Glossary of Library Terms

Abstract: A summary of an article or a dissertation.

Annotation: A note that describes, explains, or evaluates a piece of work.; usually included in a bibliography or citation.

Bibliographic Citation: Information which includes the title, author name, name of journal, year of publication or other publication information which allows the researcher to locate the item.

Bibliography: A bibliography is a list of citations that appear at the end of a paper, article, chapter or book. They could also be separate publications of books, articles, reports, documents, etc.) that are selected and organized around a particular subject or theme.

Bimonthly: Publication issued every two months.

Biography: Information on an individual’s life.

Book Review: Critical evaluation of a literary work, usually published in a periodical or newspaper.

Boolean Operators: Commands that allow search terms to be combined to either narrow or broaden a search; the most commonly used operators are: AND, OR, NOT.

Bound Periodical: Issues of journals, magazines, etc. that have been fastened together with hard book covers and spines.

Browse Searching: Online catalogues and most databases have a Browse search option that allows the user to search in alphabetical indexes such as: author, title, subject heading, etc. This is often a more precise way of searching. See also Keyword Searching.

Call Number: A code used to locate an item on library shelves. An address of sorts.

Catalogue (BORIS) : A complete list of materials that a library owns within its collection. There are two types of Catalogues. In the past, the most common type was a Card Catalogue, where the collection was listed on cards in cabinets of drawers. The second and the now more commonly used is the Online Catalogue where items may be searched online.

Circulation and Reserve desk: The counter where materials and reserves are checked out and returned.

Citation: Information needed to locate a work that has been quoted or paraphrased. This information generally includes the name of the author, title, publication date and page number(s).

Copyright: The exclusive privilege of publishing and selling a work granted by a government to an author, composer, artist, or their legally designated agent.

Current Periodical: Periodicals that are unbound and are usually issues published in the last year.

Database: A collection of information (computer records) that are searchable electronically.

Dewey Decimal Classification: The classification scheme devised by Melvil Dewey for library materials. It divides human knowledge into 10 main classes, with further decimal division using a notation of numbers. Most public libraries use Dewey.

Descriptors: Words or phrases used as Subject Headings in some databases.

Dictionary: Provides the meaning or definitions of words in a language or field of knowledge.

Electronic Journal: A periodical, often scholarly, that is made accessible in a electronic format and distributed online. An electronic journal or e-journal may sometimes be in both paper and electronic format within the library collection.

Electronic Mail (e-mail): A system whereby a computer user can exchange messages with other computer users (or groups of users) via a communications network.

Encyclopedia: Compilation of factual articles on subjects in different areas of knowledge. Usually arranged alphabetically.

Fields: A section on the computer record used for a defined category or purpose. For example, the author field in a bibliographic record, is where the name of the author is located.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP): A protocol which allows a user on one host to access, and transfer files to and from, another host over a network.

Footnote: A note to a reference, a citation, or explanatory note inserted at the foot of the page referring to a point within the text.

Full-text Database: Provides access to complete texts of articles (versus that of an abstract database which does not).

Government Document: Publications such as reports, maps, statistics, etc. published by an office of a legally organized government. Most of our library documents are provided by provincial, federal and foreign governments, as well as the United Nations.

Handbook:  A small reference book: a manual.

Holdings: Refers to the books, periodicals and other materials owned by a library. It also refers to the specific copies, volumes, numbers, years, issues, etc. of these materials.

HTML: Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is a programming language used in the creation of Web pages.

HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol): The protocol that supports the transfer of hypertext information.

Hypertext: Online text with links to other related documents on the World Wide Web.

Index: Alphabetical lists of sources of information on topics providing complete bibliographic information.

Inter library Loan (ILL): A cooperative arrangement among libraries by which one library may borrow materials from another library.

Internet: A worldwide network of computers. A network of networks in which users at any one computer can get information from other computers.

ISBN: International Standard Book Number. A unique 10-digit code assigned to a specific edition of a book before it is published.

Issue: A single numbered or dated issue of a series, a periodical or a serial publication.

Journal:  Many students get confused with the term periodical, journal, serial, and magazine. Even though they have slightly different definitions, they are often lumped as one. What they do have in common is that they are published periodically (weekly, monthly, annually, etc.) and contain articles written by various authors. Generally a “journal” contains peer-reviewed articles written by scholars or experts in the field while a magazine contains more popular articles often written by non-academics.

Keyword Searching : Online catalogues and most databases have a Keyword search option. Users enter word or words that describe their research topic, and the catalogue or database retrieves all records where the search terms appears. This is a recommended initial search strategy, but can sometimes result in too many hits or retrievals. See also Browse Searching.

Librarian: A specialist in the care, management, and the dissemination of recorded information, and one skilled in the process of helping others locate and use information.

Library of Congress Classification: The classification scheme developed by the Library of Congress for designating the subject content of library materials through a combination of letters and numbers. Most academic libraries arrange materials on the shelf in order of the assigned LC call number.

Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): An authoritative listing of the subject headings developed by the Library of Congress.

Magazine: see Journal

Microforms: Documents that have been photographed or filmed. Microforms require the use of special reader machines. Most common formats are microfilm, microfiche, and micro-card.

Monograph: A book.

Network: A group of machines connected together so they can transmit information to one another. There are two kinds of networks, local and remote.

Out-of-Print: Materials that are no longer published.

OPAC: Acronym for Online Public Access Catalogue.

Periodical: See Journal.

Periodical Index: A guide to the contents of periodicals. Some periodical indexes are general in coverage while others focus on a particular subject like art, economics, or history. You would use a periodical index to find if there are articles about a certain topic or by a certain author. In libraries, periodical indexes are available in print or as online electronic databases. Some electronic indexes will provide full-text articles. However, print indexes and some electronic indexes only provide citations to articles. The actual periodicals would have to be located for the full-text of the articles.

Primary Source: Information or work which has not been interpreted by another person, i.e., original idea or concept.

Publication Date: The year in which a book is published, or the day of the month on which a periodical is issued.

Reference Work: Authoritative sources on specific subjects that are consulted in the library.

Secondary Source: Information which has been reported, analyzed or interpreted by other persons.

Thesis Academic: An essay or treatise presented by a candidate in partial fulfillment of the requirements for a master’s degree.

Truncation: A symbol put at the end or in the middle of a word in order to catch all variant endings or spellings of that word. For example, if conducting research on marketing, typing market* as a search term would yield records with the terms markets, marketing, marketers, etc. The truncation symbol is placed at the point in the word where various spellings can occur; for example “col*r”, would retrieve the terms color or colour. Different symbols can be used for truncation in different databases, such as $, #, +, *, !, and ? Some databases truncate automatically.

Union Catalogue: A catalogue that enables simultaneous searching of many library catalogues.

URL (Uniform Resource Locator): A web address; for example, a standard URL: www.ubishops.ca/library.

Web Site: A server on the Internet which runs the HTTP protocol and where HTML documents reside.

Workstation: Computers in the library that may be loaded with special software that cannot be accessed elsewhere on campus.

WWW (World Wide Web): A navigational tool for information retrieval of Internet documents.