Boolean Operators

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The operators AND, OR, NOT, and NEAR can be used in STNEasy searches.

The operators can be applied in two ways:

• You may use them within a search term box, e.g., enter:

black not gray

• In Advanced Search, you may use the boxes provided to join terms from multiple data fields

Use Boolean operators in their usual sense:

• AND – retrieves answers containing both terms
• OR – retrieves answers containing at least one of the terms
• NEAR – retrieves answers in which both words appear in the same sentence
• NOT – retrieves answers containing one word but not the other

Search queries are processed from left to right. To ensure that your search is processed in the way you intend, use parentheses to specify word groupings within a search box. For example, if you enter:

red and black or gray

you retrieve records that contain red and black and records that contain gray. However, if you enter:

red and (black or gray)

you retrieve records that contain red and black and records that contain red and gray.

Multiple terms may be entered in a search box without an operator between them. In these cases, the NEAR operator is assumed. For example, enter:

acid rain

to retrieve only records where acid and rain appear in the same sentence.