If you are a JCE Online + subscriber, you can access the full-text of the article as it appeared in the Journal. Finding and accessing recent Journal articles online is now a reality for JCE Online + subscribers using JCE Index.

Users of JCE Index have found it a valuable online resource. To help you get started using the online JCE Index or to help you use it more effectively is the intent of the following information. We begin at the JCE Index Search page that you get to from the JCE Online home page by first clicking "Journal" in the navigation side bar and then clicking "JCE Index".

The JCE Index Search page (figure at left) is divided into two main areas: "Search for" and "Display of results". In "Search for" you select the field you wish to search (Author, Title, or Keyword) from the left pop-up menu (Author is selected in the figure). From the right pop-up menu, you constrain the search by selecting "Begins with" (selected in the figure and the default selection), "Contains", "Equals", or "Special". "Special" allows you to enter wild-card characters in the search text. You type in the text you wish to search for in the search text input field.

In "Display of results" you specify how the results will appear. You choose options for the display of the results from pop-up menus. You can have the results returned unsorted (reverse chronological order) or sorted by author, title, or volume. If you specify a field to sort on you can also choose to sort in descending order by checking the check box. The maximum number of citations you wish to appear on a page is chosen from another pop-up menu.

Once you have completed this form, click the Search... button and your search will be executed and the results displayed. The JCE Index Search Results page (figure at right) shows you the field searched and the text you searched for, the range of results and the total number found, along with the numbered citations. If the results are more than a page long, below the citations are Previous and Next buttons to display the previous or next set of results.

Rules for Searching

When you specify your search criteria, keep the following rules in mind.

• Searching is word based. This means that you are specifying criteria about the words that make up the field on which you are searching. If you search for Titles that begin with "Chem" you will find all titles that contain any word that begins with "Chem", not only those with titles that begin with "Chem".
• Searching is not case sensitive. Specifying search text of "Moore" or "moore" will produce the same results.
• You can specify more than one word. To find articles authored by both Moore and Holmes, enter "moore holmes" for the search text. This is equivalent to performing an "and" search.
• You can specify wild-card characters in your search string if you are using the Special method of searching. These wild-card characters are @ and *. @ represents a single character; * represents zero or more characters. For example, searching Author for carl@on will find both Carlson and Carlton. Searching Author for chamberl*n will find both Chamberlain and Chamberlin. These wild-card characters are useful when you do not know the exact spelling.

We hope that you find this information useful. If you were not sure how to use the Online JCE Index, this guide and the new online Search Tips should help you. If you are a successful user, we hope that you have found a tidbit to make you even more successful in your searching.

Literature Cited

1. Schatz, P. F. Computerized Index, Journal of Chemical Education. J. Chem Educ. Software, 1993, Special Issue 5.