What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

I'm so upset. Worldcat's advanced search feature has just been destroyed.

https://www.worldcat.org/#advancedsearch

There is no way to limit to "juvenile" or "fiction," and if I try to add in the filters on the sidebar after getting the results, it does not work. This renders the site absolutely useless for book searches. How are we supposed to identify people's books if we have no way to search for them?

Here is Worldcat's search results for su:nuns, with filters added in to limit to juvenile fiction:

https://www.worldcat.org/search?q=su%...

Clearly, it doesn't work, as over 1800 results pop up, and the filters have not been applied. Adult fiction and non-fiction are also showing.

What do we do???

Just took a quick look at Worldcat's redesigned Advanced Search...

Try selecting "Subject" in a drop-down menu and type a common genre (such as "juvenile fiction"). The trick is knowing which Subjects are used by Worldcat because they're not always consistent, especially for older books.

Try searching for one specific book you're familiar with. Then click/ tap "Show more information" and you'll see the "Subjects" used in the book's description.

It is awful 🙁 I had a premonition when I saw cheerful "new worldcat is coming" few days ago that I won't like it and I don't. I guess we'll grow used to it eventually but don't they have something better to do than ruin a search that was working fine...

Kris, yeah, I figured out that adding "juvenile" and "fiction" in the subject or keyword field (mostly) keeps out adult books. But who knows how many search results we're losing? Probably hundreds. :(

Ayshe, you're so right. There was nothing wrong with the old one! Why would they make the advanced search *less* useful? Are actual librarians (I'm not one) noticing and complaining?

If it ain't broke, don't fix it!!

(I'm late to the party, in total agreement, have already ranted at length about the change. Ridiculous...)

Anyway, on a related topic, today I can't search by title. For example:

ti: Chronicle
AND
ti: Forest
OR
ti: Wood

First hit: "Remedial treatment of buildings" (no subtitle)
Fifth: "[Articles about bison, January, 1995]" (same)

It's not just this, either. There was a missing book with character 'Jessica' and partial title 'Home'. With date parameters (and excluding a su: juvenile fiction or similar), do you think I got many hits with titles containing 'home'?! No!

I haven't noticed this happening before...

Just FYI. It's buggy now, often. But this title thing is especially bizarre (how can it suddenly not be able to search by title?!). :S 'Sort by': Relevance or Most Recent or whatever doesn't seem to rectify anything, either.

Capn, does Worldcat's new popup window for Advanced Search work for you? It does return some odd results at times.

https://www.worldcat.org/#advancedsearch

Looking at their current FAQ, it doesn't look like you can do complex boolean (AND, OR) searches like your example above.

Q: "I am an experienced searcher, and I would like to enter search terms in fields such as subject, title, and author. How can I do this in WorldCat.org?"

A: "You can use Advanced Search to easily search in specific fields. Access Advanced Search by clicking the filter icon next to the WorldCat.org search box. Here you can select the following popular fields for your WorldCat.org searches: Keyword, Author, ISBN, ISSN, Journal Name, OCLC Number, Publisher, Subject, and Title.."

Hi Kris,

Yes, been using that advanced search function daily. :)

If you look at my second example, it was really straight-forward (non-Boolean). The keyword imput works, but the title one doesn't return titular content?!?! And that's new today. :S

I have no idea what's going on.

Thanks very much for pointing out the FAQs - I'll have another good look through.

Honestly though, since they changed it, there's all kinds of bugs.

The title thing is new today, as far as I can tell. (I figured boolean might mess it up, but even simple searches are failing)

Kris!! I am indebted to you!

In my rage flipping through the FAQs & Search Tips, I found THIS:

Publisher Location pl: china

https://help.oclc.org/Discovery_and_R...

So.... it IS possible to search by publisher location?! :O

Oh, I wasn't paying attention to the new interface *at all*. Just noticed the "+" button to add new search parameters... and the boolean operator drop-downs (AND, OR, NOT). Yes, I'm often in a bit of a hurry.

(Title searching is functional again for me, just fyi. No changes on my end...) :S

Success Using The way-back-machine

here is the url

https://web.archive.org/web/202003020...

PaulGamerBoy360(Brigham) wrote: "Success Using The way-back-machine

here is the url

https://web.archive.org/web/202003020..."

Good thinking! :)

Did you get it to work for you? Mine is untethered (i.e. doesn't show a results page, just a WaybackMachine error message of a missing URL). :(

You might have to change wich snapshot your using.

Sometimes it worked for me other times it didn't.

Worldcat on the blink again?

"Try your search again, use different search terms, or select different filtering criteria."

It's been giving me this message.

*Sigh*

Can anyone get Worldcat to display more than 10 search results per page? It won't let me select 50 anymore.

On the plus side, if you run a search then view one book, then page-back, it looks like the search form is no longer cleared. So it's easy to modify a search.

Kris wrote: "On the plus side, if you run a search then view one book, then page-back, it looks like the search form is no longer cleared. So it's easy to modify a search."

THAT was the worst bug for me. That's good news! :)

@Rainbowheart - did you try the trick of messing with the web address? I haven't yet on WorldCat, but sometimes it works...i.e. if there's a display clause = 10 somewhere, just adding a 0 or changing the 1 to a 5.. :)

EDIT: Yeah, it works. "....&limit=10&offset=11" - if you change the limit to =50, you get (less than or equal to) 50 displayed.

SECOND EDIT: Oh wait... now I'm only seeing the last 10 of 50.... If you change the offset to =1, it starts at the first hit... drat. Nevermind. :p Maybe someone with more html ability can advise? :) In the meanwhile, you can start your ten displayed titles at number 11, or any integer, if you change the default offset. Not ideal, but, if you diddle with the web address, you lose the navigation arrows as well...

For more terrible advice, follow me on social media! XD

Haha, I tried tinkering with the URL, but didn't have much luck either.

Why do they have to "fix" things that aren't broken, lol.