The Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) can be used in Keyword Expert searches, but not any of the basic Keyword searches.
If two or more words are entered without any Boolean operators, they will be searched as if connected with AND.
Operators may be in lower or upper case.
If AND, OR, or NOT are in a search phrase, put the phrase in quotes.
"nickel and dime"
"dazed and confused"
Enclose search terms and operators in parentheses to specify the order in which they are to be interpreted. Information within parentheses is interpreted first, then information outside parentheses is interpreted next.
(life OR death) AND philosoph*
If there are nested parentheses, the inner most parenthetical expressions are interpreted first, then the next, until the full search statement has been interpreted.
((song* OR poem*) AND (life OR death)) AND antholog*
A dash before a word acts as NOT.
cats -dogs
Put quotation marks around terms to be searched as a phrase:
"distance learning"
"gold standard"
Consider using quotes for titles phrases:
"lord jim"
"call of the wild"
The single character truncation (?) and multi-character truncation (*) symbols do not work within quotation marks.
Phrase searching can be done in both Keyword and Keyword Expert searches.
To do a proximity search, put search terms in quotation marks, followed by the tilde "~" symbol and a number. Proximity syntax can be used in Keyword and Keyword Expert searches.
"carol dweck"~3 finds carol and dweck within 3 words of each other.
"online learning"~5 finds online and learning within 5 words of each other.
Truncation can be used in Keyword, Keyword Expert, and Advance searches. Do not use in Browse searches.
For multiple character wildcard searches, use * to find 0 or more characters. The * may be used at the end or beginning of a word, as well as within a word.
revolution* will find: revolution, revolutionary, revolutionaries
child* will find: child, child's, children, childhood
*blogging will find: microblogging
*communications will find: telecommunications and communications
con*ion will find: conservation, convention, constitution
In Keyword Expert and Advanced search only, use ? to substitute for a single character:
organi?ation will find: organization and organisation
t?me will find: time and tome
encyclop??dia will find: encyclopaedia and encyclopoedia
revolution??? will find: revolutionary and not revolution, unless both words are in the same record.
The truncation symbol (*) cannot be used on these searches:
| Punctuation | Treatment | Search Examples | Will Match |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apostrophe + s ('s) | apostrophe in 's is ignored | women's midsummers |
women's OR womens midsummer's OR midsummers |
| Apostrophe with other letters, contractions | Searched | don't dont |
don't OR "don t" dont OR don't |
| Ampersand (&) | & is translated to "and" and matches against an ampersand or "and" | love & death | love and death |
| Comma (,) not followed by a space | Establishes an adjacency relationship between two characters or terms | william,faulkner | "william faulkner" |
| Comma (,) followed by a space | Ignored, but impacts relevance ranking | William, Faulkner | "william faulkner" |
| Colon (:) | Ignored | Biology: An Introduction | biology AND an AND introduction (consider putting titles in " ") |
| Dollar sign ($) | Searched with and without $ | $64 | $64 OR 64 ($64 will be high in search results) |
| Exclamation point (!) | Searched with and without ! | oklahoma! | oklahoma! OR oklahoma (results with ! will be high in search results) |
| Hyphen or dash (-), single, between words, names, numbers | Establishes an adjacency relationship between two characters or terms, gets results with or without hyphen | half-life day-lewis 50-50 |
half-life OR "half life" day-lewis OR "day lewis" 50-50 OR "50 50" |
| Hyphens in ISBN or ISSN (works in an ALL Franklin search and an isbn/issn search) | Results the same with or without hyphen | 0394577787 OR 0-394-57778-7 | either |
| Number / pound sign / sharp ( # ) | Searched |
f# | f# OR "f #" |
| Percent sign (%) | Ignored | 100% | 100% 100 (100% will be high in search results) |
| Period (.) | Establishes an adjacency relationship between two characters or terms, gets results with or without period | 7.5 u.s. |
7.5 OR "7 5" u.s. AND "u s" |
| Plus sign (+) after word or character | Ignored, except for relevance ranking; selected terms such as C++ have been explicitly configured | ||
| Question mark (?) | Single character wildcard (see truncation) | p?int destin? |
paint OR point OR print destiny (not destined) |
| Slash (/) | Establishes an adjacency relationship between two characters or terms, results with or without slash | inside/outside | inside/outside OR "inside outside" |
