Databases are valuable and convenient electronic resources of global information. They comprise information from many different disciplines. Three common types of databases are bibliographic, fulltext and numeric.

• Fulltext databases contain the textual content of a book or journal article but some graphics, charts, tables, etc. may or may not be included. The majority of online databases that are available to you via the Electronic Library homepage are fulltext. A fulltext database gives the actual content which may or may not include pictures, graphs, charts, etc.
  
  
• Bibliographic databases do not contain fulltext but give a citation (title, author, publisher, publication date, etc.). An electronic catalog is an example of a bibliographic database.
  
  
• Numeric databases provide mostly numeric data, such as economic indicators, statistics, financial, demographic and census information. Examples are telephone and zipcode databases.

Described below are some common criteria to enhance searching database searching. However, it is wise to read "Help" on each database as criteria may vary. Usually boolean operators, truncating and proximity operators are limited to "Advanced Search" options.

• Boolean Operators (and, or, not)
  altitude and hypoxia (Both terms will be in each article retrieved)
  altitude or hypoxia (At least one of the terms will be in each article)
  altitude not hypoxia (In medical circles hypoxia is often linked with altitude. To exclude hypoxia because you are not looking for medical articles, use not)

• Truncating allows for variant spellings of search terms. Different databases require the use of different truncating symbols, such as the asterisk* or the question mark? (Read "Help" on each database to determine which symbol should be used. Note the symbol may be before or after the partial term
  flor? (Retrieves all articles that have words beginning with "flor" (floral, florist, florida)
  *benzene (Retrieves all articles that have words ending with "benzene"

• Proximity operators near (N) for any order and within (W) for exact order may be combined with a number (to specify the number of words). The proximity operator is placed between the words that are to be searched. Type tax N5 reform to find results that would match "tax reform" as well as "reform of income tax." The words are in any order. Type tax W8 reform to find results that would match "tax reform" but would not match "reform of income tax." W8 will find the words if they are within 8 words of each other and in the exact order in which you typed them. If proximity operators are not used, the terms "tax" and "reform" may be scattered throughout an article, and may not necessarily refer to "tax reform." Therefore, you would retrieve many articles that may not have relevance to you subject "tax reform."

Most of the online databases available to you via the distance education homepage have fulltext with options for you to print, save in a file, or e-mail. Interlibrary loan is available through this library if you need to request an item that is not available in the fulltext databases. Document delivery is a second option for you to order fulltext. See Interlibrary Loan link on thedistance education homepage for more information on these two options..