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Help on Searching

Wildcards

This table shows the wildcard characters that can be used for searching.
Wildcard Characters
Wildcard Description
? Question. Specifies any single alphanumeric character.
* Asterisk. Specifies zero or more alphanumeric characters. Avoid using the asterisk as the first character in a search string. Asterisk is ignored in a set, [ ] or an alternative pattern { }.
[] Square brackets. Specifies one of any character in a set, as in "sl[iau]m" which locates "slim," "slam," and "slum." Square brackets indicate an implied OR.
{} Curly braces. Specifies one of each pattern separated by a comma, as in "hoist{s, ing, ed}" which locates "hoists," "hoisting," and "hoisted." Curly braces indicate an implied AND.
^ Caret. Specifies one of any character not in the set as in "sl[^ia]m" which locates "slum" but not "slim" or "slam."
- Hyphen. Specifies a range of characters in a set as in "c[a-r]t" which locates every word beginning with "c," ending with "t," and containing any letter from "a" to "r."


Searching for wildcards as literals
To search for a wildcard character in your collection, you need to escape the character with a backslash (\). For example:

To match a literal asterisk, you precede the * with two backslashes: "a\\*"

To match a question mark or other wildcard character: "Checkers\?"
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Searching for special characters as literals
The following non-alphanumeric characters must be preceded by a backslash character (\) in a search string:
  • comma (,)
  • left and right parentheses ( )
  • double quotation mark (")
  • backslash (\)
  • at sign (@)
  • left curly brace ({)
  • left bracket ([)
  • less than sign (<)
  • backquote (`)
In addition to the backslash character, you can use paired backquotes (` `) to interpret special characters as literals. For example, to search for the wildcard string "a{b" you can surround the string with backquotes, as follows:

`a{b`

To search for a wildcard string that includes the literal backquote character (`) you must use two backquotes together and surround the whole string in backquotes:

`*n``t`

Note that you can use either paired backquotes or backslashes to escape special characters. There is no functional difference in the use of one or the other. For example, you can query for the term: in the following ways:

\ or ``

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Operators and Modifiers

Details on the search operator and modifier types.

Evidence operators

Evidence operators can be used to specify a basic word search. A basic word search finds documents that contain only the word or words specified in the query.
Documents retrieved using evidence operators are not ranked by relevance unless you use the MANY modifier.
Evidence Operators
OperatorDescription
STEM Expands the search to include the word you enter and its variations. The STEM operator is automatically implied in any SIMPLE query. For example, the EXPLICIT query expression 

<STEM>believe


yields matches such as, "believe," "believing," "believer".'
WILDCARD Matches wildcard characters included in search strings. Certain characters automatically indicate a wildcard specification, such as * and?. For example, the query expression

spam*

yields matches such as, "spam," "spammer," "spamming."
WORD Performs a basic word search, selecting documents that include one or more instances of the specific word you enter. The WORD operator is automatically implied in any SIMPLE query.
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Proximity operators

Proximity operators specify the relative location of specific words in the document. Specified words must be in the same phrase, paragraph, or sentence for a document to be retrieved. In the case of NEAR and NEAR/N operators, retrieved documents are ranked by relevance based on the proximity of the specified words. Proximity operators can be nested; phrases or words can appear within SENTENCE or PARAGRAPH operators, and SENTENCE operators can appear within PARAGRAPH operators.

The following table describes each operator.


Numeric and date relational operators

The following operators are used for numeric and date comparisons.

Numerical and Date Relational Operators
OperatorDescription
= Equals
> Greater than
>= Greater or equal to
< Less than
<= Less or equal to
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Text Comparison Operators

Text comparison operators match words and parts of words. The following operators are used for text comparisons.

Concept Operators
OperatorDescription
AND Selects documents that contain all of the search elements you specify.
OR Selects documents that show evidence of at least one of the search elements you specify.
ACCRUE Selects documents that include at least one of the search elements you specify. Documents are ranked based on the number of search elements found.
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Search Modifiers

Modifiers are combined with operators to change the standard behavior of an operator in some way. For example, you can use the CASE modifier with an operator to specify that you want to match the case of the search word.
Search Modifiers
OperatorDescription
CASE Specifies a case-sensitive search:

<CASE>J[AVA, ava]

Searches for "JAVA" and "Java." If a search contains a mixed-case string, the search request will be case-sensitive.
MANY Counts the density of words, stemmed variations, or phrases in a document and produces a relevance-ranked score for retrieved documents. Can be used with the following operators:
WORD
WILDCARD
STEM
PHRASE
SENTENCE
PARAGRAPH

<PARAGRAPH><MANY>javascript <AND> vbscript

The MANY modifier cannot be used with the following:
AND
OR
ACCRUE
NOT Used to exclude documents that contain the specified word or phrase. Used only with the AND and OR operators.
Java <AND> programming <NOT> coffee
ORDER Used to specify that the search elements must occur on the same order in which they were specified in the query. Can be used with the following operators:
PARAGRAPH
SENTENCE
NEAR/N

Place the ORDER modifier before any operator:

<ORDER><PARAGRAPH>("server", "Java")

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