Advanced Search Features
What is an Advanced Search?
Advanced Search can help you find more precise results by refining your search. With Advanced Search you can look for pages which contain specific information such as:
- all of the words you enter
- the exact phrase you enter
- at least one of the words you enter
- without the words enter
Advanced Search also allows you to limit the scope of your search to a specific website address e.g. by entering medfac.usyd.edu.au, search results will only be retrieved from Medicine website.
It also allows you to search specific collections, for example pages from the whole university or online/email discussions.
Other options provided by Advanced Search are the ability to search by any file format, eg Adobe Acrobat (.pdf), Microsoft Excel (.xls) etc, and to sort by score, date or URL.
You can conduct an Advanced Search by clicking on the 'Advanced Search' tab or the 'Advanced Search' link next to the 'search' button.
What is a collection?
A collection includes all files, an index to the files and the ranking formula that the search engine uses to provide results to a particular query.
The main collection ie all university web pages includes all university web pages including personal pages and blog entry pages but excludes the actual blogs and email/online discussions. There are separate collections for blogs and email/online discussions.
Can I search a specific Faculty site or website?
Yes, you can choose the scope of your search by visiting the Advanced Search page where you can enter the website address of a specific site. Alternatively, if you are already in a Faculty site you can tick the radial button next to the website address to search the site you are in, or check the 'usyd.edu.au' box to conduct a search of the entire University site.