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2-3. Full-text search (Mina Search Help)

Full-text search performs keyword searches of not just titles and tables of contents but also of the body and the captions contained in a material. There are also some materials for which you can download the full-text data.

2-3-1. About full-text data

  • The full-text data used in Mina Search has been generated from digitized images available in the NDL Digital Collections using optical character recognition (OCR) technology.
  • As of January 2024, full-text search is available for approximately 2.470 million digitized books, journals, doctoral theses, and other materials available via the NDL Digital Collections.
  • Full-text data is generated automatically by identifying characters contained in digitized images and is not checked or proofread manually.
  • Although we are working to make this system as accurate as possible, full-text data does sometimes include misidentified text that yields inappropriate search results.
  • The full-text data sometimes includes the symbol 〓 (geta), which stands in place of characters that were illegible or otherwise could not be recognized properly by OCR due to stains or fading.

2-3-2. Scope of full-text search

Full-text search is available for the following types of materials. Please also note that there are some materials that appear in full-text search results even though the full-text data itself is not available for download.

  • Full-text data generated from digitized materials using OCR (some books and journals)
    This full-text data is available for download using Mina Search.
  • Full-text data embedded in electronic files (e-books, e-journals, and doctoral theses collected as electronic files)
    Some of these have electronic files that can be accessed from links to the NDL Digital Collections.

2-3-3. Search fields for full-text search

When using full-text search, the number of displayed results may be smaller than your setting due to restrictions of the search system.

Search fields for full-text search

No.FieldDescription
1KeywordSearch by title, author, original publisher, table of contents, text, etc.
2Advanced SearchAdvanced search is available to refine or sort search results.
Search fields of full-text search
Image 1: Search fields of full-text search

Search fields for advanced full-text search

Use advanced search to specify search conditions. You can also specify how the search results are displayed.

Search fields

No.FieldDescription
1KeywordSearch by title, author, original publisher, table of contents, text, etc.
2TitleEnter the title you wish to search for.
3Author or editorEnter the author or editor you wish to search for.
4Original publisherEnter the name of the original publisher (organization or individual) you wish to search for.
5Original publication yearEnter the year of the original publication (four digits) you wish to search for or enter a starting and an ending year to search a range of years.
6NDC ClassificationEnter the NDC classification of the material you wish to search for. Search results show exact matches only.
7Search iconClick the Search icon to search using the specified conditions. Search results are displayed beneath the search fields.
8Clear all search conditionsClick this button to reset all search fields. The default setting displays all records.

Specifying how search results are displayed

No.OptionDescription
9Number of resultsSpecify the number of results to be displayed per page. Select from 20, 50, or 100 results.
10Sort optionSpecify how the results are to be sorted. You can sort title, year, and author in ascending or descending order.
11Display formatA list of search results is displayed by default. Select Thumbnails to display a thumbnail images of each material or select Table to display the search results as a table.
Search fields for full-text search (Advanced search)
Image 2: Search fields for full-text search (Advanced search)

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