Quick Facts

• UAA subscribes to hundreds of databases
• Most of those databases come from a few vendors
• Databases from the same vendor work the same way
• All databases come with online instruction manuals

The databases that UAA provides are produced by several different companies. Databases from the same company may have some individualized features, but in general, they will work the same way. Databases from different companies have many of the same features, but they frequently work in slightly different ways.

Fortunately, all databases come with an online instruction manual to help you use them. The general "help file" is usually a text link that says "help" located along either the top or left side of the database's home page. Databases also offer contextual help next to major features. It is usually accessed by clicking on a "?" button. Contextual help links directly to information about the feature it is next to and usually offers links to the entire range of help topics as well.

Some things to look for in a help file:

• Types of information that can be searched (author, title, subject,...)
• How to expand searches that are not finding enough information
• How to limit searches by specific criteria
• Special characters like truncation symbols (looks for any words that begin with the characters you type up to the symbol)
• Stop words (words that are not used for searching)
• Saving searches so that you can use them again
• How to cite sources found in the database
• Printing, E-mailing, and saving articles and search result lists
• Searching multiple databases at one time