annarad.blogg.se - Boolean search engine examples

Boolean search engine examples how to#

Boolean search engine examples how to#

How to search for posts from specific dates and locations The parts of your search that are inside parentheses will be prioritised by the database or search engine to retrieve a broader set of results.

He used this Boolean search string on Twitter: (#EP2019 OR #EuropeseVerkiezingen OR #EuropeanElection2019 OR #EUelections2019) AND (“mainstream media” OR msm OR media OR press OR lugenpresse OR “fake news” OR “fact check” OR elite OR metropolitan OR fakebook OR fascistbook OR banned OR censored OR “free speech” OR “politically correct” OR “PC brigade” OR “Western propaganda”) For example, First Draft’s Senior Research Reporter Alastair Reid was looking for accusations of media bias around the European Parliament elections. These are the building blocks for undertaking more complex social monitoring projects. (“Notre Dame” OR “Notre Dam”) NOT (“hunchback” OR “hunch back”) To group parts of a search together, you simply use brackets or parentheses ( ).įor example, if you’re looking to find various spellings of Notre Dame, while also excluding posts about the Disney film, you would write: Also known as nesting, this approach also allows you to search for several variations of your search terms at once. It will reduce the risk of the search breaking and is simpler to manage. Grouping sections together is most useful for long and complicated searches.

You won’t be able to find information that has been made private by a user.

If you’re searching for phrases (terms made up of multiple words) then you have to put them in quotation marks (eg “Notre Dame”).

Operators (AND, OR, NOT) must be written in capitals, or they won’t work.

For example, you might want to exclude mentions of the Disney film The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and so you could write “Notre Dame” NOT “hunchback”. NOT allows you to exclude terms you don’t want to appear in your search results. This will retrieve all results containing either phrase. In the case of Notre Dame, you could search for “Notre Dame” OR “Notre Dam”. This can be good for misspellings and typos. OR allows you to broaden your search to retrieve results connecting two or more similar terms.

For example, you might want to search for “Notre Dame” and fire. There are three operators for basic searches: AND, OR, and NOT.ĪND allows you to narrow your search to only retrieve results that combine two or more terms. This is possible with ‘operators’, which allow you to combine multiple keywords. You want to search for Notre Dame, but you won’t want posts about the Disney film.Ī boolean search will allow you to include posts that mention “Notre Dame”, but exclude ones about the Disney film to refine your search results and find the information you’re after. For example, let’s say you’re searching for posts during a breaking news event, such as the Notre Dame fire. How to write a basic search queryīoolean searches help you to specify exactly what you are looking or not looking for. Facebook used to support Boolean searches, though it appears it no longer does. Twitter, Reddit and Google currently support Boolean searches, while YouTube supports them to some extent on top of its advanced search function (a Boolean search on YouTube might not work when sorting by ‘relevance’, but will when sorted by upload date). In this quick guide, we run through the basics of what you need to know to search social media for effective newsgathering.Ī quick note: platforms vary. These strings of words allow you to cut through the usual social media chatter by upgrading a default search to a multifaceted, specific search to find more precise snippets of information. This is where Boolean search queries help. When searching for newsworthy content online, you’ve got to know exactly what you’re looking for and have the skills to find it.