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Search Syntax

The following operators are valid:

AND, OR, XOR, ADJ, NEAR, WITH, SAME, NOT, NOT WITH, NOT SAME, NOT NEAR, NOT ADJ, Quotation marks " ".

See a description of each below.


AND

Use the and search operator to retrieve documents that contain both of the specified search terms. This operator places no condition on where the terms are found in relation to one another; the terms simply have to appear somewhere in the same document.

term AND term


OR

Use the or search operator to retrieve documents that contain one or both specified search terms. This operator places no condition on where the terms are found in relation to one another; one or both terms simply have to appear somewhere in the same document.

term OR term


XOR

Use the xor search operator to retrieve documents that contain either the first search term or the second term but not both terms.

term XOR term


ADJ

Use the adj search operator to retrieve documents in which the second search term is found in the same sentence as the first. The order in which you specify the search terms is the order in which the terms must be found in the document. You can modify the number of documents retrieved with this operator by specifying the maximum number of searchable words that can occur between your search terms in a sentence.

term ADJ[n] term

where, n, is used by the search engine to compute the maximum number of searchable words that can separate your search terms in the same sentence. The value of n can be between 1-99. This is optional.


NEAR

Use the near search operator to retrieve documents in which the second search term is found in the same sentence as the first. The order in which the terms appear in a sentence is unimportant. You can modify the number of documents retrieved with this operator by specifying the maximum number of searchable words that can occur between your search terms in a sentence.

term NEAR[n] term

where, n, used by the search engine to compute the maximum number of searchable words that can separate your search terms in the same sentence. The value of n can be between 1-99. This is optional.


WITH

Use the with search operator to retrieve documents in which the second search term is found in the same sentence as the first term.

term WITH term


SAME

Use the same search operator to retrieve documents that contain the second search term in the same paragraph or subparagraph as the first search term.

term SAME term


NOT

Use the not search operator to retrieve documents that contain the first search term you specify but not the second term.

term NOT term


NOT WITH

Use the not with search operator to retrieve documents that contain the first search term in a sentence but that do not contain the second search term in the same sentence.

term NOT WITH term


NOT SAME

Use the not same search operator to retrieve documents that contain the first search term in a paragraph or subparagraph but that does not contain the second term in the same paragraph or subparagraph.

term NOT SAME term


NOT NEAR

Use the not near search operator to retrieve documents in which the second search term does not satisfy the near condition for the first search term.

The second term must satisfy one of the following conditions:
1) in a different document than the first search term.
2) in a different paragraph than the first search term.
3) in a different sentence of the same paragraph as the first search term.
4) in the same sentence as the first search term and with more than n-1 searchable terms between the two search terms.

term NOT NEAR[n] term

where, n, is used by the search engine to compute the maximum number of searchable words that can separate your search terms in the sentence. The value of n can be between 1-99. This is optional.


NOT ADJ

Use the not adj search operator to retrieve documents in which the second search term does not satisfy the adj condition for the first search term.

The second term must satisfy one of the following conditions:
1) in a different document than the first search term.
2) in a different paragraph than the first search term.
3) in a different sentence of the same paragraph as the first search term.
4) in the same sentence as the first search term but the second term precedes the first.
5) in the same sentence as the first search term, with the first search term preceding the second search term, but with more than n-1 searchable terms between the two search terms.

term NOT ADJ[n] term

where, n, is used by the search engine to compute the maximum number of searchable words that can separate your search terms in the same sentence. The value of n can be between 1-99. This is optional.


Quotation marks " "

Use quotation marks (" ") to surround a sentence or expression that you want to appear in the search results.

Important exception:

the presence of a period (.) in an expression will guarantee erroneous results; this is particularly true when searching initials. However, placing the initials between quotation marks without a punctuation mark will resolve most problems;

when searching a sentence or expression using double quotation marks which also contains an apostrophe, the string must be entered with the addition of a backslash ( \ ) before the apostrophe.

Example: "St John’s Newfoundland" becomes "St John\’s Newfoundland".

"term1 term2 term3"

"St John\’s Newfoundland"


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