Searching

You can search for single words or phrases in record and folder names, Short Text data, and Discrete text data. Using the Search box in the toolbar performs a rapid, full-text search for keywords in all the records available in your currently-selected database or Profile.

  • Search terms are reduced to their root form, so a search for "marage" will find records containing the terms "marage", "maraged", and "maraging".
  • Multiple words entered here will be combined using the AND operator unless otherwise specified.
  • You can include wildcards and query string operators such as AND, OR and NOT here.
  • Full-text queries are not case-sensitive. For example, searching for "Aluminum" or "aluminum" returns the same results.
  • Non-alphanumeric characters will be treated as a space (unless they are a reserved character). So the search criteria "Steels/Stainless" is equivalent to "steels stainless".
  • The Profile or database that is currently selected can affect the number of records returned. For example, with a Metals Profile selected, searching for the keyword 'aluminum' will produce many results, while searching for the same keyword when a Plastics Profile is selected will return only a few results.

Reserved characters

The following characters are reserved, and will be interpreted as wildcards or query string operators if included in text query keywords:
  • Asterisk ( * ) and question mark ( ? ), which are interpreted as wildcard operators.
  • Parentheses ( ), which are interpreted as grouping operators.
  • Double quotes ( " ), which are interpreted as phrase search operators.
  • Hyphen ( - )

The following characters in text query keywords are simply ignored:  ^ ~ : \ { } [ ]  

Search operators

Operator Search term Result
AND
  • germanium silicon
  • germanium AND silicon
 Will find all materials containing both of the terms
Note: AND is the default search operator.
OR germanium OR silicon Will find materials containing any of the terms
NOT germanium NOT silicon will find materials containing the term 'germanium' but not the term 'silicon'
( ) iron AND (ore OR cast) Used with Boolean operators to group multiple search terms. Parentheses cannot be empty. Will find materials containing the word 'iron' and one or both of 'ore' or 'cast'.
" " "steel alloy" Matches all of the search terms between the quotes, in the same positions relative to each other. Will find materials containing the words 'steel' and 'alloy', next to each other and in that order. Results for the phrase "alloy steel" and "steel alloy" will not be the same.
Note: Use of a phrase search does not override whitespacing of special characters - these will still be ignored.
* Wildcard Search poly* Matches zero or more characters. Will find materials containing the terms 'poly', 'polymer', 'polyimide', 'polyurethane', 'polypropylene', 'polycarbonate'
? Wildcard Search oxid? Matches a single character. Will find materials containing 'oxide' but not 'oxides' or 'oxidized'
Note: Search operators are case sensitive.