Search Syntax

Searching here uses simple query string syntax which supports the following operators:

  • + signifies AND operation
  • | signifies OR operation
  • - negates a single token
  • " wraps a number of tokens to signify a phrase for searching
  • * at the end of a term signifies a prefix query
  • ( and ) signify precedence
  • ~N after a word signifies edit distance (fuzziness)
  • ~N after a phrase signifies slop amount
  • To use any of the above characters literally, escape it with a preceding backslash (\).
  • A space between search terms implies the default operator of OR.
  • When upper case is used, the search is case-sensitive. Otherwise it is case-insenstive.

Examples

Searching : annot*
returns pages with Annotation, Annotations, annotate, annotated, etc.
Searching : Annot*
is case-sensitive and returns pages with Annotations, Annotation but not annotate.
Searching : annot* +object
returns pages with Annotation, Annotations, Annotated AND object.
Searching : getannotationobject\(\)
returns pages with GetAnnotationObject()
Searching : annot* | object
returns pages with Annotation, Annotations, Annotated and also returns pages with object.
Searching : load~4
returns pages including load, lead, head, goal
Searching : "load balance"
returns pages with the whole quoted phrase as opposed to pages that contain both load AND balance somewhere on the page.
Searching : load -balance
returns pages with contain load AND not do not also contain balance.
Searching : foo bar -baz
returns pages containing foo or bar as well as any pages that do not contain baz (which probably expands the results well beyond those containing just foo or bar). This is probably not the intention. This is because the default operator (implied by spaces) is OR. To return documents that contain foo or bar but do not contain baz, the search string would be foo bar +-baz or (foo bar) +-baz.