Site navigation and search hints

From the home page you can search across the entire database and bring up records for all formats (Images, Newspapers, Oral Histories and Archives) and all regions (North Shore, Waitakere, and Rodney). The Search box is in the lower left corner.

From the home page, you can also limit your searching to specific formats or collections by using these links:

To navigate back to the Home page from anywhere on the site

• Use the Home link (top left) or the Home icon (upper right)
  

To navigate back to a previous page use your back arrow or use these links:browser

Click on any title banner to go to that part of the database

Searching and Browsing

Searching and Browsing

• search for particular words or phrases
• browse images and/or index records by place
• browse images and/or index records by subject
• browse images and/or index records by date

You can search for particular words or phrases that appear in the text by entering your search terms in the Search for box that appears on every screen. If you want to refine your search further, you can also click on Advanced Search.

You can browse by place by clicking the Browse place link. This brings up a list of images and/or records in alphabetic order.

You can browse by subject by clicking the Browse subjects link. This brings up a list of images and/or records based around a common theme such as schools, roads or geographical features.

You can browse images by date by clicking the Browse dates link. This brings up a list of images and/or records grouped by year.

Search Hints

Keyword searching is often the most effective way to look for what you want. Search terms can be entered as individual words, or you can narrow your search by looking for a specific phrase or group of words and/or numbers. You can also widen the search by using wildcard and truncation symbols to replace individual letters or groups of letters within or at the end of words.

• Phrase searching - use quotes around the phrase. ("Auckland Harbour Bridge")
• Wildcard - use ? to replace a single letter. (election? retrieves election and elections)
• Truncation - use * to replace a group of letters at the end of a word. (music* retrieves music, musical, musician, and musicians)

This is a keyword search on the subject headings assigned to each record. Enter your key words to bring up a list of records with that term in the subject heading.

Searches each record by the name of the author, photographer or organisation responsible for creating the original photo, article, oral history or archive.

This is a keyword search on the description of each record. Enter your key words to bring up a list of records with that term in the description field.

Searches each record by the date the original item was published, photographed etc.

If you are looking for newspaper articles written on a specific date, you can do this as a date search, but you can also do it as a keyword search by treating the date as a phrase, and entering it in this format - "DD Month YYYY" e.g. "11 July 1998".

This is a keyword search on the title of each record. Enter your key words to bring up a list of records with that term in the title field.