of being locked. A message that the record is locked appears only when you open the record in the MD Editor. Select Edit Record from the search results to open the record in the MD Editor.
Locked By Notation
This notation indicates that there is an open draft for the record and that someone other than you is working on it. This record cannot be edited until the operator that has it locked does a Release or Save and Release in the MD Editor or the setting for the working_copy_lock_timeout parameter has expired. The default setting for working_copy_lock_timeout is one hour. See working_copy_lock_timeout for more information.
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| Digital Titles | View It | View the digital object. Opens the Alma Link Resolver Services page from which you can view the object (if you have permission/access to the object).
For more information regarding the Alma Link Resolver Services page, see Using the Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services Page.
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| Representations | Edit the digital representation. Opens the Digital Resource Editor. For more information, see Managing Digital Resources. | |
| Export | Export the title. A note appears at the top of the Repository Search page (above the Search Criteria options) providing the location of the exported digital title. | |
| Add Representation | Add representation. Opens the Representation Details page. For more information, see Managing Digital Resources. | |
| Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines). | |
| Publishing Information | View publishing information for this title. Opens the Publishing Information page that provides the following information (Available explicitly for General System, Repository, and Catalog Administrators, and Deposit Managers):
Learn about debugging publishing information in the Debugging Publishing Information video (1:52 mins).
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| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action appears only if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Linked Data | View linked data. See Using Linked Data from the Repository Search Results below for more information. | |
| Add Reminder | Create and edit reminders for the bibliographic record by entering the following pieces of information:
For more information, see Working with Reminders.
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| More Info | View more information for this title. Opens the More Info dialog box with the following information:
For information on displaying the courses associated with a title, see the View Courses Linked to a Title video (2:43 mins).
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| Digital Files | View It | View the digital object. Opens the Alma Link Resolver Services page from which you can view the object (if you have permission/access to the object).
For more information regarding the Alma Link Resolver Services page, see Using the Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services Page.
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| Deliver (New Digital Viewer only) | Displays the file in the New Digital Viewer. Only available when the New Digital Viewer is configured. For more information , see Configuring Viewer Services. | |
| Representations | Edit the digital representation. Opens the Digital Resource Editor. For more information, see Managing Digital Resources. | |
| Download | Download the digital file. | |
| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action appears only if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Physical Items | Edit | Edit the item. Opens the Physical Item Editor page (see Updating Item-Level Information). |
| Holdings | View holdings information. Opens the MARC simple Record View page (single record) or the List of Holdings page (multiple records). For more information, see Viewing Metadata Read-Only in the Simple Record View Page and Working with the List of Holdings. | |
| Items | View item information. Opens one of the following pages:
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| Request | Initiates a fulfillment request (see Creating a Request). | |
| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action appears only if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Work Order | Initiate a work order for the item, such as to request binding or process a withdrawal (see Creating a Request). | |
| More Info | View more information about the item. Opens the More Info dialog box with the following information:
For information on displaying the courses associated with a title, see the View Courses Linked to a Title video (2:43 mins).
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| Copy Item to Host Library |
Select in the below cases:
This option appear only when the below takes place (for details, see Joint User of Inventory in Consortia):
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| Physical Holdings | View | View the record in the sliding pane that opens on top of the current page. |
| Edit | Edit the record in the Metadata Editor. | |
| Push to MDE | Pushes the selected record the the Metadata Editor in order to work with it later. | |
| Relink | Move the holdings record from one bibliographic record to another bibliographic record. | |
| View Items | Open the list of items for the record in the sliding pane that opens on top of the current page. | |
| Associate a PO Line | Associates a PO line to the record. | |
| Add New Holdings | Opens a new holdings record for the bibliographic record of the seleted holdings record. | |
| Delete | Deletes the record. | |
| Create and Filter Set | Enables users to create and edit details of a logical set. For more information, see Editing Logical Set Details. | |
| Electronic Portfolio (Institution tab) | Edit | Edit the portfolio. Opens the Electronic Portfolio Editor page. For more information, see Editing a Portfolio Using the Electronic Portfolio Editor. |
| View | View the portfolio. Opens the Electronic Portfolio Editor page in view mode. | |
| Activate / Deactivate | Activate or deactivate the portfolio. The resource’s icon changes when the activation status changes. For example, when an unlinked portfolio is activated, the icon appears in color ( |
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| Order / Additional Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines). | |
| Link to Community | Initiate the process to link a local portfolio to a Community Zone portfolio. This option is available only if a local portfolio was created as a standalone portfolio and not as part of an electronic collection.
You may, for example, use this option when you have created a local portfolio during the acquisition process and later want to link the portfolio to an electronic collection in the Community Zone.
When you select Link to Community, the Link Standalone Portfolio to Community Zone Collection wizard opens, in which you 1) select a matching Community Zone portfolio, 2) select a local electronic collection with which to associate the standalone portfolio, and 3) select to use the descriptive metadata from the Community Zone bibliographic record or retain the Institution Zone descriptive metadata.
If you choose to retain the Institution Zone descriptive metadata, the portfolio’s descriptive metadata will not be synchronized with updates from the Community Zone.
After the local portfolio is linked to a Community Zone portfolio, the Link to Community search results action no longer appears and the icon changes from the Institution Zone icon to the Community Zone icon (see Search Result Icons).
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| Create E-Activation Task | Create an electronic activation task and displays a confirmation message when successful. | |
| Test Access | Test access to the portfolio and display the results on the Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services page (see Using the Alma Link Resolver Electronic Services Page). | |
| Delete | Delete a local portfolio or a portfolio that is linked to the Community Zone. | |
| Report to Ex Libris | Send a portfolio update, add, remove, or coverage request to Ex Libris. Opens the Report to Ex Libris page. The contact information provided on the Report to Ex Libris page is defined by an administrator; see Configuring CRM Contacts.
For information on using this option in the Institution tab, see the “Send to Ex Libris” for Local Collections video (3:03 mins).
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| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action only appears if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Electronic Portfolio (Community tab) | Activate | Initiate the process to add and activate portfolios from the Community Zone for a library. |
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Select this action to view the base linking information for the portfolio that is available in the Community Zone. This action can be selected for activated portfolios and non-activated portfolios. In the pop-up that appears when this action is selected, there is also the option to choose to activate the portfolio. When present in the Community Zone, static URL and dynamic URL information appears in the pop-up display. |
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| Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines). | |
| Report to Ex Libris | Send a portfolio update, add, remove, or coverage request to Ex Libris. Opens the Report to Ex Libris page. The contact information provided on the Report to Ex Libris page is defined by an administrator; see Configuring CRM Contacts. | |
| Resource Sharing Request | Initiate a resource sharing borrowing request on the title. Opens the Resource Sharing Borrowing Request page (see Adding a Resource Sharing Borrowing Task from a Search). This action appears only if you have one of the roles Fulfillment Services Operator or Fulfillment Services Manager in the scope of the resource sharing library. | |
| Collection | Edit Record | Edit the bibliographic record (title record) for the collection. Opens the MD Editor. |
| Collection | Manage the collection.
 Collection Action
Opens the Collections Resource Editor page where you can view summary information for the collection, look up the history related to this collection, view titles in the collection, and add sub-collections to the collection.
 Collection Action Opens Collection Resource Editor
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| Title List | Displays the list of titles in the collection.
 Title List Action
 Displays List of Titles in the Collection
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| View Collection Resource | View all related services and components of the collection without the ability to change or add data. | |
| Electronic Collection (Institution tab) | Edit | Edit the electronic collection. Opens the Electronic Collection Editor. |
| Activate/Deactivate for Search in CDI |
A collection can be activated or deactivated for search in CDI if the following three conditions are met:
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| Remove CDI-only full text activation | When the operator has the CDI Inventory Operator role and CDI is configured as Fully Flexible, this option removes the Active for full text in CDI only status from the collection and allows Primo users to access the collection's full text. Once the status has been removed, you cannot add it back.
During CDI enablement, the Active for full text in CDI only status was applied to collections if the following was true prior to enablement:
For more details, see CDI FAQs. |
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| Delete | Delete the electronic collection.
A confirmation dialog box presents the option to delete the electronic collection (along with deleting associated electronic collection services, portfolios, and e-activation tasks, and unlinking PO lines) and a drop-down list of options (delete, suppress, or do nothing) for handling childless bibliographic records when deleting the electronic collection.
 Electronic Collection Delete Confirmation
After you select Confirm, a background job runs, deleting the e-collection and its associated components.
While the job is running, the action buttons for the record are not available. The job ID appears at the top of the page. To monitor the job and view the job report, see Delete Electronic Collection Job Report.
If the job runs for a long time and the actions are still disabled, you can request Ex Libris Support to restore the action buttons.
If the e-collection is empty, the deletion is handled online—that is, without running a job.
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| View | View the electronic collection. Opens the Electronic Collection Editor page in view mode. | |
| Portfolio List (number) | View the portfolio list. Opens the Portfolios List page. For more information see Working with the Portfolio List. | |
| Order / Additional Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines). | |
| Link to Community | Initiate the process to link a local electronic collection to an electronic collection in the Community Zone. Linking local electronic collections to the Community Zone provides the benefit of Community Zone updates to the electronic collections that you link to the Community Zone. See Linking a Local Electronic Collection to the Community Zone for more information. | |
| Create E-Activation Task | Create an electronic activation task and displays a confirmation message when successful. | |
| Publishing Information | View publishing information about the electronic collection. Open the Publishing Information page with the following information (Available explicitly for General System, Repository, and Catalog Administrators, and Deposit Managers):
Learn about debugging publishing information in the Debugging Publishing Information video (1:52 mins).
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| Edit Service | Edit the electronic service. Opens the Electronic Service Editor. See Modifying an Electronic Service. | |
| Report to Ex Libris | Send a portfolio update, add, remove, or coverage request to Ex Libris. Opens the Report to Ex Libris page. The contact information provided on the Report to Ex Libris page is defined by an administrator; see Configuring CRM Contacts. | |
| More Info | View more information about the electronic collection. Opens the More Info dialog box with the following information:
For information on displaying the courses associated with a title, see the View Courses Linked to a Title video (2:43 mins).
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| Electronic Collection (Community tab) | Portfolio List (number) | View the portfolio list. Opens the Portfolios List page. For more information see Working with the Portfolio List. |
| Activate/Deactivate for Search in CDI |
A collection can be activated or deactivated for search in CDI if the following three conditions are met:
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| Descriptive Record | View a simple view of the electronic collection. Opens the Community Zone level bibliographic record available for the electronic collection in the MARC Record Simple View page. See Viewing Metadata Read-Only in the Simple Record View Page and Working with Electronic Collection Bibliographic Records and URLs Added to the Community Zone for more information. | |
| Activate | Activate the electronic collection. Opens the Activation Wizard (refer to Activating an Electronic Collection Using the Activation Wizard). Where applicable, the collection can also be activated for CDI in the wizard (only when the CDI model is Fully Flexible). | |
| Order | Initiate a purchase order. Opens the PO Line Owner and Type page (see Creating PO Lines). | |
| Report to Ex Libris | Send a portfolio update, add, remove, or coverage request to Ex Libris. Opens the Report to Ex Libris page. The contact information provided on the Report to Ex Libris page is defined by an administrator; see Configuring CRM Contacts. | |
| Authorities (Institution tab) | As available, the Seen from information is provided in the search results. This information is pulled from the 4XX fields. | |
| See also | As available, the See also information is provided in the search results with links to this information. This information is pulled from the 5XX fields.
If the authority vocabulary does not use authority IDs for these pointers, clicking the "See also" link generates a search for the term in the 5XX field.
Institutions that prefer the previous keyword-based “See also” search behavior can select to opt out of the enhanced system. They can set the customer parameter aut_see_also_link to ‘false’ to retain the old behavior. |
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Search Bibliographic Records Matching This Value |
When you select the Search Bibliographic Records Matching This Value link, Alma searches for bibliographic records that use the authority record from which you selected this link. Note that the search results depend on your linking strategy. If your linking strategy is based on ID, the ID is searched. Otherwise, a textual string is used for the search. The values that appear in the search results are based on a Solr search and not on the fact that these records are linked to a relevant authority record. |
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| Edit | Edit local authority information. | |
| Authorities (Community tab) | As available, the Seen from information is provided in the search results. This information is pulled from the 4XX fields. | |
| See also | As available, the See also information is provided in the search results with links to this information. This information is pulled from the 5XX fields.
If the authority vocabulary does not use authority IDs for these pointers, clicking the "See also" link generates a search for the term in the 5XX field.
Institutions that prefer the previous keyword-based “See also” search behavior (for example, you work with a vocabulary where doing a fuzzy match is more desirable), you can select to opt out of the new system. Users can set the customer parameter aut_see_also_link to ‘false’ to retain the old behavior. |
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Search Bibliographic Records Matching This Value |
When you select the Search Bibliographic Records Matching This Value link, Alma searches for bibliographic records that use the authority record from which you selected this link. Note that the search results depend on your linking strategy. If your linking strategy is based on ID, the ID is searched. Otherwise, a textual string is used for the search. The values that appear in the search results are based on a Solr search and not on the fact that these records are linked to a relevant authority record. |
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In addition, the Export button that appears at the top of the page for all search types provides the option to export search results to an Excel file. The columns of information in the Excel file vary depending on the search type that you have used.
Excel files for all search types except Collections and Authorities have an MMS ID column.
For more information, see Export to Excel.
Example Repository Search Results
Since the repository search facility in Alma provides the flexibility to conduct a variety of searches, the search results include information related to physical, electronic, and digital resources. As a result, the content of the search results vary and are specific to the type of search you are conducting. For example, the Titles (All, Physical, Electronic, and Digital) search results include bibliographic information (Note: For repeatable bibliographic fields, only one occurrence of the fields is displayed); and the inventory (such as Items, Portfolios, and Files) search results include details from imported data or data that you have entered using the Physical Item Editor (see Updating Item-Level Information) or the Electronic Portfolio Editor (see Editing a Portfolio Using the Electronic Portfolio Editor).
In general, the repository search results include:
- Material type - See Material Types in Search Results for more information regarding bibliographic material types. See Search Indexes for a list of the MARC tags associated with all the displayed fields.
- Process type - When loan text is displayed, it is a checkable link that displays the On Loan Item page with loan information.
- Resource type - See The Resource Type Field for more information.
- Content type
- Media type
- Carrier type
- Creator
- Publication place
- Publication date
- Publisher
- Subject
- Library - For portfolios, one of the two parameters "Library" or "Electronic Collection Library" is displayed (for details, see Library set on electronic resource):
- The "Library" parameter displays the portfolio-level parameter (if defined).
- The "Electronic Collection Library" parameter displays the portfolio's electronic-collection-level value (if defined).
- Location
- Copy
- Barcode
- Item policy
- Orders - The Orders link shows the number of orders placed for the title, item, portfolio, or collection. Select the number/link to view the PO lines related to the entry. This link connects you to the PO lines using the PO line ID.
- Identifying numbers:
- Alma record number (the first number in 035a, the Other System Number)
- ISSN, ISBN
- Call number
- Item ID (Physical Items)
- Holdings ID (Physical Items)
- (Electronic) Collection ID (Electronic Collection and/or Electronic Portfolios)
- Portfolio ID (Electronic Portfolios)
- Service ID (Electronic Portfolios)
- File ID (Digital Files)
- Representation ID (Digital Files)
- Collection ID (Collection)
- MMS ID (Authorities)
- Dates - Dates are formatted on the display according to your date configuration settings and are included as separate columns of information when you export search results to Excel. Dates can be:
- Creation Date
- Modification Date
- Receiving date (Physical Items)
- Receiving operator (Physical Items)
- Notes:
- Public note (Physical Items)
- Fulfillment note (Physical Items)
- Internal notes (Physical Items)
- Statistics note (Physical Items)
- Availability - Provides a link for accessing additional record details.
- Availability of related records - The Availability of Related Records appears in the search results when a bibliographic record is found and contains a 773 field with linking information to another bibliographic record with items. See the example below where the search results of an electronic item shows related records of two physical items.
Related Records Search ResultsYou can configure the appearance of the location and library in the Availability line. For more information, see Customizing How Library and Location Appear.For information about enhanced visibility of related records, see the Enhanced Visibility For Related Record Inventory video (1:42 mins). - Service
- Icons - See Search Result Icons
The illustrations below highlight the following search result examples. For non-bibliographic/authority related searches, see the page referred to at the end of Performing a Simple Search.
All titles search results (Institution tab):
Repository Search Page with the Results of All Titles Search
Physical titles search results:
Repository Search Results for a Physical Titles Search
Electronic titles search results (Institution tab):
Repository Search Page with Results of an Electronic Titles Search
Digital titles search results (Institution tab):
Repository Search Page with Results of a Digital Titles Search
Digital files search results (Institution tab):
Digital Files Search Results List
Physical items search results:
Repository Search Page with Results of a Physical Items Search
Electronic portfolio search results (Institution tab):
Electronic Portfolio Search Results
Collection search results (Institution tab):
Collection Results (partial)
Electronic collection search results (Institution tab):
Electronic Collection Search Results – Institution Tab
Electronic collection search results (Community tab):
Electronic Collection Search Results – Community Tab
Authorities search results (Institution tab):
Authorities Search Results on the Institution Tab
Authorities search results (Community tab):
Authorities Search Results on the Community Tab
The Resource Type Field
The Resource Type field is constructed based on existing bibliographic fields such as the LDR and 008 or dc:type or dcterms:type fields, in the case of Dublin Core. The Resource Type field supplements (but does not replace) the Material Type field.
The Resource Type field is searchable, available as a facet, and is extracted to Analytics. It is much more detailed than the Material Type field. As a result, it is a useful means of constructing detailed reports.
For details regarding the Resource Type field and the criteria for its creation, see the following tables:
- Rules Used to Create the Resource Type Field – MARC 21/KORMARC and UNIMARC
- Rules Used to Create the Resource Type Field – CNMARC
- Rules Used to Create the Resource Type Field – Dublin Core
The order of these tables is specific to how the rules are processed from beginning to end for creating the Resource Type field. As soon as a condition is met, the table is no longer consulted. As a result, if a bibliographic record meets conditions of more than one resource type, the first one appearing in the table is used.
After a record is saved or indexed, the Resource Type field information appears in the search results.
Resource Type Field
Resource Type is also available as a facet and an option in the advanced search.
Material Types in Search Results
The following bibliographic material types are identified in Alma’s search results:
- Books
- Journals
- Computer files
- Maps
- Music Records
- Visual materials
- Mixed materials
Bibliographic material types are identified using the MARC 21 format for bibliographic data (described in the Scope of the Bibliographic Format table and the Fields that Identify the Bibliographic Material Type table, both below).
| Scope of the Bibliographic Format |
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MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic Data is a carrier for bibliographic information about printed and manuscript textual materials, computer files, maps, music, journals, visual materials, and mixed materials. Bibliographic data commonly includes titles, names, subjects, notes, publication data, and information about the physical description of an item. The Alma Bibliographic Formats described below are built according to the official Bibliographic Formats in MARC as described at: https://www.loc.gov/marc/bibliograph...e/bdintro.html The bibliographic format contains data elements for the following types of material:
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These material types are identified from the bibliographic fields highlighted in Fields that Identify the Bibliographic Material Type table below.
Search Results with Restricted Access
Search results for electronic resources may include details about access restrictions by groups of libraries, campuses, and/or institutions. When restrictions are enabled, an Available For label/row appears in the search results followed by a list of groups that have access. Hover your mouse over the list to see the complete list.
The search result facets include which groups are associated with the campus or library.
Available For in Search Results
For information on restricting availability for electronic resources, see Configuring Distributed Access to Electronic Resources.
Linked Data in Repository Search Results
You can view linked data in repository search results for the following types of searches:
- All titles
- Physical titles
- Electronic titles
- Digital titles
For more information about linked data, see https://developers.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/integrations/linked_data.
To access linked data:
- Complete a titles search for the resource for which you want to access the linked data elements.
- Select the action Linked Data. A list of linked data appears.
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Linked Data List PageThe list displays the following information:- Vocabulary field
According to context. The default context is https://open-na.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/alma/contexts/bib. If there is an active Linked Data integration profile (see Linked Data) with a path to a context, this context is used.A Linked Data integration profile does not have to be defined to access linked data in the search results. However, a Linked Data integration profile is required to expose linked data in JSON-LD format (see Linked Data for more information).
- Linked data URI
- Label
For ISBN, ISSN, and OCLC, the field content appears. For creator and subject, the value of the heading appears.
- Vocabulary field
- Select a link to access the linked data.
For more information, see the Linked Data Services video (1:50 min.).
Also see Using Linked Data While Working with Bibliographic Records for information regarding linked data in the MD Editor.
Ghost (Deleted) Records in the Repository Search Results
Ghost records are records that appear to exist but do not; they are leftover information about deleted records. On the rare occasion that a ghost record appears in search results, Alma proactively identifies and eliminates the record automatically.
A ghost record appears with the message Indexing issue was identified with record and will be fixed for next search.
Ghost Record Message
The next time that you search, the message and the ghost record are gone. Since the record is actually a deleted record, it does not appear in Analytics reporting.