A Keyword search searches all of the following fields (called "indexed
fields) in Ariadne records: Author, Title, Series, Subject Headings,
and
Contents Notes (the Notes field lists titles of chapters or sections
in compilations or anthologies).
The default keyword
search in Ariadne is a phrase search. That means that the
words you type into the keyword search box will be searched on as a
phrase, with the exception of "and," "or," and
"not." These words have special functions when you search.
See Boolean Operators below to learn how they work.
BOOLEAN
OPERATORS
Use AND, OR, and NOT to combine concepts or terms.
Use
AND to combine topics: Example: (annotated
bibliography) and children.
The AND operator is used to retrieve records that contain all of the
specified words or phrases in indexed fields. For example, the search
expression "fractal and geometry" will retrieve all records that contain
both the words "fractal" and "geometry" in indexed
fields. Note that the two words need not appear in the same field. For
example, the word "geometry" might appear in the Subject field
of a given record and the word "fractal" might appear in
the Title field of that same record. This search expression will retrieve
this record, even though the two words do not appear in the same field
together.
Use
OR to search for words that are similar concepts or synonyms:
Example: Soviet
Union or Russia.
The OR operator is
used to retrieve records that contain at least one of the specified
words or phrases in an indexed field. For example, "phobos or deimos" would
retrieve all records that contain either of these words in an indexed
field (though not necessarily in the same field together).
Use
AND NOT to exclude words: Example:
Mexico and not
New.
The AND NOT operator
is used to modify the results produced by the other Boolean operators
(it cannot be used by itself). For example, "mercury and not planet"
(or "mercury & ! planet") would retrieve records that contain
the word "mercury", but do not contain the word "planet".
When you use Boolean
operators, use parentheses to group words together:
Example: (alaska or
canada) and (adventure and
not vacation).
ADJACENCY
Multiple words are searched together as an exact phrase. Adjacency
searching is the default search in Ariadne. Example: United
States supreme court
However, if your search terms include a Boolean operator, you
may use quotes to specify a phrase search.
Example: pride and prejudice will
find records with the words pride and prejudice, in any order, but
"pride and prejudice" will find only records with the
exact phrase "pride and prejudice"
TRUNCATION
USe the asterisk (*) to truncate the ends of words, allowing you to
retrieve plurals and variations of word endings. The
asterisk (*) matches
up to five non-space characters, starting at the specified position
in the word.
For example, "inter*" will match
"internal" and "internet", but will not match "international".
The '*' wildcard may also be embedded in a search string.
For example, "colo*r" would match
both "color" and "colour". Use a single asterisk
* to truncate from 1-5 characters.
The '*' wildcard
may only appear after at least two characters. For example, "n*" would
be rejected, but "ne*" would
be accepted (but would likely produce an unmanageably large result
set)
Use two asterisks (**) to match any number of non-space characters,
starting at the specified position in the word. For example, "inter**"
will match all words that begin with "inter" (e.g., "internal",
"internet", "international", etc.). As is
the case with the '*' wildcard, the "**" wildcard may only
appear after at least two characters (e.g., "p**" would be
rejected).
Example: communis*
Retrieves records with communism, communist, or communists.
Example: environment*
polic*
Example: fyodor
dost**
WILDCARD
Use the
? to match any single character in the specified position in the word.
The '?' wildcard may only appear after at least two characters.
Example:
"anders?n" matches
both "anderson" and "andersen".
PROXIMITY
Use NEAR to specify words within ten words of each other, in any order,
in the same field.
Example: California near
university
Use "WITHIN #" to specify terms which occur within # words
of each other, in any order, in a record.
Example: united states within
3 econom*
Use BEFORE or AFTER to retrieve records that contain the specified
words or phrases in a particular order in the record. Any number of
words can appear between the specified words or phrases.
Example:"chester before arthur"
or "arthur after chester" would
retrieve records containing the word "chester" followed at
any distance by the word "arthur" (e.g., "Chester Arthur",
"Chester Alan Arthur", etc.), but not records containing those
same words in the opposite order (e.g., "Arthur Chester" would
not be retrieved).
FIELDS
Specify fields to search, using field abbreviation.
Fields available for this database are a: (author), t: (title),
s: (subject), and n: (note.)
Example:
(a:twain)
and (t:huck*)
Example:
(a:united and
a:states) and
(s:handicapped or
s:disabled)
Example:
n:virtual reality