This page contains information about USearch, the library's online catalog. Through USearch, you can find many online resources; however, not all resources will be discoverable through the catalog. You will want to search in a variety of places. Other reliable resource locations are referenced within this guide.
When searching in USearch, you can use the limiters on the left to confine your search results to online resources. To do this, simply initiate a search using the search box on the library homepage. To find the most online resources, make sure that All Libraries is selected from the drop-down menu.
Once your search results appear, locate the "Refine my results" area to the left of your search results and select "Full Text Online" and "Open Access" from the Availability options by clicking to the immediate left of each. If you are only interested in a specific resource type (e.g., book, article, etc.), then you also select that from the "Format" limiter within the "Refine my results" options. Once you have selected your desired filters, press the Apply Filters button to confine your search results to online resources.
Want to eliminate certain resource types or other items from your results, simply hover to the right of most limiters within the "Refine my results" area and click the red check box.
For example, to find only online materials, you can select the red check box to the right of the "Available in the Library" limiter. This will eliminate all items that are physical and in print.
Would you like to learn more about additional features in USearch which can be helpful for maximizing its research potential? Check out our USearch Help Page. Learn how to use the advanced search option. You can also email items, save searches, retrieve citations and permalinks, receive email alerts, personalize your results, search within journals, and so much more!
We have created a guide to help you utilize many of the options that are available in USearch. You can use search options to confine your search results to online resources. You can also find links to online resources within item records. To learn more, click on the link and/or watch the video below.
Google Scholar is another great place to search for online resources. Once you initiate a search in USearch, you can use the External Search filter to also search Google Scholar. To do so, simply click the Google Scholar link. A new page will open and search Google Scholar directly for you, using your search terms.
If you have selected Northwestern as your library, you can also view links to library resources directly in Google Scholar. "FindIT @ NU" links will appear to the right of search results if it is available online through the library. To learn how to log into your account, see the USearch link above.
If the FindIT @ NU link does not appear to the right of the text, you can still search the library catalog for the item. To do this, click the 
below the item information and then select "FindIt @ NU" which will engage a search and attempt to retrieve the item in the library's catalog.
In order to utilize these features, you will need to select Northwestern as your library. To do this, open Google Scholar and log into your account. Click on 
in the top left and select Settings. Then, select "Library links" from the left menu. If Northwestern does not appear in your libraries, enter Northwestern into the search box, press the magnifying glass, and check the box next to "Northwestern University - FindIt @ NU". Finally, select Save. Now, all of your Google Scholar searches will link to the library catalog to search and provide access.
Search Google Scholar directly by using this search box. You can link back to USearch by selecting the FindIt @ NU links below or beside each record. For more information, see the Google Scholar box on this page.