SearchEngine:
How to search
Topics
Once the Search button is enabled - indicating that the database has been loaded,
enter your request, see entering a search request, in
the 'Enter query:' box, (you may have to click in the box first, before the
cursor appears), then press the Search button.
On terminating the search, all resulting documents are listed in the results
box. If no matching documents were found, a message appears to this effect.
The results list is ordered by the number of word hits, that is, the number
of matching words in the document, from the highest to the lowest. Double clicking
on any of the documents listed will cause the browser to load that document.
Obviously, to continue searching after loading another document, you must first
return to this page.
A search request consists of words and Boolean operators. Don't be frightened
by the terminology, you don't need a degree in Computer Science to use this
applet. All words are case insensitive, which means that Hello is the
same as HELLO is the same as hElLo. The Boolean operators
are the following, and they all have the same meaning in English as their mathematical
meaning:
- AND. Use the symbol '+' or '&'. Notice that the word
'AND' can not be used.
Search for all occurrences of one word AND another word. Documents which have
only the one, or only the other, or neither, are excluded.
- OR. Use the symbol '-' or '|. Notice that the word 'OR'
can not be used.
Search for all occurrences of one word OR the other word. Documents which
have neither word are excluded.
- NOT. Use the symbol '!'. Notice that the word 'NOT' can not be
used
Search for all occurrences of any word except the given word. Documents which
have the given word are excluded.
In addition there is the wild-card (symbol '*') which means "and
ending with anything", for example, word* could be word,
or words, or wordsworth, etc.
For the Computer Scientists; more than one operation can be applied, though
they are implemented as read, from left to right, that is, they have equal precedence
and left associatively.
Let's try a few examples, you've found a space agency site, and you want something
about the Sputnik or Sputnic or ... how is that word spelled? Type:
Sputnik | Sputnic
which means "search for the word Sputnik OR Sputnic". You could also
try using the wild-card, thus:
Sputni*
which means "search for anything beginning with Sputni". After all
you may not be the only one who doesn't know the correct spelling - my money's
on Sputnik, however.
Now let's say you're looking at an animal interest site, and you want to find
something on birds, or bees, but not lions. You would type:
bird* | bee* & !lion*
which means "anything beginning with bird OR anything beginning with bee
AND NOT anything beginning with lion".
You can fine tune your search, specifying where the engine should look by selecting
one or more of the radio buttons above the results panel.
- The title button searches words within the <TITLE> of the
document.
- The headings button searches words within standard HTML heading
tags, <H1..H6>, or <CAPTION>.
- The lists button searches words within standard HTML list tags,
<DT> or <LI>.
- The body button searches words not in title, heading or
list tags.
Copyright
© 1987 - 2001 Rational Software Corporation
| |
|
Process Engineer Toolkit >
Search Engine >
