NOT or – (dash): Using NOT or the – (dash) will exclude the topic following the Boolean operator. You can see the difference in a search result comparison when you search “Car accident AND lawyer” versus “car accident lawyer.” OR is actually a default connector to many search engines, which is why basic search results usually come up with many results.īy default, Google’s search engine will read the phrase “car accident lawyer” as “Car OR accident OR lawyer” and will bring up any results that include these keywords. OR: This operator will gather any results that have either one or all of the terms. For the purposes of illustrating their use, they are capitalized in the examples below.ĪND: This will give you results on all the terms searched, and will exclude any results that are missing any of the terms.įor example, searching “car AND accident AND lawyer” will only gather results that include “car”, “accident” and “lawyer” together, and exclude results of just “car”, just “accident”, or just “lawyer”. An important note: when searching normally through a database, catalog, or engine, boolean operators do not have to be capitalized. Adding these to any search will generate better returns. Here are the most common Boolean search terms, explained below. In contrast, submitting “ cat AND dog” will give significantly different top results, and the pictures of a cat and dog together. Without using the Boolean term “AND”, searching “ cat dog” will yield millions of results (most of them about the cartoon “Catdog”). Let’s say you want pictures of a cat and dog together. The result: a list of relevant webpages that meet your specific criteria, instead of every webpage that has your term.īoolean terms are useful to anyone conducting research, because they simply generate the results you really want. Boolean logic is essentially a mathematical equation: the right terms can add or subtract results based on the variables you give. Knowing the basics to Boolean Logic will improve your search strategies, saving you time and effort.īoolean logic refers to search operators or terms that can help narrow or broaden your search results. That’s where Boolean logic comes in: Boolean search terms can help you find the most relevant websites efficiently. But when you need meaningful search results, a simple phrase or keyword might not generate the most relevant results. Search engines like Google and Yahoo! bring tons of information quickly whenever we ask for it.
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