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ES&H Search Tips
The following tutorial is provided to assist you in acquiring
the most valid query results possible. The information provided
in the form of your queries determines which documents will be
returned for your review. You should enter query words that
describe the subject you are interested in. The information
below introduces how to write queries, and covers:
How to Write Basic QueriesYou can write a basic query using words and
phrases, separated by commas. If you want to see documents
about using text editors to create Web documents, you can
start with a single-word query, such as:
- editor
In this case, your query finds all the documents that
include the word "editor." However, this search would
include not only documents about text editors, but also
documents about people who are editors. (You don't have to
specify the plural form, because a basic search includes
stemmed variations, such as "editors.") Documents about the
Web that did not include the word "editor" would not be
retrieved.
To ask for more specific results, you could enter several
words or phrases, separated by commas, that describe the
subject more precisely, such as:
- text editor, document, web
In this case, your query finds documents that contain
"text editor," "document," or "Web." (Case doesn't matter in
queries: a word entered in lower case will match words in
upper case, lower case, or mixed case.) The most relevant
documents, such as those that discuss creating HTML
documents for the Web using a text editor, will appear at
the top of the results list.
How to Incorporate Operators
You can make your queries more specific by
combining the words you used for basic queries with
operators. Operators are special words that are used to
indicate logical relationships between the descriptive terms
that make up your query.
Basic Operators
Here are basic operators that you can specify as part of
queries.
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Operator
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Description
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AND
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Finds documents that contain all of the search
elements you specify.
Ex: nuclear AND workers
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OR
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Finds documents that show evidence of at least
one of your search elements.
Ex: nuclear OR workers
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NOT
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Finds documents containing the word preceding it
and excludes documents containing the word that
follows it.
Ex: nuclear NOT control rods
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<NEAR>
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Finds documents containing specified search
terms, where the closer the search terms are within
a document, the higher the document's score.
Ex: nuclear <NEAR> control rods
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<SENTENCE>
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Finds documents that include all of the words
you specify within the same sentence.
Ex: nuclear <SENTENCE> pressurized water reactor
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<PARAGRAPH>
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Finds documents that include all of the search
elements you specify within a paragraph.
Ex: nuclear <PARAGRAPH> boiling water reactor
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<THESAURUS>
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Thesaurus operator that searches for documents
containing words that are synonyms for the word you
specify.
Ex: <THESAURUS> altitude
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,
(comma)
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Finds documents containing at least one of the
words specified, ranking them using "the more, the
better" approach, so documents with the most
evidence of the words searched for are given the
highest rank.
Ex: nuclear, reactor, pressurized, accident
|
NOTE: AND, OR, and
NOT are treated as operators by default, and do
not require brackets. If you want to use them as literal
words, place them in double quotes. All other operators must
be placed within brackets.
More About Operators
Here are some additional operators that you can specify
as part of queries.
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Operator
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Description
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?
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Wildcard operator that represents any one
character. You can use a ? to specify
the first letter of a word.
Ex: DOE Order 420.?
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*
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Wildcard operator that represents one or more
characters.You cannot use a * to
specify the first letter of a word.
Ex: hand* (finds handbook, handle, handball, etc.)
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' '
(single quotes) |
Placing a word in single quotation marks finds
stemmed variations of the word. NOTE: The
default behavior is to find stemmed variations if
no quotation marks are used.
Ex. 'edit' (finds "edited", "editing", "edition", etc.)
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" "
(double quotes) |
Placing a word in double quotation marks finds
exact matches only, excluding stemmed variations of
the word.
Ex: "edit" (does not find "edited", editing", edition", etc.)
|
Query Examples
Using these examples, you can write queries
that will return exactly the information you want.
Finding Words
Most queries can be written by entering the words and
phrases you're interested in, separated by commas. If you
were looking for information about the Web or about using
laptop computers, you could enter:
- web, laptop computers
This query returns documents that contain the terms "Web"
(case doesn't matter in queries), "laptop computers," or
both. Your results list will display a ranked list of
documents, with the most relevant documents at the top of
the list.
Finding Phrases
Perhaps you want to see documents that refer to a series
of words that occur in a specific order, such as "Web
publishing with HTML". You could enter the whole phrase:
- web publishing with html
This query returns only documents that contain all of
these words in the exact sequence you specified, including
stemmed variations of the search terms.
Finding a Specific Subject
The simple query returned some documents about the Web,
some documents about laptop computers, and some about both
subjects. If your real interest is in accessing the Web
using a laptop computer, you can use the AND
operator to be more specific. You could enter:
- web AND laptop computers
This query returns only those documents that contain both
"Web" and "laptop computers" in the same document, so this
list will be shorter than the results of the query written
using commas. (You can enter AND in lower case
and it will still be treated as an operator.)
AND is treated as an operator unless it is
surrounded by quotation marks. So if you want to use the
word "and" as part of a phrase, place it inside quotation
marks. For example, to search for the phrase "addresses and
URLs", you would enter:
addresses "and" URLs
Excluding Terms
You might want to specifically exclude certain documents
from your results list. For example, you might want to see
documents about most Web browsers, but you're not interested
in Lynx. You could enter:
- web browser NOT lynx
This query returns only documents referring to Web
browsers that do not also mention Lynx. If a document
includes both "Web browser" and "Lynx," it will be excluded.
Last
modified: Wednesday July 28 2004
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