JustCite
If you have never heard of JustCite, it is a legal search engine that cross references cases, legislation and articles covering all major law series in the UK. JustCite links to all major legal databases including Westlaw, Lexis Library, Justis, Casesearch and Bailii. This means that with one search you can find the case/legislation/article you are looking for, see whether it is still good law and then link through to that item by choosing one of the databases that the University subscribes to. We are offering a demonstration on Thursday 25th November at 10.30am for anyone who is interested – you can sign up on the classes page. Alternatively you can contact me at katharine.jackson@bodleian.ox.ac.uk and we can arrange a training session. Read on to find out a little bit more on the new JustCite.
With the new version of JustCite there have been major improvements: the speculative keyword searching now brings more relevant case law to the top; a new interface allows the user to see the relationship between documents much more easily and gives snapshots of the status of a case; further improvements to the deep linking to other databases.
- To find JustCite all you need to do it look for the database on Oxlip+.
- Once through to the sign in page it should automatically recognise you as being at Oxford and so all you need to do is click on the sign on the ‘Continue’ button.
- This brings you to the main search screen with the search box at the top. This allows you to search across everything.
The new JustCite homepage
Unlike the old site there is just one main box to search from the main page. This is their basic search and you can search for specific items such as cases or legislation or you can search by subject. There is also plenty of help from this page and so if you are lost there are plenty of options. This list of help options follows you around the database until you actually conduct a search!
If you are wanting to narrow your search down by material type or if you are wanting a more structured search then you can try the advanced search option.
JustCite advanced search
As you can see from the screenshot this defaults to the case search screen and you can see there are options to use a structured form. You can choose the relevant type of material from the left hand menu and this will alter the search form. If you want to go back to the simple search then the box is still at the top of the screen to use.
The results screen is quite simple and lists all the results in the middle and so if you are looking for a specific item this should not be very long. If you are looking for material on a subject then you can get a longer list of results and so you may want to use the left hand menu to narrow down your results by type of material, search the text of the results or filter by jurisdiction.
The document screen is made up of three panels. In the main panel in the middle you will see a summary of the item along with an overview and citation, cases considered, subsequent cases, legislation considered and articles. With all of these it will only show the most recent ones and so you need to select ‘show all’. If you do this you may find it useful to use the left hand navigational panel to move around the document rather than scrolling.
On the right hand side you will see a full list of citations and full text options.
Clicking on one of these will show you which databases you will find the full text of. You need to be careful about which one to choose – it should only let you choose one that we have access to but it is a little bit temperamental. As a Justis product it will always have Justis as the first option.
Remember if you need any help (and it’s not available from JustCite website) then contact me at katharine.jackson@bodleian.ox.ac.uk.
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