Gallagher Law Library - UW School of Law

Other Library Catalogs

Updated Oct. 7, 2009.

Library catalogs provide information about the books, documents, videos, and journals that a library owns. They often link to online resources, too.

Sometimes you use a catalog to find a source you already know – you just want to find out whether this library owns it, where it is located, and if it is already checked out.

At other times, you use a catalog to find books and other materials on a topic you are researching – you want to find out what is available, in this library or in other libraries.

Catalog for UW Libraries

The Gallagher Law Library catalog only includes material in the Law Library. All of the material held by other libraries on campus (and at the University of Washington campuses in Bothell and Tacoma) appear in the UW Libraries catalog.

UW Law WorldCat: A Combined Catalog

Combined catalogs bring together records from many libraries. Some of these permit faculty, students, and staff of the participating institutions to directly request and borrow books from other participating libraries. For instance, a UW School of Law student who is looking for a book that is not owned by the Gallagher Law Library could search WorldCat and place a request for the book that is owned by the University of Oregon Law Library (via Summit Libraries). The requested book is delivered to the Gallagher Law Library, or another UW library of your choice.

The new WorldCat catalog provides users with several options for selecting combined catalogs:

  • UW Law Library
  • Summit libraries
  • Major law libraries
  • Libraries worldwide

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OCLC FirstSearch & Wayfinder: Other Versions of WorldCat

The UW Restricted version OCLC FirstSearch, WorldCat uses an older platform to search for material owned by libraries around the world. It has a different look and feel from UW Law WorldCat (and can be a bit confusing to identify because of the Wayfinder banner). Use the advanced search features to identify specific titles.

The Wayfinder catalog provides a single search for locating materials owned by the major Washington libraries, with a look and feel that is similar to UW Law WorldCat

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Other Local Library Catalogs

Most other publicly accessible libraries make their catalogs freely available on the Internet, including:

See the Gallagher guide on Law Libraries in Washington State and the U.S. for additional sources, including websites with links to academic, public, and other libraries and library catalogs around the country and around the world.

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