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Advancedsearch PDF

This document provides instructions for refining searches in Microsoft Word. It describes how to narrow search results from a previous search by confining the search to already returned documents. It also explains how to use the Word Assistant to help build search queries using options like word stemming, synonyms, and sounds-like matches. Finally, it outlines the different search options available, like match case, proximity, word stemming, sounds like and thesaurus, and how each can expand or limit search results.

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Fei Han
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184 views4 pages

Advancedsearch PDF

This document provides instructions for refining searches in Microsoft Word. It describes how to narrow search results from a previous search by confining the search to already returned documents. It also explains how to use the Word Assistant to help build search queries using options like word stemming, synonyms, and sounds-like matches. Finally, it outlines the different search options available, like match case, proximity, word stemming, sounds like and thesaurus, and how each can expand or limit search results.

Uploaded by

Fei Han
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Advanced Search

Refining your searches


If your search returns too many documents or provides too many matches in individual documents,
you can pair down the search results by confining the search to documents returned by a previous
search. Furthermore you can more narrowly define your search term, and use the general search
options and the Word Assistant. Alternatively, if your search did not provide the information you were
looking for, you can broaden your search query using the search options, for example:

Refining searches in progress


If you want to narrow a search further, you can refine or confine your search to documents listed in a
prior search. For example, you can first search for (and find) all documents containing “Survey”, and
then define a search query for that subset of documents. The result would be a subset of documents
that contain “Survey” and contain the new search string.

To refine a search:
1. Choose Edit > Search > Query to display the Search Results window. Select and show the
results of a previous search.
2. In the Search dialog box, refine or replace the query that produced the list of documents.

Note: If you used a simple text string for the search query, you might consider refining the search
Help query by using the search options, or by using Word Assistant. For more information, see Using Word
Assistant on the next page.

3. Press Ctrl. The button label changes from Search to Refine.


Start
4. Click Refine. This produces a Search Results list of documents that are a subset of the
previous list and that match the new query.
Advanced Search continued
Using Word Assistant

Word Assistant enables you to build a list of terms that will appear when you specify a search using
the Sounds Like, Word Stemming, or Thesaurus options. The resulting list shows you if the option you
are using is likely to return helpful results. If the list is too long or full of irrelevant words, you can
quickly construct a list of words to find by copying words from the Word Assistant dialog box and
pasting them into the search dialog box.

To use the Word Assistant with search options:

1. Choose Edit > Search > Word Assistant.


2. To check the available indexes or change the selection of indexes, click Indexes.
3. In the Index Selection dialog, select the indexes you want to use.
4. Select a search option (Sounds Like, Word Stemming, or Thesaurus) from the Assist
menu.
5. Enter the search word in the Word text box, and click Look Up.

To copy words from the Word Assistant dialog box:


Help
1. Choose Edit > Search > Query to open the Search dialog box.
2. Use the Word Assistant to generate a list of related words.
3. Double-click a word to search.
Start 4. Double-click and copy the word in the Word text box to the clipboard.
5. In the Search dialog box, select the Find text box, and paste in the selected word.
6. Repeat steps 3 through 5 for each word you want to use; separate each pair of words in
the Find text box with AND or OR.
Advanced Search continued
Setting the search options

You can expand your search term by using the search options Sounds Like, Word Stemming, or
Thesaurus. To determine if your choices will be useful in limiting your search, you can use the
Word Assistant to build a list of terms that will appear when you specify these options. For more
information, see Using Word Assistant.
You can limit your search term by using the search options Match Case and Proximity.

Help

Start
Advanced Search continued
To set the search options:
In the Search dialog box, select one or more of the options:

• Word Stemming finds words that contain part of (a word stem) the specified search word. It
applies to single words, not phrases; does not apply to words that contain wild-card
characters (*, ?); finds words that end in ing, ed, s, ion, etc., but not er; and cannot be used
with the Match Case option. Word Stemming works only for indexes built with this option.
• Sounds Like finds different spellings for proper names. It applies to single words, not
phrases; does not apply to words that contain wild-card characters; and cannot be used
with the Match Case option. Sounds Like works only for indexes built with this option.
• Thesaurus finds similar words that appear in the documents you are searching, not
necessarily all the similar words you might find in a complete thesaurus. It applies to single
words, not phrases; does not apply to words that contain wild-card characters; and cannot
be used with the Match Case option.
• Match Case limits the results of the search by finding only those documents that contain
words with the same capitalization. It can be used with a Boolean expression and with terms
that use wild-card characters. Characters matched by wild-card characters can be either
uppercase or lowercase.
• Proximity limits the results of simple AND searches to one pair of matches per
Help document—the pair closest together. The two matches must be within three pages or fewer
of each other. This option is useful for locating a document that concentrates on some topic
of interest.
Start
Proximity affects relevancy ranking in searches. The closer the matches are within a document, the
higher the ranking. Proximity does work with complex AND searches—such as, Safety AND (Valve OR
Requirements).

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