Advanced Search Operators

Title 

Operator 

What does it do? 

Example

Quotations 

" " 

Returns search results that include the exact phrase within quotes in the given order.

"sewer rehabilitation project" will only bring up searches that contain that exact phrase.

AND 

+ 

Forces exact match for all  

works/phrases.

"civil engineering"+infrastructure returns a search that includes both phrases/words

OR 

| 

Returns search results that match terms on either side of the pipe.  The same as writing "OR" between search terms.

"civil engineer"|"mechanical engineer" will find searches for either of these two exact phrases.

NOT 

- 

Excludes a word or phrase from the results.

"dog noise"-"dog park" will show results for the exact phrase dog noise but will exclude any documents that also include the exact phrase dog park within them.

Parentheses 

() 

Used to group search terms and control the search logic of the query.

(rfp|rfq) announcements will  show content that includes either rfp or rfq and announcements

Asterisk 

word* 

Includes wildcard characters. 

Demand* will return demand,  demands, demanding, etc.

Tilde 

~N 

Where N is a number, this signifies edit distance (fuzziness) between words in a phrase.

"water project"~3 returns a search with the phrase water project and up to 3 words between water and project, such as water treatment project.