About the OPAC:
- An online catalog (OPAC) is an electronic listing of materials available in a library.
- An online catalog will provide citations to and locations for materials.
- An online catalog will not provide the text of the item.
- At the Benedictine University Library, the online catalog is knows as I-Share.
- I-Share is a shared catalog of the Benedictine University Library as well as the collections of the I-Share libraries (76 other academic libraries in the state of Illinois).
- Circulating materials you locate in I-Share maybe be borrowed directly from the holding library or requested through interlibrary loan.
Finding Books at Benedictine:
- From the Library Home Page, go to Find
Books: at the top of the page.
- Select the link "At
Benedictine University" to connect to
Benedictine's catalog, I-SHARE.
- You will see a Quick Search
text box on the screen (the default) and an Advanced Search link beneath it.
- Quick Search works best for "known item"
searching, that is, you know the author, title, subject
heading, etc. of the book or other item you wish to
find. (Note: we do not recommend using the "Any
Word Anywhere" search, as it often returns too
many irrelevant results.)
- Advanced Search gives you much more flexibility
in the type of searches you can do within the catalog.
You can also combine multiple types of searches (for
example, author and title searches) using Boolean
logic.
- More information about using I-SHARE is available through
its Help
pages (these pages are also accessible within
I-SHARE by clicking the "Help" button).
At Other I-SHARE
Libraries:
- From the Library Home Page, go to Find
Books: at the top of the page.
- Select the link "At
Other I-SHARE Libraries" to connect to
I-SHARE's Universal Catalog (all I-SHARE libraries). The
search options for searching the Universal Catalog are
the same as for searching only Benedictine's catalog:
- You will see a Quick Search
text box on the screen (the default) and an Advanced Search link beneath it.
- Quick Search works best for "known item"
searching, that is, you know the author, title, subject
heading, etc. of the book or other item you wish to
find. (Note: we do not recommend using the "Any
Word Anywhere" search, as it often returns too
many irrelevant results.)
- Advanced Search gives you much more flexibility
in the type of searches you can do within the catalog.
You can also combine multiple types of searches (for
example, author and title searches) using Boolean
logic.
- More information about using I-SHARE is available through
its Help
pages (these pages are also accessible within
I-SHARE by clicking the "Help" button).
Elsewhere:
Not all the libraries in Illinois are open to the public. Libraries at other educational institutions or special, hospital and corporate libraries may require special passes or permission to use their collections. If you wish to visit a library which is not an I-Share or LIBRAS member, please call them or visit their web page to determine their access policy, or ask one of our Benedictine University librarians if the library you wish to visit requires an appointment, a special pass, etc.
For links to catalogs of other libraries beyond I-SHARE,
please refer to Finding
Books at Other Libraries. The instructions
for searching these catalogs will vary by system; consult
each catalog's "Help" features for more information.
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