Simple Search Help

The following search enhancements are available wherever you see a single search field on the AvantGo website, such as the search field located above the channel navigation or on the simple search form.

Requiring All the Terms to Match — Using "+" or "AND"

By default, searching our channels for multiple words will return only those results which contain all of the words requested. The "+" and "AND" enhancements that are commonly used on other search sites are not required on AvantGo for this to happen.

Example: You want to find a place to eat in Chicago.

Just enter
   chicago restaurant

This is the same as
   chicago +restaurant

or
   chicago AND restaurant

Requiring Only One Term to Match — Using "OR"

When you want your search to return matches where either of two words — or any one or more of multiple search terms — are found, include the "OR" operator.

Example: You want to find a place to eat in Chicago, and you suspect that relevant material could include either the word "restaurant" or the word "dining."

You could search for
   chicago restaurant OR dining

or you could expand this to
   chicago restaurant OR dining OR takeout

Excluding Matches on a Term — Using "-" or "NOT"

If your search returns many irrelevant matches, see if you can identify a keyword that occurs in the irrelevant matches but not in the results that you want. Then you can exclude matches containing this keyword by using the NOT operator — a minus sign ("-") or the word "NOT" in front of the term.

Example: When you search on chicago restaurant, you get too many results about fast food, and you want to exclude those results.

Just enter
   chicago restaurant -fast

or
   chicago restaurant NOT fast

Requiring a Phrase to Match

Sometimes you want to search for an exact phrase — several words in a certain order. You can do this by enclosing the phrase in quotation marks.

Example: You want to search for Chinese takeout in Chicago.

Just enter
   chicago restaurant "chinese takeout"

Controlling How a Complex Search is Interpreted — Using Parentheses

AvantGo supports the use of parentheses to group search instructions. Combined with the "OR" and "NOT" operators discussed above, this allows you to specify precisely the way in which a complicated search expression should be interpreted.

Example: You want to find a place to eat in Chicago, which is not fast food, unless it happens to be Chinese takeout. You enter
   chicago restaurant NOT fast OR "chinese takeout"

But how would this be interpreted? A match will have to contain "chicago" and "restaurant", and not contain "fast", but how will OR chinese takeout be interpreted at the end — will "chinese takeout" count as a match if "chicago" is absent?

To be certain, you can add parentheses:
   chicago (restaurant NOT fast) OR "chinese takeout"

To be absolutely certain that Chinese takeout only counts if it's in Chicago, you could add more parentheses:
   chicago ((restaurant NOT fast) OR "chinese takeout")

Advanced Search Help

AvantGo's advanced search lets you enter complicated queries without having to type special operators, and it lets you refine your search in ways that are not available in the simple search form.

Entering Keywords

The Keywords section of the advanced search form lets you enter your search terms without ever having to type the "AND", "OR", or "NOT" operators.

  • "with all of the words"

    All search terms entered into this field must appear in order to be counted as a match. Typing words in this field without any operators or quotes gets exactly the same results that the simple search would get.

  • "with the exact phrase"

    What you enter into this field must appear as an exact phrase in order to be counted as a match. This is useful for searching for things that are multiple words long, such as san francisco.

  • "with at least one of the words"

    If any one or more of the terms you enter into this field appears, it will be counted as a match. This is useful to help include multiple words with similar meanings in your search query, such as searching for a place to eat by entering dining food restaurants.

  • "without the words"

    When you enter search terms into this field, results containing the terms will be eliminated from what is displayed. This is useful when you are getting a lot of irrelevant matches and want to narrow down the results by eliminating those that contain a particular word. For example, entering fast here should eliminate fast food restaurants from your search results.

Note: In order to be counted as a match, each of the first three Keywords fields in which you make an entry must count as a match. Then, matches containing terms listed in the last Keywords field are eliminated.

Setting the Number of Results per Page

By default, 10 results will be returned per page. You can set this higher if you have a high-speed Internet connection and are more concerned about seeing more results at once than the time it will take to download them.

Use the Results drop-down to change the number of results per page returned.

Refining the Scope of the Search

The rest of the fields on the Advanced Search form let you refine your search by searching channel content instead of just titles and descriptions, or by limiting your search to a particular channel category, language, or geographic area.

  • Occurrences — lets you specify what to search:
    • channel titles and descriptions — searches the stored channel catalog that contains a title and descriptive text for each channel. Channel titles and descriptions are not updated often and are only intended to provide a general summary of the type of content that the channel offers. You can expect to get fewer matches by searching the channel titles and descriptions.
    • channel content — searches the current channel pages. Channel pages are updated more frequently and will contain a wider variety of text to match. You can expect to get more matches by searching channel content, and the matches will reflect the channel's current contents. This is especially useful if you are searching for news about current news stories — events that may have only happened days or hours ago.
  • Categories — lets you limit your search to a single channel category, such as Entertainment or Travel. If one of the available categories matches the general area in which you are interested, limiting your search to that category will eliminate irrelevant matches in other categories.
  • Language — lets you limit your search to a language other than English; or you can select any language to expand your search to include channels in all languages.
  • Location — lets you limit your search to channels that are related to a specific geographic area:
    • Country — lets you limit your search to channels that are related to a specific country. This is useful, for example, if you are planning a trip and want to take along some channels about the place you are visiting.
    • Zip Code — if you have selected USA for Country, lets you limit your search to a particular ZIP code within the USA that is near the center of a geographic area of interest.
Close Window