If you use the advanced search feature in Smart Search, you might want to make use of some more advanced search strategies, including AND/OR/NOT (also known as Boolean operators)
AND/OR/NOT (Boolean operators)
Boolean searching is a great way to limit, widen and/or redefine your search. Therefore, it’s a great search method for complex research topics. AND/OR/NOT are known as Boolean operators and they’re used to define the relationship between your search terms.
- “and” will narrow your results
- “or” will expand your results
- “not” will exclude terms from your results
Phrase Searching- using quotation marks
When quotation marks are used around a phrase (with 2 or more words), it ensures that the phrase will be searched for as a whole and the words won’t be searched separately in the database.
For more information about the types of searches you can do in Smart Search, see the documentation on this webpage (note: Summon is another name for Smart Search- it's the same system): Summon: Phrase, Field, Boolean, Wildcard, and Proximity Searching