Keyword Search
Combine keywords, “quoted phrases”, and Filters to narrow your search results to records with the highest probability of matching your target content. To initiate or update a search, either:
- Click the Search button after specifying words and/or “quoted phrases” in the keyword bar (empty = no keyword constraint).
- Apply one or more Filters, accessed from the Filters bar.
Search parameters are remembered within your browser session
Keywords and Filters can be modified in any order, and the search results will change accordingly. These search parameters will be preserved as you navigate throughout OSDP. The only actions that will reset the search are:
- Pressing the Clear Search button to intentionally start a new search.
- Performing an OSDP action whose purpose is to initiate a new search. e.g., Requesting to Retrieve Mapped Records on the Map tab, starting a new search on the home page, or pre-populating the search and map with sample layers when requesting to do so from the Learn About Cumulative Effects or Learn About Development Activities pages.
Creating Effective Search Queries
Creating effective search queries starts with knowing key characteristics of the content you seek, and then understanding how to use the tools at your disposal to focus the Search Result Set. This section will cover how to use the Keyword Search tool, and specifically what Metadata Fields it uses.
Keyword Use: While keywords are not mandatory for your search (e.g., a search could utilize just Filters, or use nothing to return all records), they are a powerful means to limit the Search Result Set to records referencing specific words or phrases. Further, combining Keyword Search with a Keyword Relevance sort order in the Search Result Set, permits those records with the most references to bubble to the top of the list.
Search isn’t case-sensitive: e.g., searching for “Air Quality” or “air quality” returns the same result.
Whole Word Compare: The search engine compares whole words in specific fields (Title, Description, Keywords, Citation, Publisher, Creator, and Placename) to whole words provided in the keywords bar, subject to the search option selected.
Multi-word Phrases: To consider a multi-word phrase as a single search condition, its essential it be specified as a “quoted phrase”.
- For example, if the keyword bar includes an unquoted Air Quality then the search will look separately for records that contain the words “air” and “quality”, which could reasonably return records discussing Water Quality depending on the search option selected.
- Alternatively, if the keyword bar contained “Air Quality” instead, then the search would look for records that contained the phrase “air quality” and the search results would be a closer match to the target.
Search Options: The search option selected controls how the keywords are interpreted and has an enormous effect on the returned Search Result Set, because it controls how narrowly or broadly the provided keywords are interpreted. Specifically, producing from most to least specific search results:
- Exact match on ALL words: All words/phrases in the Keywords bar must be included in any given record exactly as specified for it to be included in the result set. e.g., in our unquoted Air Quality example, each record must contain “air” AND must contain “quality”.
- Exact match on ANY words: Any words/phrases in the Keywords bar must be included in any given record exactly as specified for it to be included in the result set. e.g., in our unquoted Air Quality example, each record must contain either “air” OR “quality”.
- Partial match on ANY words: Any words/phrases in the Keywords bar OR a stemmed version of it must be included in any given record for it to be included in the result set. As with the Exact match ANY above, this option uses an OR condition as well. By permitting stemming of the keywords, search can result in even more possible hits. e.g., if you search for the word city, a search that uses stemming will find records with the word city OR cities.
Note that the default value for this search option is Exact match on ANY words, but you can change it to your preference, and that change will be remembered across browser sessions.
Noise words are removed from unquoted keywords: Imagine searching on an unquoted Ring of Fire only to return 100,000 records because it found every record with the word “of”. OSDP search filters out “stop words” or “noise words” like this from the search to restrict this from happening. As such, if we perform an Exact match on ANY words with an unquoted Ring of Fire, then search would find all records that contained “Ring” OR “Fire”. Alternatively, if “Ring of Fire” was quoted, then search will continue to match only records with that full 3-word phrase.
Keywords and Filters are complementary: Combining keyword constraints with Filters is a great way to surface records of interest in the Search Result Set. The Keyword Search is a strong mechanism for isolating a cross-section of records based on the content inside Metadata Fields that are freeform text, while filters mostly focus on further filtering content based on specifically assigned values.
Advanced Search alternative: In situations where you’re seeking to search and filter using any OSDP Metadata Fields (as opposed to just the common filters in the Filters bar), or to save and recall common search baselines for repeated use, this functionality can be accessed from the Advanced and Saved Searches link in the Search options bar. When recalling a saved search for use, those results can be further filtered by additionally setting the common filters.