WISER Humanities: SOLO (Search Oxford Libraries Online)

Search suggestions

Finding a specific book in SOLO

Search for a specific book of your choice using the surname of the author and/or significant words from the title or use our examples

Enter “Demons dreamers Frankfurt” to find

Demons, dreamers, and madmen : the defense of reason in Descartes's Meditations / Harry G. Frankfurt.

Which editions are held in Oxford in which libraries?

Make sure you look at all available “versions” by clicking on the link:

Note you need to click on Hold title to reserve a book which is on loan, Request from stacks to get material brought from Bodleian stacks to a reading room and Patron functions to renew your books or change your password. The OLIS username is your University card barcode and the default password is your date of birth in the form 11Oct1965.

Search by subject for your topic

Search on a topic of your choice or use the following example search.

Enter “logic” in the search box

Refine your search

  1. Look at the drop-down options beneath the search box
  2. Click on “advanced” search to see how you can combine terms. Click on “simple search” to return.
  3. Click on help in the top right to see more search advice.
  4. Look at the options for refining your search on the right of the results list. These are subsets of your original search.
  5. Scroll down to the bottom of the screen to search on these related topics or creators without the original query terms.
  6. Click on the title of one of the references. Note the subject terms attached to the resource. Click on the hyperlinks to see other resources with the same subject term.

Selecting, saving, emailing and exporting references from SOLO

  1. Click in box next to Add to e-Shelfto select a record.

b.Login optional : You can either use the Guest e-Shelf or if you login using your Oxford Single Sign-On (see you can retain chosen records after you close your browser.

  1. From the e-Shelf select a record by clicking in the box next to it and then choose email and enter your email address and click on Send. Note you can also easily push the record to Refworks if you choose the Save option.

SOLO Articles and databases sampler

Select this tab and then try a subject search of your choice or use our example. You will need to select a subject area as well as keyword/s to search on and then click on Go

Choose subject area: English and then search on “Marriage Shakespeare Women”

Link through to full-text where it is shown as available. We may have the print copy so it is worth using the No Full text GetIt link and checking the OLIS catalogue. It is also possible to request an inter-library loan if we do not have it in stock.

Information about ILL at

Click on the link

to see the choice subject librarians have made for the sampler.

Note: We recommend you choose OxLIP+ and identify the most relevant databases for your subject for a thorough literature search.

OLIS: the Oxford Universities Library Catalogue OLIS allows you to be more precise in your searching than in SOLO and italso allows you to browse indexes and view cross-references. Patron functions such as renewing books and placing reservations are done in OLIS.

Try browsing the subject index in OLIS:

  1. Choose Connect via the web – then Start – then Browse in index.
  2. Enter a search term in the box eg “logic” and find LC Subjects in the drop-down menu.
  3. Type the suggested alternative term in the search box to see all the sub-divisions.
  4. Click on the hyperlinked subject term to view the records attached.

Locating online articles using OU E-journals

  1. Find the English Review bysearching on the title in the OU e-Journals. Click on Go to find the available full-text.
  2. See what happens when you choose between the search options Starts with, Contains and Exact. This could save you time.

Oxford Research Archive

You can find ORA records in SOLO or you could go to ORA direct and use the Browse option to see what is relevant to you. October 2008