Configure WorldCat Discovery to search more like FirstSearch
Applies to
- WorldCat Discovery
- FirstSearch
Answer
There is no single setting or guide that makes WorldCat Discovery search exactly like FirstSearch. Some of the difference is architectural rather than configurable: Discovery always defaults to a keyword search and applies FRBR grouping, while FirstSearch lets users select a base index and does not group results at all. A few FirstSearch query features, including proximity operators and index browsing, have no Discovery equivalent. See FirstSearch and WorldCat Discovery index differences for the full list of unsupported syntax.
For users who rely on FirstSearch's index-driven searching, the closest equivalent in Discovery is the Advanced Search screen. It supports up to 10 search boxes at once, each with its own index drawn from the databases selected, along with limiters for format, content type, language, year, and audience, and a choice of sort order. Selecting specific databases instead of searching everything and choosing indexes explicitly instead of relying on the default keyword search brings power users closer to the precision that FirstSearch's index searching allows.
Library staff can also adjust several settings in OCLC Service Configuration under WorldCat Discovery and WorldCat Local, Search Settings, to shape what the Advanced Search page shows by default:
- Default Grouping: set to Show all. This produces an ungrouped results list, the closest match to FirstSearch's non-FRBR display
- Advanced search default search indexes and Advanced search recommended indexes: setting Keyword, Title, and Author as the three defaults, then promoting Subject, ISBN, ISSN, and OCLC Number as recommended indexes, mirrors the base index list FirstSearch power users are used to picking from
- Default Sort and Advanced search sort order: Most Widely Held is documented as an "unclustered" view of results, which makes it the closest available match to FirstSearch's flat, ungrouped list. This is a reasoned recommendation based on that description, not a documented FirstSearch equivalence, so test it against your own users' expectations
- Search Expansion Settings (related terms, translated terms, local search expansion) and the spelling-suggestion setting: turn these off. FirstSearch does not expand or auto-correct queries, so disabling them gives the closest match
These settings narrow the gap for advanced users but do not eliminate it. Index browsing, proximity search, and Discovery's keyword-and-FRBR search algorithm are not configurable.