Search Tips

Some basic facts:

• Every word matters. Generally, all words in the query will be used;
• Searches are always case insensitive. A search for Chernobyl Accident is the same as a search for chernobyl accident;
• Generally, punctuation is ignored, including @#$%^&*()=+[]\ and other special characters;
• Common articles or determiners, i.e. stop words, such as the, a and for are usually ignored.

Describe what you need with as few terms as possible.

The goal of each word in a query is to narrow the focus. Since all words are used, each additional word limits the results. If limited too much, a lot of useful information will be missed. Starting with fewer key words will help decide which words need to be added to refine the next search. For example, chernobyl accident is a simpler way to search for information about the Chernobyl accident than using chernobyl accident radiation doses.

Choose descriptive words.

The more unique the word is, the more relevant the results. General words, such as reactor and nuclear are usually not needed. Keep in mind, however, that even if the word has the correct meaning but it is not the one most people use, it may not match the pages you need. For example, chernobyl accident is more specific than reactor accident.

Search Results

Search results display the bibliographic information of a record. Where the full-text of a record is available in INIS, the title of the record points to its location. In cases where the full-text is not available in INIS, the title may point to an external source, such as a DOI, PURL or the link to the full-text.

The full list of author names is displayed in the compressed view of the search results. Hovering over the author name displays the corresponding author affiliation(s).

Metadata

Bibliographic information is organised by metadata, with each metadata field showing the corresponding information.

Working with the search results

The icons to the right of the title in each record in the search results allow the following actions: View Metadata (), Export/Download Citation (), Export to PDF, HTML, EXCEL or XML format (), Print (), Permalink () and Translate ().

Highlighted search terms

Search terms are highlighted within the search results. For a free text search, the search terms are highlighted wherever a corresponding match occurs. For searches within a particular metadata field, the search terms are highlighted only against the corresponding metadata field.

Extending search results

Search results can be extended further by clicking on the hyperlinks within the record’s bibliographic information. For example, the ISSN for a journal article appears as a hyperlink in the search results. Clicking on the link will perform a search that displays all the records with the matching ISSN.

Manage citations

Search result(s) can be exported as references in different ways as illustrated below:

Export to Microsoft Word in APA citation format

• Click on the citation icon ()
• Under Download Citation click on the option Plain Text. A new window opens displaying the citation.
• Copy/Paste the citation to Microsoft Word or any other text editor for further editing.

Direct Export

To export references directly to your RefWorks or Mendeley account:

• Click on the citation icon ()
• Under Export Citation click on the name of the reference manager to which you wish to export references to. A new window opens up with the option to log in to your reference manager account.
• Once logged in, the references are automatically imported.

Offline Export

Many popular reference managers such as EndNote allow importing references using a file. Usually, this file contains the references in a specified format, such as the Research Information Systems (RIS) format. IRS exports several metadata fields including Type of Reference, Author, Abstract, Title, Journal Title, Volume, Issue, Report Number, ISSN, ISBN, DOI and URL.

To export references in RIS format:

• Click on the citation icon ()
• Under Download Citation click on the option RIS. A file containing all the references is downloaded to your device.

Standard Search

The Standard Search box provides excellent results for most search requirements. It searches for keywords that appear anywhere in the INIS repository (e.g. in the full-text of the document, Title, Abstract, Authors, Descriptors etc.).

A drop down selector – Insert Unicode - has been added to the search tab. This makes it easier to insert Unicode characters when conducting searches

Writing your own queries

If more specific information is needed using the Standard Search box, a query can be written following the guidelines below:

For example,

nuclear reactor -title:chernobyl language:English descriptors:"reactor accident"

will find documents in English on nuclear reactors with the phrase reactor accident in Descriptors excluding those with the word chernobyl in the title.

For further details, see Write Your Own Queries.

Free text search

IRS provides the following free text search options - Everywhere, Bibliographic only or Full-text only.

Everywhere

By default, free text terms in a query are searched everywhere in the INIS repository, including the full-text of INIS Non-conventional Literature (NCL) and bibliographic metadata.

For example, for the query

nuclear reactor language:English descriptors:"reactor accident"

the free text terms nuclear and reactor will be searched in the full-text and bibliographic metadata fields, such as Title, Abstract etc.

Bibliographic only

With this option, the free text terms in the query are searched only within the bibliographic metadata. The full-text of NCL documents is not searched.

For example, for the query

nuclear reactor language:English descriptors:"reactor accident"

the free text terms nuclear and reactor will be searched ONLY in the bibliographic metadata fields, such as Title, Abstract etc.

Full-text only

With this option, the free text terms in the query are searched only within the full-text of NCL documents. Bibliographic metadata is not searched.

For example, for the query

nuclear reactor language:English descriptors:"reactor accident"

the free text terms nuclear and reactor will be searched ONLY in the full-text of INIS NCL documents.

Facets Search

The facets search feature enables further filtering of a query by specific metadata such as Subject Category and Publication Year. Once a search is performed, the facets filter options appear in the search results page separated by category. By clicking on a filter option under a category (example: Subject Category, Publication Year), the search results are filtered to the selected option.

The filter can be cleared by clicking the icon against each option or by clicking on the specific filter option on the top navigation panel as shown below.

RSS 2.0 Feed

IRS supports subscription of queries through RSS 2.0 format. Once a search is performed, the RSS 2.0 feed for the particular search can be subscribed by clicking on the Subscribe link in the search results page. The resulting feed can be added to any RSS 2.0 feed reader or bookmarked in the web browser for further use. At any given time, the feed will list the best matched search results (maximum of 100) for the particular query.

Advanced Search

Using Advanced Search

The Standard Search box provides excellent results for most search requirements. However, if a more precise search is needed, the query builder form on the Advanced Search allows you to describe precisely where and how you want to search. This query will appear in the Advanced Search query box.

It has tools that enable you to describe precisely where and how you want to search. You can construct your query using the query builder form on the advanced search page, and your query will appear in the Advanced Search query box.

Constructing queries

For those not familiar with writing queries, using the query builder is the simplest way to utilize Advanced Search. The options chosen will be reflected in the Advanced Search query box.

1. In the Include section, specify either All Words, to include all of the search terms, or Exact Phrase and then enter the word or phrase to be found. Words entered with Exact Phrase will appear together in the results. Words entered with All Words will appear anywhere in the results, but not necessarily together.

   Example: All Words and reactor chernobyl will return results with reactor and chernobyl. Exact Phrase and TRIGA reactor will return results for 'TRIGA reactor' and 'TRIGA reactors' but not 'TRIGA nuclear reactor'.

   All words and Exact Phrase will search for terms in all the fields (in the full-text of the document, Title, Abstract, Authors, Language, Country of publication, Descriptors, Subject Category).

   To limit your search to specific fields, specify the field to be searched, and then enter the word or phrase to be found. E.g. Country of publication and France will return results where the Country of publication field is France.

2. To search additional fields, click the Add another link, and then repeat step #1.

3. To exclude certain results, select fields and enter terms in the But do not include section. For example, to find documents on reactor accidents but to exclude chernobyl, select Anywhere and then enter chernobyl.

4. To exclude additional terms, click the Add another link, and then repeat step #3.

5. Once the query has been constructed, review it in the Advanced Search query box, and then click Search.

Writing your own queries

To write your own queries, type them directly into the Standard Search query box.

For example,

nuclear reactor -title:Chernobyl language:English descriptors:"reactor accident"

will find documents in English on nuclear reactors with the phrase "reactor accident" in Descriptors but excluding the word chernobyl in the title.

For details, see Write Your Own Queries.

Write Your Own Queries

To write your own queries, type them directly into the Standard Search query box.

For example,

nuclear reactor -title:chernobyl language:English descriptors:"reactor accident"

will find documents in English on nuclear reactors with the phrase reactor accident in Descriptors but excluding the word chernobyl in the title.

Search fields

The Advanced Search makes it possible to indicate the kind of information to be found by specifying a field. Below is a list of commonly used fields:

Field Name	Example
Abstract	abstract:radiation
Author	author:Marks
Country of publication	country:Sweden or country:"United States"
DEI	DEI:"reactor accidents"
DEC	DEC:"reactor accidents"
Language	language:English
Ref. Number	rn:42027087
Primary Subject	primarysubject:"elementary particles"
Title	title:"nuclear reactor"
Publication Year	year:2007

To create a search, specify a field, followed by a colon ':', followed by a word or value. For example:

author:Marks

will find documents with the word Marks in its author field.

Not specifying a field will search in all fields. The following query will look for Marks in the Author field, and the word reactor in all fields:

author:Marks reactor

Use double quotes to look for more than one word within a specified field:

author:"Marks Viktor"

Boolean operators

Search terms may be combined using the Boolean operators AND, OR and Minus(-) for NOT.

Boolean operators must be ALL CAPS. However, field specifiers and words or values are not case sensitive.

AND / OR

AND is the default operator when more than one field is specified. In an AND operation, only results that meet all field constraints will be returned.

Use OR to find all results that match one (but not necessarily all) of several field constraints.

For example, to search for results with chernobyl in the Title, and either source terms or fission products release in Descriptors, use:

title:chernobyl descriptors:("source terms" OR "fission products release")

Minus '-'

The NOT operator is denoted by the Minus '-' sign. It excludes all results that contain the term after the Minus '-' sign. The '-' symbol must not be followed by a space. To search for results described by reactor but not TRIGA use:

reactor -TRIGA

Range queries

Range queries enable the user to search for results where field values are between the lower and upper range specified by the query. Range queries are specified using the Range operator, written as two consecutive dots.

Examples:
year:2007..2009

will return results with a publication year between 2007 and 2009, inclusive ;

year:2007..

will return results with a publication year after and including 2007;

year:..2007
will return results with a publication year prior to and including 2007.

INIS Multilingual Thesaurus (feature only available in desktop mode)

To search using the INIS Multilingual Thesaurus, use the Advanced Search query builder and follow the steps below:

1. Using the Advanced Search query builder, select one of the following fields: Descriptors, DEI or DEC.
2. A dropdown list of languages appears. Choose the language in which you want to use the INIS Thesaurus.
3. When you start typing the text for the selected field, an auto-populated list of descriptors appears in the chosen language.
4. Select a descriptor from the auto-populated list. A word block will appear on the right side of the Advanced Search query builder, showing the relation to the selected descriptor.
5. Click on a descriptor to replace the one that was originally selected in the query builder.
6. In case of languages other than English, the equivalent English term from the INIS Thesaurus is used to search. The English equivalent search term is displayed under the word block. The same term is also highlighted in the search results.

INIS Authorities

Subject Category, Journal and Report fields in Advanced Search can be searched using INIS Authorities.

In Advanced Search:

1. Select one of the following fields – Subject Category, Journal or Report.
2. A drop-down list appears with options to further refine the search. For Subject Category, you can search by either Code or Title. For Journal, you can search by ISSN, CODEN or Title.
3. Selecting an option from the drop down list loads an auto-populated list from the INIS Authorities.

Browse

A Browse feature has been added to the IRS, to enable quick access to information and to perform searches. The Browse button is available on the header menu from any IRS page.

User Profile

User registration for the INIS repository is provided through NUCLEUS, the common access point to the IAEA's scientific, technical and regulatory information resources. Once a user account is created in NUCLEUS, the user has access to many other IAEA resources as well.

For new users, the Register link will open the registration page. Once registered, the Sign In link can be used to log on to the INIS website. User account information can be managed from the Edit Profile link which shows up when clicking on your account name.

Users within the IAEA are automatically identified.

My Selection

My Workspace

My Workspace is a collection of search results saved by the user for later retrieval. For logged-in users, a Save () icon appears against each search result in the search results page. Clicking on the Save icon, saves the search result to My Workspace. My Workspace can be accessed under the menu item My Account.

Multilingual User Interface

The IRS website can be viewed in any of the following languages: Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese, English, French, German, Japanese, Persian, Russian and Spanish. The user can choose a language from the dropdown list that appears in the header section of each page, as shown below. When a user signs in, the preferred language saved in the user profile (My Settings under My Account) is automatically applied (see My Settings). This language preference can be changed any time during a session from the dropdown list in the header without changing the default language chosen in the user profile. The next time the user signs in, the language setting will revert back to that chosen in the user profile.

Cross-Language Search

Cross-language search enables simultaneous searching of a query in the following languages: Chinese, English, French, German, Japanese, Russian, and Spanish. This feature is integrated with the Advanced Search interface. Cross-language search applies only to the search terms specified as All Words, Exact Phrase or Anywhere in the Advanced Search query builder. When the user selects either All Words, Exact Phrase or Anywhere, a small window appears on the right side of the query builder. The user can choose the languages by selecting the appropriate check boxes. The language preference is preserved until the query is executed. Once the query is executed, the translated terms are highlighted in the search results.

Search History

For easy access to past queries, a search history of the user's past 10 queries is displayed on the search results page as shown below. The list under Search History shows only the past unique queries executed by the user.

Unicode Characters

Since 2011, INIS includes the Unicode character set, UTF-16.Unicode characters are searchable in metadata fields such as Abstract, Author and Title. Previously, characters such as â, ñ, ä, and ô were substituted using standard renderings. For example, the ä in Schäfer would be rendered as Schaefer.

In order to search records created with both the old and new methods, IRS automatically searches for records input with the old character renderings when Unicode characters are used in a search. For example, when a user searches for author:Schäfer, IRS automatically performs the search author:Schäfer OR author:Schaefer. This is true when using both the simple and advanced search interfaces.

A complete list of Unicode characters, and their equivalent additional characters searched automatically, is below:

Unicode character	Additional 'OR' search
â	a
ñ	n
ä	ae
ô	o
à	a
ö	oe
á	a
ò	o
æ	ae
ó	o
å	aa
ø	oe
ç	c
ß	ss
é	e
ù	u
ê	e
ü	ue
ë	e
ú	u
è	e
û	u
ï	i
î	i
ì	i
í	i
þ	th

Note: Please be aware that the reverse is not true — characters searched with the old-style renderings are not automatically searched with the equivalent Unicode characters.