Search: New Term Search Capabilities

High-performance search capabilities now in IN-SPIRE replace the search mechanisms in previous versions.  The new search capabilities now provide much faster phrase searching, more flexibility of search words and phrases close to each other, as well as phrases that contain stopwords.  The new search text syntax can be used on datasets created using IN-SPIRE 5.0 and later (with the exception of realtime datasets, which currently require the old search syntax).  The new search syntax includes the following search elements: Single Words, Phrases, Choices, Ordered Phrases, Unordered Phrases, and Booleans (AND, OR, NOT).

Single Words

The specified word, which may include the wildcard characters (? And *), will match single words in the text.

1. The question mark (?) is a single-character wildcard that substitutes for a single character.
2. The asterisk (*) is a multiple-character wildcard that substitutes for one or more characters.

For example:

• defen?e will match documents containing the word defence or defense
• defen* matches documents containing the word defence, defense, or defensive

Phrases

A specific sequence of elements, which is defined within double quotes (“…”), will match phrases in the text.

For example:

• “chief prime minister” will match documents containing the phrase chief prime minister
  “german shepherd*” will match documents containing the phrase german shepherd or german shepherds

Ordered Phrases

An ordered sequence of elements defined within brackets and a leading asterisk (*) (optional) followed by an integer will match ordered phrases in the text.

For example:

• [volcano erupt*] will match documents containing the phrase volcano erupt or volcano erupting
  [*1 volcano erupt*] will match documents containing the phrase volcano erupt or volcano is erupting

Unordered Phrases

An unordered sequence of elements defined within brackets that includes a leading tilde (~) and an integer (optional) will match unordered phrases in the text.

For example:

• [~ volcano erupt*] will match documents containing the phrase erupting volcano or volcano erupting
• [~ 1 volcano erupt*] will match documents containing the phrase erupting the volcano or volcano is erupting

Choices

The specified choice list, which is defined within parentheses ((…)), will match one or more of the elements.

For example:

• “(ringed bearded) seal” will match documents containing either the phrase ringed seal or bearded seal
• [(“ringed seal” “sea lion”) habitat] will match documents with the phrase ringed seal habitat or sea lion habitat

Booleans (AND, OR, NOT)

Each Boolean operator (AND, OR, and NOT) is applied to the two elements that surround it in the search.  Capitalization is not ignored.  For example:

• seal AND “sea lion” will match documents containing the word seal and also containing the phrase sea lion
• lion OR “sea lion” will match documents that contain the word lion or containing the phrase sea lion
• lion NOT “sea lion” will match documents that contain the word lion but not containing the phrase sea lion