Thursday
10Feb2005
NP Library search bookmarklet
Thursday, February 10, 2005 at 11:14AM
Many a times, while browsing the web, we come across some interesting book. The first thing we want to do is to find if our campus library has the book. It is a tedious processs. You got to open the library search page, copy and paste your text etc. We are very lazy so we created this bookmarklet. Feel free to use it if you use the NP library.
NP Lib Search. For Firefox (works on IE for Mac but not on IE for Windows, trying to fix it).
NP Lib Search. For Safari.
To use the bookmarklet on your browser, drag the appropriate version to your browser's bookmark or link bar - this bar is located just below the place where you type in your web addresses.
If you are not sure how to use the bookmarklets follow the steps below.
On top you see two links "For Firefox" and "For Safari". They are the links that contain a small peice of Javascript code. This Javascript will do the searching for your books. Such codes are called Bookmarklets.
(Press your mouse button on the link and drag it to the link bar and then release the mouse button.)
You will see a new tab on this bar. "NP Lib Search"
Now go to some web page and (A)highlight some text (it could be the name of an author, or a book or just some text). (B) Click on the "NP Lib Search" tab.
And our little book marklet would bring up all the books and media related to the highlighted text.
The bookmarklet was created using theBookmarklets.com site and a bit of google searching to make it work with Safari. The Bookmarklet site has a bookmarklet called "Make Search Bookmarklet" that lets you create search bookmarklet for your own library.
NP Lib Search. For Firefox (works on IE for Mac but not on IE for Windows, trying to fix it).
NP Lib Search. For Safari.
To use the bookmarklet on your browser, drag the appropriate version to your browser's bookmark or link bar - this bar is located just below the place where you type in your web addresses.
If you are not sure how to use the bookmarklets follow the steps below.
On top you see two links "For Firefox" and "For Safari". They are the links that contain a small peice of Javascript code. This Javascript will do the searching for your books. Such codes are called Bookmarklets.
(Press your mouse button on the link and drag it to the link bar and then release the mouse button.)
You will see a new tab on this bar. "NP Lib Search"
Now go to some web page and (A)highlight some text (it could be the name of an author, or a book or just some text). (B) Click on the "NP Lib Search" tab.
And our little book marklet would bring up all the books and media related to the highlighted text.
The bookmarklet was created using theBookmarklets.com site and a bit of google searching to make it work with Safari. The Bookmarklet site has a bookmarklet called "Make Search Bookmarklet" that lets you create search bookmarklet for your own library.
Reader Comments (4)
Thanks for the bookmarket idea. It's useful for lazy searchers like us! :)
I think your bookmarklet doesn't work because the Library's OPAC uses frames. Try the link without frames, i.e., right click on OPAC link in the left menu and open it in a new window. It will appear without the frames.
It works for me!
One more thing which I found out... To actually retrieve results from every field other than the "Title" field, do the initial search using "Combined Search" (select from drop down list) instead of the default "Title" field.
I tried with "Murakami" when my bookmarklet was defaulted to Title search and it didn't produce any results; but when I changed the search to "Combined Search", it retrieved all of Murakami's works. :)
Hi Stefanie
It does work fine on Firefox and Safari. The troublesome one is IE. Yes. I am giving it the proper frame as input and I am also using the combined search field.
The problem is IE's javascript implementation. Someone sent me a hack to fix it . Hopefully I'll have it fixed soon.
This is really cool. Preetam, I got your comment in my blog (i.e. that you were trying to do a similar one with NLB catalogue) and am asking who in NLB can give you the info. Man, if it works, NLB should give you like 1 year free premium membership or something. Heck, if they don't I'll personally buy you a cuppa.