February 1998 - Volume 4, No. 2
Knowing Your Limits, or
One of the most powerful features of MadCat, the library's computer catalog, is its ability to "limit" a search. By using specified codes, any search can be limited by its format, language, library location, or date of publication.
For example, when using the Command version of MadCat, you can quickly retrieve a score of Haydn's Symphony No. 98 by using the following search:
Haydn and symphon* and 98 and form sco
The final part of the search phrase, and form sco, "limits" the search to only scores. The same search could be limited to only recordings by substituting rec for sco.
Haydn and symphon* and 98 and form rec
Notice in the examples above that the search consists of a composer's last name, distinctive elements from the title, and the limit. This is a strong and effective strategy which can be applied to many searches for music materials.
The library collects heavily in foreign language books and other materials. This may be a blessing to some and a curse to others, as a given MadCat search may yield hundreds of hits in many languages. To eliminate books in unwanted languages from your search, notice the following example:
music and spain and lang eng
The limit, and lang eng, forces the computer to respond with a list of only those library materials about music and Spain that are in English.
Limits can also be combined. For example, if one would like to quickly generate a list of all the books added to the Music Library with a publication date of 1997, the following search could be used:
loc mus and form bks and date 1997
Using limits is an efficient way to search MadCat, but one must formulate each search using the proper mnemonic limit codes. A list of these can be seen online by typing "d limits" (or F11) while in MadCat, or they can also be located in the printed MadCat Users Guide. A list of the commonly used codes for music searches is given below.
Happy searching! And remember, you can always ask a library staff member for assistance in using MadCat.