Huntington Beach Public Library Catalog Help and FAQs


Why can't I ?	How do I ?	What does ?
Why can't I log in? Why can't I renew my book? Why can't I request a book? Why can't I find a book? Why can't I save or access My List? Why can't I get a reminder before my book is due?	How do I log into my account? How do I renew a book? How do I get on a waiting list? How do I search for a Music CD? How do I search for an item? How do I search for magazine articles?	What does My List mean? What does Request Item mean? What does location mean? What does call no. mean? What does keyword search mean? What does browse or starts with mean?
Why can't I log in? Wrong data entry. Make sure you have entered all 14 digits without spaces. For example, your card number should be entered like: 21119001234567 If you cannot remember what phone number you used when you registered for your card, you must come in to update your account. Your card has expired. You must come in to update your account. The date printed on your card is the date the photo expires, your card usually expires sooner. Huntington Beach resident cards expire every 3 years and non-resident cards expire each year. If your card has not expired, you can log in to the My Account/Renew tab page, click on Profile to see when your card will expire. Your address, phone number, or birth date is not on file. You must come in to update your account. If you have a new phone number, you must also come in to change it. For security purposes, phone & pin number changes must be done in person with a photo id. You have a Media only card or owe large fines to the library. You must come in to update your account. Your card was reported as lost or stolen. You must come in to update your account. Why can't I renew my book? Your book is past the due date. The library does not allow renewals on overdue items, you should return your book immediately to avoid accruing fines. The item is a Media item. Music CDs, Video DVDs/VHS, Audio books, MP3s, and Playaways cannot be renewed. The book is being requested by another patron. Books with a waiting list cannot be renewed. Why can't I request an item? The item is a Media item. Music CDs, Video DVDs/VHS, Audio books, MP3s, and Playaways cannot be requested. The book is checked in. If all copies of the title are checked in, you may not request the title. You may call the library where the item is located to hold it free of charge for 3 days. Central Library: 714-842-4481 option 6, Children's Dept: 714-842-4481 option 4, Banning: 714-375-5005, Main Street: 714-375-5071, Helen Murphy: 714-375-5006, Oakview: 714-375-5068 You may call for Media items that are checked in to be held for up to 3 hours. Media: 714-842-4481 option 5 Back to Top Why can't I find a book? Misspelling - check your spelling. Read our how to search section. The library doesn't own it. If you need the book immediately several options are available: Check the Orange County Public Library system at www.ocpl.org. Buy a copy online from www.amazon.com. Check www.worldcat.org to see if any other libraries own it. Come into the library and pay $3 for an interlibrary loan (ILL). The $3 nonrefundable charge is for the cost of the search itself even if the item is not fulfilled. It normally takes 3-6 weeks for an interlibrary loan to be fulfilled. A common misconception is that the library owns all books ever published. Since the Huntington Beach Library is a public library and space is limited, if the book does not appeal to the general public or has not been checked out for a long time, the library would not carry it. The library also does not carry highly specialized or academic items like school textbooks. Why can't I save or access My List? To save or access My Lists, you must log into your account first through the My Account/Renew tab, then click on the My List link located on the upper right corner of the screen. To add more titles to My List, click on New Search or Advanced to search for more titles. If you click on on any of the location links like All Locations, Children's, Media, Banning, Helen Murphy, Main Street, Oak View, Genealogy you will be logged out of your account. Why can't I get a reminder before my book is due? The library can email you several reminders by email before your books are due. To activate the email reminders simply log in to the My Account/Renew tab, click on Profile, type in your email address and click the Update button. Back to Top How do I log into my account? From the library catalog site, click on the My Account/Renew tab and enter your library card number (14 digits without spaces) and the pin number (the last 4 digits of your phone number. How do I renew a book? From the library catalog site, click on the My Account/Renew tab and enter your library card number (14 digits without spaces) and the pin number (the last 4 digits of your phone number). Click on the Checked Out link, then place a checkmark next to the title you wish to renew and click Renew. How do I get on a waiting list? You can request a title that is checked out by clicking on Request Item next to the title record, then logging into your account if prompted, and click on Place Request to confirm your hold request. This service costs $1.00 and is non-refundable once you place the request. You pay when you pick up the book. The library will call you when the book is ready to be picked up. You cannot be placed on a waiting list for Media items (CDs, DVDs, Audio books) or items currently checked in. How do I search for a Music CD? From the library catalog site, click on Media and type your search term in the Music CDs Keyword box and click search. Back to Top How do I search for an item? From the library catalog site, you can simply enter the author's name and title of the book in the keyword search box. Keyword requires the spelling to be correct so if you are not certain how the author's name or title is spelled, use the browse (starts with) search options. For example if you are looking for Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell you can search by Keyword: mitchell gone wind or Title starts with: gone with or Author starts with: mitchell, marg or Subject starts with: women georgia How do I search for magazine articles? The library has a number of online databases accessible remotely from home through the library's catalog by clicking on the Databases tab. You can find online magazine, journal, and newspaper articles like Consumer Reports in the Gale Infotrac database. Genealogy, telephone & marketing directories, auto repair manuals, and practice exams are just some of the types of information that you can access through the library's databases. A descriptive list of databases is available at the library's website. What does My List mean? The My list feature allows you to save up to 10 titles in up to 20 different lists for up to 90 days. My List is useful for keeping a list of books that you may want to read in the future or have enjoyed in the past. You must log into your account first to save your lists. Once you are logged in, you can access saved My Lists by clicking on the My List link located in the upper right corner of the catalog. Note if you click on any of the location links like All Locations, Children's, Media, Banning, Helen Murphy, Main Street, Oak View, Genealogy you will be logged out of your account. Use the New Search or Advanced links if you wish to remain logged in. What does location mean? The library has holdings in 5 different buildings, the Central Library at 7111 Talbert Ave, Banning at 9281 Banning Ave, Helen Murphy at 15882 Graham St, Main St at 525 Main St, and Oak View at 17251 Oak Lane. Media, Children's, and Genealogy collections are all housed in the Central Library. Media is a collection of audiovisual items like CDs, DVDs, and Audio books. Back to Top What does Request item mean? Request item allows you to be placed on a waiting list for a book that is checked out or on order. This service costs $1.00 and is non-refundable once you place the request. You pay when you pick up the book. The library will call you when the book is ready to be picked up. You cannot be placed on a waiting list for Media items (CDs, DVDs, Audio books) or items currently checked in. What does call no. mean? Call no. is an abbreviation for call number, the number used to find the book on the shelf. After you do a catalog search for a book and see that the status is checked in, you can find the book by writing down the call number and searching the shelves. Library books are organized by call number and many public libraries use the Dewey Decimal call number system. Fiction (made up stories) are shelved by the author's last name. Non-fiction (real and factual) are shelved by subject with a Dewey number. For example, Gone with Wind would be shelved alphabetically in the fiction "M" section with a call number of FIC Mitchell, M. Non-fiction books like Cooking A to Z would be shelved numerically in the 640 cooking subject section. All Children's books are identified by an X in front of the call number. Large print books have SS (for sight savers) in the front. Mysteries have MYS, Science Fiction has SF, Story Collections have SC, Reference books (use in library only) have a R, and Young Adult books have YA preceding the call number. Media item call numbers are CD for compact disc, DVD or VHS for videos, BOCA for audio book on cassette, BOCD for audio book on CD, BOMP for audio book on MP3, and BOPA for audio book on playaway devices. What does keyword search mean? The library keeps track of items with records that contain the title, author, subject, and summary description. When you use keyword to search for an item, the system searches all areas of the record: the title, author, subject, and summary. So a keyword search of homer would retrieve a record with a title of Homer's Odyssey, another title called The Far Reaches by author Homer Hickam, and a Bob Dylan music CD that has the song Open the door, Homer in the summary description. If you knew two pieces of information like the author and title you could do a keyword search for homer reaches to narrow in on author Homer Hickam's book. With keyword search the exact order of the words does not matter so you may do a keyword search for reaches homer far to retrieve Homer Hickam's book. However, you do need to be exact in spelling. If you did a keyword search with a misspelled homor, you would not get any search results. What does browse or starts with mean? As written above in the keyword section, library records contain title, author, subject and summary description. When you use a Starts with (browse) search, you do not have to have the exact spelling, but you do need to know the difference among title, author, and subject. Using author Homer Hickam's book as an example, you see that the title is The Far Reaches and the subject is Marine Corps -- Fiction. So you can do a title search for the far rea to see all the books that begin with far rea. You can also do an author starts with search but you need to enter the search as lastname, firstname for it to work. So for an author browse search you could enter hickam, homer. Finally, if you want to do a subject search you can enter marine corp which will give you many subject listings but you can scroll down to marine corps -- fiction. With a browse search you do not have to be as exact in spelling because you will always get some results, but you have to be somewhat close. Doing an author browse search of hickum, homer would put you far down on the listing so you would have to scroll backwards many times to find hickam. In general, a browse search is handy for title searches when the words are common words. A title browse search for gone with the wind would be faster to locate than a keyword search with those same terms. Back to Top