related links
- Libraries Australia Tips and Tricks
- Libraries Australia FAQ
- Other ways of searching Libraries Australia
- Libraries Australia Release Notes
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Libraries Australia Search Service
Libraries Australia is a large database of records for more than 40 million items held in over 800 Australian libraries. It also provides access to more than one million digital images from Picture Australia.
There are two versions of the Libraries Australia Search Service:
- Free Service for individuals, and
- Subscription Service for libraries and their clients, or for individuals who choose to subscribe.
Both free and subscription services can be accessed at the following Web Address: http://librariesaustralia.nla.gov.au
Both services provide ways in which you can get an item; from your own or other libraries, or from commercial suppliers or booksellers.
There are also other ways of searching Libraries Australia.
Libraries Australia Free Service
This service is freely available to anyone, anywhere. It has a simple search interface which provides a gateway to resources in Australian Library Collections, and the digital collections represented in Picture Australia. Searchers can:
- search for items in
- Australian Library Collections (Australian National Bibliographic Database) (ANBD)
- Picture Australia (Pictures from Australian Cultural Agencies)
- limit searches to specific categories of material – eg Australian publications, government publications, particular types of material (books, pictures etc) or formats (online, large print etc)
- find which libraries have an item in their collections
- order or purchase material from the National Library’s CopiesDirect service, or from online bookshops
- use records from the service for bibliographic citations.
Searching the Free Service
Searching can be on any combination of words and number (including ISBN/ISSN). You can limit your search by type of material (journal, book, video etc).
It supports boolean operations (AND, OR, NOT) :
- cats dogs : Each record will contain both terms cats AND dogs. The default search puts AND between every word without needing to type it.
- cats OR dogs : Each record will contain one of the terms cats or dogs, or both
- cats –dogs : T his search will retrieve records that contain cat but not dog in the same field, however, the same record may contain both cat and dog in different fields, e.g.
Title: Cat stories
Contents: Cat on the mat -- Cat meets dog -- Cat toys
Records can be displayed in a summary of results, or a full view format .
You can can e-mail records to yourself or print them. You can view the searches that you have already conducted, and if need be, you can refine them.
Libraries Australia Subscription Service
Only registered users can access the Subscription Service.
In addition to the functionality offered in the free service, users of the Subscription Service can:
- Save/download or order MARC records
- Select from three search interfaces
- Create or import bibliographic records (libraries only)
- Add, edit or delete holdings (libraries only)
- Set up personalised accounts
- Create alerts to be emailed to them regularly
- Define their “Own” library or group of libraries
- Request loans or copies from other libraries via Interlibrary loan (libraries only)
- Use additional limits to refine searches
- Access any of the following databases:
- Australian Library Collections (Australian National Bibliographic Database) (ANBD)
- Picture Australia (Pictures from Australian Cultural Agencies)
- Australian Journal Articles (APAIS/APAFT)
- Australian Research Repositories Online to the World (ARROW)
- British Library Catalogue
- Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information (CISTI)
- Consortium of [British] University Research Libraries (CURL) OPAC (COPAC)
- Library of Congress Catalogue
- Singapore National Union Catalogue (SNUC)
- Te Puna Database
- OCLC WorldCat Database
- Libraries Australia Authorities
Searching the Subscription Service
- The three search interfaces:
Searching can be on any combination of authors, titles, control numbers, subject headings and keywords in author, subject, title and notes fields. You can limit your search by many options including country, language, date of publication, number (including ISBN/ISSN), and type of material.
It supports boolean operations (AND, OR, NOT) using simple and nested logic, comparison operators (=, <, >), proximity operators (NEAR and WITH), character masking (*) and truncation (#).
Records can be displayed in MARC, brief or full.
You can save records to a file on your own PC or system; or if you wish, you can e-mail records to yourself or print them. You can view the searches that you have already conducted, and if need be, you can refine them or save them as Alerts.
Connect to Libraries Australia now
Searching can also be perfomed using Z39.50.
Search
The search box located in the middle of the Search page allows you to enter a single search query. The functions of the search screen are similar to those on search engines such as Google and uses keyword searching. You can use a single search term or enter more than one word in the search box, and the system will combine the words using the Boolean operator AND. In Search you can conduct a variety of queries including:
- Enter a single word for example, dolphins
- Enter keywords for example, term natural will find “For the term of his natural life”
- Search for an ISBN for example, 0312585152
- Find books by a certain publisher for example, Shambhala
Indexes Searched
In database terms, an Index is a field you can search on. When you enter a search term in Search all the following indexes are searched:
- Title keyword
- Name keyword
- Subject Keyword
- Publisher name keyword
- Identifier (ISBN, ISSN, Amicus number, etc.)
- Notes
Advanced Search
Advanced Search allows you to conduct more complex searches than Search, as you are able to:
- Select indexes using multiple drop-down menus
- Select a ‘grouping’ for your search term e.g. all of these, any of these, as a phrase, etc.
- Combine more than one search term using Boolean operators
- Select Material Group Limits as with Search
- Limit your search to year/s of publication
- Limit your search to items held in libraries in a state or territory of Australia, or at your own library or not in your library.
Command Search
In Command Search you can perform more complex and specific searches than in Search or Advanced Search. All ANBD indexes are available when from the drop-down menus used in the Command Search screen.
Command Search requires the use of Common Command Language (CCL), as well as a familiarity with the codes used in the various database indexes. The Guide me feature enables you to use Command Search if you are less familiar with CCL and index codes.
See Appendix 3 of the Libraries Australia Manual for details of codes.
Alerts
The alert service of Libraries Australia Search allows you to save your search query so that the search will be run automatically either weekly, monthly or every 3 months. Your alert search then looks for newly added records that match the search query and sends search results to you by email.
Alerts are limited to 100. Alerts can only be created for queries that search the following databases: Australian Library Collections and Libraries Australia Authorities.
Frequently asked questions about Alerts
Adding holdings
You can add holdings to the Australian National Bibliographic database (ANBD) on the Libraries Australia search service. If you have a username and password with this level of access you can connect now. If not, please contact the Libraries Australia Help Desk.
Frequently asked questions about Adding Holdings
Adding a New Record
The Libraries Australia web cataloguing form can be accessed from Libraries Australia Search. It allows libraries to create bibliographic records as well as add, edit and delete records in the Australian National Bibliographic Database. Web Cataloguing form supports input of Latin 1 characters only; diacritics and special characters cannot be input.
Libraries Australia customers with a cataloguing sign on can access the web cataloguing form. You can only add, edit and delete the holdings of your own library. If you would like to contribute bibliographic records to the Australian National Bibliographic Database using the web cataloguing form, please contact the Libraries Australia Help Desk and ask for a cataloguing sign on.
Libraries Australia cataloguing standards
Details of the Libraries Australia cataloguing standards are available here: http://www.nla.gov.au/librariesaustralia/standards.html
The standard for descriptive cataloguing used in Libraries Australia is the Anglo American Cataloguing Rules (latest edition and revisions) and the Library of Congress Rule Interpretations. Please use these tools when determining the bibliographic content of the record.
For full descriptions of the data elements that are supported in the Web Cataloguing interface consult the MARC 21 Format for Bibliographic Data Standards.
Enhanced Requesting
Libraries Australia offers a number of improved options for getting items found as a result of searching the ANBD (Australian National Bibliographic Database). By selecting the 'Get this item?' button beside the record you have selected you are able to choose from several options to obtain items:
- Online
- At Your Library
- At Other Libraries
- At Other Suppliers
The additional Enhanced Requesting option in Libraries Australia allows you to obtain items from other libraries by requesting them as an inter-library loan or copy through the completion of a request form. A recent release of Libraries Australia now offers a choice of request forms. A slightly longer request form aimed at end users, as well as a shorter form, to be used by ILL staff.
Frequently asked questions about Enhanced Requesting
Personalisation
Currently many existing Libraries Australia User-ID's for Libraries Australia are 'shared accounts' which means that settings apply to everyone using that account. Libraries Australia now has the functionality to allow users to create their own personal account within the shared account.
This will enable individual users, whether end users or library staff, to:
- create a personal account
- choose their own user-id and password
- save records and queries into a personal folder
- specify which search screen will display at login
- customise default databases for searching
- choose up to three libraries as "your library"
You can choose to let individuals use these accounts in addition to:
- set up alerts for regular emailing of new records from a search
- request interlibrary loans
How do I activate personalisation?
Libraries who wish to offer personalisation to allow their staff or patrons to create personal accounts should contact the Libraries Australia Help Desk (email: librariesaustralia@nla.gov.au) with the following information, by email or fax (02 6273 1180):
- A list of the Libraries Australia User-ID's that the library wants personal accounts to be created from
- Specify whether personal accounts should enable:
- access pay per search databases (for example: APAIS)
- create alerts
- request interlibrary loans
- access Libraries Australia via the library's internal authentication system or from any internet connected computer
Once an account has been setup to allow the creation of personal accounts, anyone logging into the 'shared account' will see an option to 'create a personal account.' Selecting this option will then enable the user to create their own account for immediate use. Any searching done by this user will appear in Libraries Australia usage reports against the new personal User-ID.
Examples of different individual accounts.
A University Library requests the following types of personal accounts:
- library staff can access all databases and create alerts.
- interlibrary loan staff can access all databases and request ILLs.
- academics can access all databases, create alerts and request ILLs.
- undergraduates can access the free databases and create alerts. They can not access pay per search databases or request ILLs.
- all individual accounts must be verified through the university's internal authentication system. This may mean that individuals must log on to the university website, go to Libraries Australia, and then log on to their individual account.
A Public Library requests the following types of personal accounts:
- reference staff can access all databases and request ILLs, but can not create alerts.
- library patrons can only access free databases including the ANBD and will have no access to alerts or ILL requesting.
- library patrons can only access personal accounts from within the library's internal authentication system. This may mean that patrons must physically be within the library building to access Libraries Australia.
A Special Library requests the following types of personal accounts:
- library staff can access all databases, create alerts and request ILLs.
- Library patrons can access all databases and create alerts from any internet connected computer.
Frequently asked questions about Personalisation
Ordering MARC records
You can order MARC records from the Australian National Bibliographic database (ANBD) on the Libraries Australia search service. You will need a username and password with this level of access.
There are three ways of obtaining the MARC records:
- Download a record straight from the subscription service,
- Record Export Service, where you order records by adding a holding or using a specific command,
- Alerts, Libraries Australia service provides for a range of enhanced services including creation of Alerts (SDIs) to enable you to keep up to date with what's new in your area of interest. Alerts are linked to the user accounts for your library, so if you have users sharing passwords, information on alerts will be visible to all users using the same account, and
- Products, where you can receive MARC records which have your holdings attached via FTP.

