Search Engines (Continued)

Boolean Searching
(Power Searching)

Search directories and search engines are maintained on large computer databases. As such, their contents must be searched according to the rules of computer database searching. Database searching is based on the principles of Boolean logic. Boolean logic refers to the logical relationship among search terms, and is named for the British mathematician George Boole.

Unfortunately, each of the directories and search engines discussed earlier have their own way of letting you search their databases by using their own query language.

Simple power searching. All directories and search engines allow you to use + and - with your searches:

+

Adding a + to your search will require that this word will be found in all search results. For example, computer+education.

-

Adding a - to your search will require that this word be excluded in your search results. For example, computer-education.

Some directories and search engines allow you to create custom power search queries by using what are called "Boolean operators".

Boolean operators can be used to narrow or broaden a search. Boolean operators include AND, OR and AND NOT. These operators must be entered in ALL CAPS with a space before and after the operator. In some cases, Boolean searching can only be done from the advanced search page.

The following diagrams and examples show how the Boolean operators affect a search. The shaded area of each diagram represents the searching results.

Complex Boolean Searches. To group complex Boolean phrases, called nesting, you can use parentheses (). For example, (Microsoft AND Help) OR (Word AND Excel) finds documents with the words 'Microsoft Help and Word' or 'Microsoft Help and Excel' or both.
Parentheses are supported by most search directories and search engines.

Additional search tips are listed below. These only work on the search directory or engine specified:

• If you enter an asterisk * it will truncate a search term and your search results will contain pages with variations of the term. For example, to find pages that contain the word femini* matches feminine, feminist, feminism, etc.
  Works with AOL Anywhere, AltaVista, HotBot, MSN Search, Northern Light, Yahoo.
• If you enter link:URL, the search results will contain all pages with a link to the specified URL. For example, to find pages that contain links to http://www.1stsitefree.com, enter link:www.1stsitefree.com. Works with AltaVista, Google.

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