Characters removed from beginning of user-typed search

You can configure how WebPAC manages initial articles in search strings when performing searches for index tags 't' (Title) and 's' (usually used for Series). For a detailed discussion of this option's effects, see Initial Articles: Coordinating Cataloging Practices with User Searches.

Enter one of the following depending on how your library wants WebPAC to handle initial articles in search strings:

Desired System Behavior:	Enter:	Example:
Do not remove any initial articles from search strings.	; (space and semicolon)	The user enters "The New Yorker"; the system searches on "The New Yorker", returning results that start with "t". If you choose this behavior, your users must learn to omit initial articles from their searches if they want to return meaningful results.
Remove the default initial articles (the English-language words "a", "an", and "the" only).	; (semicolon only)	The user enters "The New Yorker"; the system searches on "New Yorker", returning results that start with "n".
Remove specific initial articles.	A list of specific articles. For example: a ,the ,le ,l',les ;	The user enters "L'enfant terrible"; the system searches on "enfant terrible", returning results that start with "e".

When you are finished, choose Enter to return to the OPAC options menu, or Esc to exit without saving your changes.

Creating a List of Specific Initial Articles

In Sierra 5.3 and later, the system uses this list of articles for title index searches in the Sierra Desktop Application for logins that have the Use same initial articles as OPAC enabled.

The list of initial articles must have the following format:

article,article,article;

For example:

a ,the ,le ,l',les ;

When creating this list, observe the following guidelines:

Entries in this option override the system default. If you want the system to remove "a", "an", and "the", you must include these articles in the list.
Articles can be either separate words, such as "the ", or attached to nouns, such as the "l'" in "l'enfant".

Adding non-English articles to the list of initial articles ignored in WebPAC searches can cause the omission of some English titles from the search results. For example, adding "los ", "la ", and "el " to the list causes searches for names such as "Los Angeles Times", "LA Times", and "El Paso Times" to fail. Likewise, adding the German article "die" causes the omission of titles such as "Die and Tool" or "Die Hard". Libraries with a primarily English catalog and relatively few non-English titles might prefer not to strip non-English articles from WebPAC title searches.

If an article is a separate word, you must include the trailing space to ensure proper indexing of the title; for example, "the ".
If an article is attached to a noun, do not include a trailing space; for example, "l'"
Do not enter a space before an article. The following example fails to remove the word "the" due to the preceding space:
a ,an , the ;