Financial Times 1992-2000

on stand-alone CD-ROM PC

Introduction

The Financial Times on Stand-Alone CD-ROM PC provides computerised access on CD-ROM to the text of back issues of one of Europe's leading business newspapers. It covers international companies, finance, economics, politics, management, and trade and industry. The CD-ROM includes issues from 1992 to 2000. See the Library guide FT.com : Financial Times via the Web for help on accessing more recent issues online.

[Back to the top]

Access to Financial Times 1992-2000

The period 1992-2000 for this title is only accessible from the stand-alone CD-ROM PC in the JB Morrell Library. A CD-ROM for each year within this period is provided in the Library: please ask at the Key Texts Desk for the CD-ROMs covering the years that you need.

  • Insert the relevant Financial Times CD-ROM into the CD drive
  • Wait until the drive light stops flashing, then click on Financial Times 1992-2000 from the menu provided
  • At this point you may be presented with a prompt: choose Open
  • A pop-up window with copyright information will appear - click on OK to continue

[Back to the top]

Help

Help can be displayed at any time by clicking Help (at the top of the screen) and selecting Help Index. Either browse through the help topics or search them by keyword. To return to the database either close the help window or click on the searching window.

[Back to the top]

Conducting your search

Searches are conducted by selecting options and entering keywords through the Homebase screen's submenus.

Publications

Click on the Publications button and you will see a line confirming the year of issues contained in the CD-ROM. Click Done to return to the Homebase screen and continue your search.

Entering a single word or phrase

To enter a search term click on the Words button. Type your chosen word or phrase in the highlighted box (1st). If you wish, you may enter two or more words in the same box as a phrase, for example, gordon brown. Alternatively you can split it into linked sections as explained below. Click Done when you have finished.

If you are happy with your search term and do not to specify a narrower date range within this publication year, proceed to the instructions for processing the search below.

Combining search terms

In the Words screen, you may combine words and phrases within the same search line. For example, gordon brown and tony blair will retrieve articles containing both phrases. Entering gordon brown or tony blair will retrieve articles which contain either name. To change the search term between phrases click on the default OR setting to cycle through the three terms available.

Alternatively you may wish to combine words or phrases on different search lines. Type your first term on the 1st line and your second, and possible third, on the other two lines. You can change the linking terms (AND, OR, NOT) between these lines in the same way. Remember using the link AND means that you will find articles in which all your terms occur, using OR means that you will retrieve articles in which any of your terms appear. Be careful of using NOT as it may well eliminate valuable results.

Using truncation

In the Words screen, you may use the "*" character to retrieve articles containing the words beginning with a given stem. For example, entering parliament* will retrieve articles which contain the word Parliament, Parliaments, Parliamentary etc. You may also use * to search for words which have alternative spellings, for example, gorbach*v.

Proximity searching

In the Words screen, you can search for words or phrases which appear within a specific distance of each other by putting a W and a forward slash (W/) and the number of words allowable after the first word. For example, market w/3 share will find all articles containing the word Share after the word Market, within three words.

Searching different parts of the article

If you wish, you can narrow down your search to specific sections of articles. While in the Words screen click on the drop down menu at the end of each line and select the area to be searched. The options are Anywhere (complete text), Headline (headline only), Journalist or Column (byline or column name) and ALL except HED or BYL (text excluding headline or byline). Click Done when you have finished.

Restricting your search by date

To narrow down the range of dates searched select the Dates button on the Homebase screen. Click the pointer on the start date box or end date box to set the months and days (inclusive) between which to search. Click Done when finished.

Processing the search

When you have finished entering the details of your search, click on the Info search button. When the search is completed the number of articles found is displayed.

[Back to the top]

Displaying your results

A list of the headlines of the articles that you have found is displayed. The scroll bar is used to move through the list. To display the full text of an article, move through the list and press Text when the one of interest is at the top of the screen. You can return to the headline display by clicking Hdlns. Alternatively, you can display the text of the next article by clicking on the Article ">>" button, or the previous article by pressing Article "<<".

Browsing through the text

You can either scroll through the text or move to the next highlighted keyword, or the previous highlighted, keyword by clicking the Hit "<<" or ">>" buttons respectively.

Displaying the context

You may choose to look at only those sections of the article where your chosen search terms appear. To see this "context" display, click the Context button while viewing the text or headline. Clicking Text will return you to the full text display.

Tagging articles

You may "tag" or mark articles of particular interest from the headline display or from the full text display by clicking on the button next to the headline. A red tick will appear in the box. You may then choose to save these items to a file (see Saving articles below).

[Back to the top]

New Searches

To amend or alter your search click on the Done button on the Headlines or Text screen to return to the Homebase. Select and alter your chosen options. To clear all searching options click on New Search. All changes are then erased as though you had just entered the database.

[Back to the top]

Saving articles

You can save the full text of articles to a file. With the full text displayed, click on the floppy disk icon. Select a Drive: available drives are either Drive A: (floppy disk) or Drive E: (zip disk). Type in a File Name and click on OK.

[Back to the top]

Printing articles

The stand-alone CD-ROM PC is not attached to a printer. You will need to take your downloaded files on your floppy or zip disk to a networked classroom or office PC to print.

[Back to the top]

Changing the year of publication

To search an earlier (or later) range of years you will need to exit the database, eject the current CD, select the appropriate CD that covers the date range you require and insert this CD into the drive.

[Back to the top]

To finish your session

To exit from the Financial Times at any stage, click File and select Exit freeway CD-ROM. Confirm that you wish to leave the software by clicking OK. Remove the CD from the drive by pressing the eject button under the CD drive. Wait while it opens, then carefully remove the CD and put it back into the container.

[Back to the top]

Other newspapers in the JB Morrell Library

The Library receives the print versions of the Guardian, The Times, The Sunday Times, Financial Times, Daily Telegraph, Observer and Independent. Current copies of these and other titles are kept in the Current Periodicals section.

Back copies of The Times (1785-1991), Guardian (1968-), Financial Times (1968-1991), Independent (1986-1991) and New York Times (1970-2000) are kept on microfilm: check the Library Catalogue for exact locations.

The Library has an online subscription to the Financial Times that covers the last five years. See the Library guide to FT.com: Financial Times via the Web for further details.

In addition, the Independent is also available on the stand-alone CD-ROM PC for the years 1992-1997, and the Guardian and Observer are available for 1996-1997.

Please check the Catalogue for full details of the holdings of titles.