[PW] Boolean Search Experts...Arise!

[Nichael Cramer]

mtknight at mail.usf.edu wrote:
>Hi everyone,
>
>We got a strange request that I cannot seem to find a perfect answer for.
>Here it is:
>
>A patron wants to search Children's audiobooks by author, but only wants
>the results to show CL and beyond. He specificall mentioned Clery.
>
>Now, I just can't seem to make him perfectly happy. He wants the first
>result to be CLES or beyond.
>
>Any ideas how to narrow this search this deeply?
>
>Thank you so much!

1] Part of the question here involves the nature of your search engine,
and how you are able to specify search parameters.

For example, does your search tool allow you define a "range" of characters.
As one example, in a regular-expression-based search you can write
search parameters like "[C-Z]*" which means "match all strings whose first
character is in the range C to Z".

(It's likely I have the syntax wrong --I'm doing it off the top of my
head-- but you get the basic idea.)

(Also, please forgive me if I'm simply telling you things you already know.
That's always a danger with 'net-communications.)

2] But, assuming you can do some kind of "range-of-characters" search,
I'd split the search above into two parts:

-- Search for authors whose name begins with letters in the range 
"Cles to Czzz"
-- Search for authors whose name begins with letters in the range "D to Z"

This is not as elegant as writing a single, complex, search-criterion,
but it's a lot simpler (and, I'm lazy so I prefer this.  -)

Hope this is of some help,
Nichael


--
Nichael Cramer
Guilford VT
nichael at sover.net
http://www.sover.net/~nichael/