Tips for searching

These are some things you should be aware of as you use this search engine:

• Romanization of Russian
  • I don't use the ye. So it is Eltsin, not Yeltsin. It is Dukatskoe, not Dukatskoye, Evgenii not Yevgeny or Yevgeni or Yevgenyi or Yevgeniy.
  • I use Ya, not Ia, Yu not Iu.
  • I use skii, not skiy, or ski, or sky
• Case insensitive chukotka = CHUKOTKA = chuKOTka
• Ranked results Records most closely matching your search words will/should be at the top of the list returned.
• Truncation/wildcard searching is allowed.
• Boolean searching is allowed.
• Free text searching is allowed.
• Exact phrase searching is allowed.
• Subject codes can be very useful in helping narrow a search. An explanation of how they are derived is available.

So, how do I ...

• find the latest articles? Right now you can't, really. But you can check out each month by using truncation. See below for an example.

• deal with the vagaries of word endings? I generally like to use the nominal form in place names. But you can collapse it all using truncation. See below for an example.

• find just the articles added since I last looked? You can't. Sorry. I am looking into adding such a field.

• find something like just the articles on Far East mining published in March 1997? In advanced search do this -> subject/urem3 and 199703*.

• see a list of possible search terms? You can't.

Truncation/Wildcards:
Wildcards are supported, so if you aren't sure of a person's name or aren't sure how Russian adjectival endings are handled, do this:

Primor*

will return Primore, Primorye, Primorskii, Primorskoe, Primorskugol, etc.

199610*

is useful if you want to find all the articles published in October 1996. Use this only with months or days, don't try it with years, you will retrieve too many!.

Boolean searches:
The standard search form is really a boolean form. You can choose your field (full text is the default), type a word in each blank, and then choose the operator in the middle (and is the default).

If you just want to search for a single word, type that in. Simple.

The weight option allows you to assign an importance of 1 to 3 to each word. You may or may not find it useful. For example, if a word in the title is more important than the same word in the text, assign the one in the title a higher weight.

Free Text searches
For these, the advanced search form is probably better. The form has some examples of possible searches.

Exact phrase searches
Sometimes one wants only exact phrases such as north slope, not north and slope, but north slope. This is possible -- just enclose the phrase in quotation marks. For example "north slope".

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