Using An Advanced Search To Find Note Records

A regular keyword search, uses a single set of keywords (the entire group of keywords you type in, including any spaces) and searches every field in a record to find where those keywords exist.

In this search, the keyword phrase 'monday,' would be the value that's searched for in every searched record's fields.

A regular keyword search, can only search one set of keywords (a single keyword phrase) at a time, and it will only search, the set of records currently being displayed in the window.

Advanced searches, let you choose which fields will be searched, and let you define a set of simple or complicated instructions for how those fields should be searched.

In this image, the Creation Date field will be searched to see if it contains a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday value. But not all three at the same time.

Advanced searches also let you search for multiple sets of keywords at a time. In Advanced Searches, each keyword phrase (set of keywords) is placed in its own paragraph in a panel.

Multiple keyword phrases can be searched during one Advanced search.

When a search is run on a record, each set of keyword phrases will be searched to see if they exist, in the specified field, inside the record.

In this image there are 3 separate keyword phrases, each containing 1 keyword, being searched.

Regular keyword searches can't search multiple keyword phrases, in a single search. They can only search, multiple keywords, inside of a single keyword phrase, during a search.

If I used the keywords, in the advanced search above, in a regular search, they'd all be in a single keyword phrase, and only those records that contained all 3 of them, as a single unit, and the way they are shown below, would be a match.

An Example Advanced Search, That Involves 3 Record Fields

Let's say that we wanted to search for all the Note Records, created on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, regardless of month or year, that don't have a parent Work Session record, and are linked to more than 4 computer files.

We'd start the search by clicking on the Advanced Search hyperlink in the Search Panel.

That would display an Advanced Search Settings dialog box, like the one shown below. Then we'd use that dialog box to configure how we wanted a set of fields to be searched.

Here's How You'd Configure Each Field's Search Settings

You'd click the name of a field in Panel 1 to select it.

Then you'd go to Panel 2 and enter each keyword phrase (group of keywords) you wanted to find in that field. If you're searching multiple phrases, press the Enter key to put each of them on their own line.

Now you'd go to Panel 3 and use its components to describe how you wanted those keywords compared to each record's field values.

Select how you want keywords compared to field values.

Finally, you'd go to Panel 4 and click on the appropriate "Match Method" radio buttons to tell the search how many of the keywords it must find in a searched field.

Then, if you're searching more than one field, you'd repeat steps 1 to 4, for each new field you wanted configured.

Select how many keyword phrases have to be found in the search.

The next 3 images show you how a single Advanced Search Settings dialog box is used to configure each field that needs to be searched, to perform the search described above.

Work Session ID Field:

Total Data Files Field:

Creation Date Field:

How To Run The Search

After you've configured all the field's you're going to search, then click the dialog box's Search hyperlink.

This image shows that the search is being done on 2,535 Note records.

All the Search Settings for the Advanced Search have been defined. Now just click the Search hyperlink to run the search.

The dialog box closes, and a split second later, all your matching records are displayed in the Notes Index Window.

To open any of these records in the Notes Window, so I could read and/or edit them, all I'd have to do is double click anywhere on its record entry in the list.

This image shows the first record's note being displayed in the Notes Window, after I double clicked on that record.

Notice, that the search parameters are even highlighted in this window.

The Note belonging to a double clicked record entry is displayed in the Notes Window.

Reviewing And Modifying The Search Settings For A Field, Before You Do The Search

Every time you click a new field in Panel 1, the Advanced Search Settings dialog box, stores the name of the field you're configuring, and all the search settings in panels 2 to 4.

Then it adds the named collection to the Review Search Settings combo box.

If you click the down arrow on that combo box, you can select a field name, and the dialog box will redisplay all of that field's settings so you can review and/or change them, before you click the Search hyperlink. Once the Search hyperlink is clicked, those settings are gone forever.