Search Help

Basic Searches

• Search items are separated by spaces, commas, or new lines.
• ALL search items must match text somewhere in the record to select that record.
• Use an underscore '_' to match a (possible) word break.
• Upper and lower case doesn't matter, either will match.

Groups

• Parentheses may be used to enclose a group of items. A match of ANY item within the group causes the whole group to match.

Exclusion

• If a Minus sign '-' precedes an item or group, it will cause the record to be rejected if the record matches that item or group.

Confined (Field) Searches

• A record may contain one or more 'fields' of information. A field consists of a 'label' followed by a colon ':', which is followed by content (one or more lines of text). For example:

          Address:  1234 Main Street, Sometown, USA

• A search can be confined to scan only within a field, by specifying an item consisting of all or part of the label, then a colon ':' (or an equals '='), followed by the text to be found. For example:

          address = main

  will match a record containing the field shown in the example above.
• Field searches cannot be used within a group. However a group can be used to specify either the label portion or the content portion (or both) of a field search. For example:

          address = (center main)

  will match an address containing either 'main' or 'center'. Furthermore:

          (address location) = (main center)

  will match either a field called 'address' or a field called 'location' containing either 'main' or 'center'.

Full Field Matching

• A search normally scans the field to determine if it contains the desired text. Sometimes it may be desirable to match the field exactly (completely). This is done by immediately preceding the desired text with an exclamation '!'. For example, if one record contains:

          Color:  White

  and another record contains:

          Color:  Red, White, and Blue

  the following search text:

          color = !White

  will match the first record, but not the second record.

Use of Punctuation

The following punctuation characters have special meaning, and normally cannot be used as part of the matching text.

comma ','

Separates items

underscore '_'

Matches word breaks

parentheses '(' ... ')'

Specifies a group of items - ANY item can match

minus/dash '-'

Excludes records matching the following item/group

colon ':'

Specifies a field search

equals '='

Specifies a field search

exclamation '!'

Full field match - must match entire field

If it is desired to use one of these characters literally as part of the matching text, the character should be entered twice for each desired occurance of the character in the matching text.

Spaces and new lines cannot be matched literally. Instead, an underscore can be used, which will match one or more space(s), new line(s), or punctuation.