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You can search entire documents by entering words, phrases, and plain language like what many web search engines use.

Search terms

In a search form enabled with the Internet query parser, users can enter words, phrases, and plain language. The Internet parser does not support the Verity query language (VQL).

Words

To search for multiple words, separate them with spaces.

Phrases

To search for an exact phrase, surround it with double-quotation marks. A string of capitalized words is assumed to be a name. Separate a series of names with commas. Commas aren’t needed when the phrases are surrounded by quotation marks.

The following example searches for a document that contains the phrases “San Francisco” and “sourdough bread”: 

"San Francisco" "sourdough bread"

Plain language

To search with plain language, enter a question or concept. The Internet Query Parser identifies the important words and searches for them. For example, enter a question such as:

Where is the sales office in San Francisco?

This query produces the same results as entering: 

sales office San Francisco

Including and excluding search terms

You can limit searches by excluding or requiring search terms, or by limiting the areas of the document that are searched.

A minus sign (–) immediately preceding a search term (word or phrase) excludes documents containing the term.

A plus sign (+) immediately preceding a search term (word or phrase) means that returned documents are guaranteed to contain the term.

If neither sign is associated with the search term, the results can include documents that do not contain the specified term as long as they meet other search criteria.

Query syntax

The query syntax is like the syntax that users expect to use on the web. Queries are interpreted according to the following rules:

  • Individual search terms are separated by whitespace characters, such as a space, tab, or comma, for example:

    cake recipes

  • Search phrases are entered within double-quotation marks, for example:

    "chocolate cake" recipe

  • Exclude terms with the negation operator, minus ( - ), or the NOT operator, for example:

    cake recipes -rum

    cake recipes NOT rum

  • Require a compulsory term with the unary inclusion operator, plus sign (+); in this example, the term chocolate must be included:

    cake recipes +chocolate

  • Require compulsory terms with the binary inclusion operator AND; in this example, the terms recipes and chocolate must be included:

    cake recipes and chocolate