Forum Message Searching Tips
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From the main Forum screen, click the Search button. The following screen is displayed:
Type in one or more words for which to search and specify a search type, date range and forum. Search results will display below the search panel. Each thread subject is a link, allowing you to quickly navigate to the thread where the search text entered on the Search screen is highlighted in the thread.
For example, a search for "balloon" yields the following results:
Navigating to the first result will take you to the thread, where all instances of the word "balloon" are highlighted.
All Words
The system will find every message that includes all of the specified words.
Example: If you specify "red blue green", the system does an internal search for "red AND blue AND green", finding matching messages that include all three words. You do not need to include the word "AND" in your search.
Note that the system will ignore more than 120 “noise” words in your search value, such as “a”, “the”, “is”, “and”, etc.
Any Word
The system will find every message that includes any of the specified words.
Example: If you specify "red blue green", the system does an internal search for "red OR blue OR green", finding matching messages that include any of the listed words. You do not need to include the word "OR" in your search.
Exact Phrase
The system will find the exact phrase that you entered.
Example: If you specify "red and green balloons", the system finds messages that include that exact phrase (case insensitive).
Advanced (Boolean)
With this option enabled, the system allows you to construct an advanced search, including the following special operators:
- AND
- OR
- NOT
- NEAR
- ( ) - Parentheses to indicate grouping
- " " - Quotation marks to indicate an exact phrase
- * - Asterisk to indicate a wildcard (for example, "bl*" to find "black" and "blue") Note that a wildcard search term must be enclosed in double quotes as shown above.
This option is for users who have more experience with programming models or other search systems.
Fuzzy
This option uses an internal thesaurus to search using words with similar meanings to the phrase you entered. Note that AND, OR, *, etc. do not work with this option. Enter a simple phrase and the system will find messages including that phrase and related phrases.
Post Date Range
You can further filter the search to messages posted within a specified date range, including the past week, month, two months, six months, year, or an explicit date range.
Select Forum
Specify a forum or use the <All Forums> option search across all active forums.
When you click Search (or just press the [Enter] key), a screen similar to the following will appear:
The first 100 matches are shown, including the message subject, author and date/time posted, as well as the forum in which the message appears and the first few lines of the message body. When you click the link in the Subject column, it will take you directly to that message. Click Return to Search to go back to the search screen.
Previous search values and forum selection will be remembered.