InfoTrac contains 11 individual databases. The most commonly used ones are Expanded Academic ASAP, Professional Custom Journals, Custom Newspapers, and OneFile. This is a general guide to all InfoTrac databases.

To access InfoTrac databases

1. Choose InfoTrac from the drop down menu on the Electronic Resources page.
1. Click on the name of a database to search that database.
2. You can only search one database at a time, but the InfoTrac OneFile database is a comprehensive database combining the resources from most of the other databases, so choosing it gives essentially a multi-database search.
2. Or, go to the list of individual databases on our website, and click on the specific database you are interested in (i.e. Expanded Academic ASAP). This will take you directly to the basic search page, with your chosen database preselected.

Basic “Keyword” Search (Main search page)

Type your search words in the box. Below the box you will see ways to limit your search:

1. Checking the box beside “to articles with text” will return only full-text articles (no citations/abstracts)
2. Checking the box beside “to refereed publications” will limit your search to scholarly journals.
3. By Date: You can narrow your search by date. You can enter just a month and year, or a date range (i.e. 01/99 to 06/01).
4. To the following journals: If you need articles from a specific journal, enter its title here.

Advanced Search

The Advanced Search only gives one benefit over the keyword search – the ability to search specific fields (article title, subject, etc.). The dropdown box that says “Select Index” contains the fields that can be searched.

Boolean Searching
Unlike most databases, InfoTrac doesn’t have a guided search page to assist you in Boolean (AND, OR or NOT) searching. However, you can enter Boolean phrases in the search box on either the Keyword or Advanced search pages. To construct a Boolean search, use the terms AND, OR or NOT to connect your search terms and narrow your search. For example, “drugs AND addiction NOT alcohol” will find articles about drug addiction, but that aren’t also about alcoholism.

Search Results
A successful search will take you to the search results page. This page lists 20 articles at a time, with blue arrows to move to the next page of results. The entry for each article includes:
 

1. The title of the article in bold, followed by the author, journal name in bold italics, date, page numbers, etc.
2. 2A notation in blue noting how much of the article is available (citation, text, text and graphics, or “1 full page PDF” which is an image of the page that preserves the original layout as it was in the journal).
3. A checkbox to the left of each article for marking articles that you want to go back to.

To view an article, click on blue link noting the article availability. You can then scroll down and read the article. If you click on an article for which there is no full-text, you will get an extended citation and an abstract (summary) if there is one. Below the article is a list of related articles.
 

• Marking articles: To mark an article, check the box beside it in the article list, or check the box labeled “Mark” if you are looking at the article itself. If you mark several articles at once, you can then go back and review/print your selected articles. Click on “View Mark List” in the blue bar on the left.
• Printing: To print an individual article, click the Print button in the blue bar on the left. To print your list of marked articles, view your Mark List, click the radio button beside “Full Article” if you want to print the complete articles instead of just the list, and click the gray “submit print request” button.
• Emailing:  If you like, you can email the articles to yourself to read or print later. Scroll down to the end of the article and you will see a box where you can enter your email address. Then click the gray button in the box to send the email.

To begin a new search, click “Search” button in the blue bar on the left. To search in a different InfoTrac database, click “Gale Group Databases” in the blue bar.

Always feel free to ask a librarian if you have questions or problems using InfoTrac databases! We’re here to help you!