Content Searching Syntax

Because of the volume of documents that a Content Search must handle, some searches are faster than others. To determine the best search method for your particular task, consider these factors:

  • If you are performing a search for a word that contains a period at the end, such as Mr. or U.S.A., the search engine will assume that the final period is the end of a sentence and will not index it. Enter the words without the final period, as in Mr and U.S.A, to locate them.

  • Special characters, such as those used as wildcards and precedence expressions, are not indexed, so you cannot search for them. In such a case, you could simply enter your search without the characters. For a phone number, enter the number using spaces instead of parentheses or dashes, as in 781 555 3800.

  • A common problem is searching for a broad topic. If your Search Results list is too long for you to find the document for which you are looking, you should narrow your search. Include more operators or select Profile fields (Author, Entered by) for a more specific search. A search for a specific document containing the term Alimony is more easily found if you include other terms to narrow the search. For example, Alimony <AND> Caldwell <AND> December returns a more focused list than one of these search operators alone. The PHRASE and NEAR/n proximity operators are more useful in a case where a normal “AND” search might deliver a very large list.

If you are not familiar with the search engine syntax, see these sections:

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