Introduction

You can search very easily in Primo. Just type one or more words that you are looking for and click the Search button. If you enter multiple words, Primo will return results that contain all of the specified terms.

Once you are familiar with the basic Primo search, you might want to try doing more with the Search panel or use the Advanced Search option (see Performing Advanced Searches). Both of these options offer numerous features for making your searches more precise and enable you to get results that are more useful.

How Can I Do More with the Search Panel?

1. ( ) – Parentheses allow you to group search terms and alter the order of precedence. For more information, see Grouping Terms Within a Query.
2. AND and NOT – left-to-right precedence is used in case of multiple operators.
3. OR – left-to-right precedence is used in case of multiple operators.

• honey bee communication – Primo treats the entire query as a phrase and returns results in which all of the words may be closer together.
• honey bee AND communication – Primo treats honey bee and communication as separate phrases and returns results in which both phrases may not be as close together.

• Searching for a Phrase
• Searching for Any Specified Words or Phrases
• Excluding Words or Phrases
• Searching Using Wildcard Characters
• Grouping Terms Within a Query
• Selecting Your Search Scope
• Using Special Characters
• Using the CDI Search Scope

Searching for a Phrase

To search for an exact phrase, type quotation marks around the phrase. You can combine both words and phrases in your search.

• If you do not enclose the phrase with quotation marks, the system will find items that contain the individual words in the phrase, regardless of whether these words are located next to each other in the order specified.

• If a comma is used to separate words in a list, the comma must be followed by a space. Otherwise, the system will consider the comma to be part of the word and return fewer results than expected.

For example, to search for global warming as one term, type the following in the search box:

Searching for Any Specified Words or Phrases

You can search for items that contain at least one of the words or phrases you type in the Search box. To do so, type OR between the words or phrases.

If you search for words or phrases without specifying OR or NOT, Primo assumes that you are searching for all the specified words or phrases.

For example, to search for items with the word Irish or the word Celtic, type the following in the search box:

To use Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) within search phrases, you must enter them in uppercase letters. Otherwise, Primo removes them and performs a simple search that includes all search phrases.

Excluding Words or Phrases

You can exclude items that contain specific words or phrases. To do so, type NOT and then type the word or phrase to exclude.

If you search for words or phrases without specifying OR or NOT, Primo assumes that you are searching for all of the specified words or phrases.

For example, to search for items with the word Celtic and exclude any of these items with the word Irish, type the following in the search box:

If parentheses are not used for a query that contains multiple operators, it is recommended that you use the NOT operator last to ensure that results are excluded from the entire query. For example: cycling AND safety NOT helmet. If it is necessary to place the NOT operator elsewhere, make sure that you enclose the operation with parentheses. For example: (cycling NOT safety) OR helmet.

Grouping Terms Within a Query

You can use parentheses to group terms to clarify the order of multiple operators specified in a query.

Example 1: The following query searches for records that contain Shakespeare and either tragedy or sonnet:

When using more than one operator, it is strongly recommended to use parentheses to clarify precedence. For example, if no parentheses are specified in the above query, Primo will apply the precedence rules (see precedence rules) and instead group the words Shakespeare and tragedy as follows:

Example 2: The following query searches for records that contain either Irish or Celtic and do not contain Gaelic:

If no parentheses are specified in the above query, Primo will apply the precedence rules and instead group the words Celtic and Gaelic as follows:

Selecting Your Search Scope

The search scope defines where the system should perform the search. A default search scope is predefined based on your login, usually corresponding to your major field of study or some other criteria set up by the institution. However, you can change the scope of your search by selecting a search scope from the drop-down list as shown in the following example.

Using the CDI Search Scope

CDI is a centralized search index that encompasses tens of millions of records of global or regional significance that are harvested from primary and secondary publishers and aggregators. To search from these resources, select the CDI search scope or a search scope that includes it.

If you want to receive results for CDI items that do not contain full text, select the Expand My Results check box.

Search Limits

The system will display a message and provide suggestions when the following limits are exceeded:

• The query contained more than 30 boolean operators.

• The query contained more than 8 question marks.

• The query contained more than 7 asterisks and the word length is greater than 2 (such as abb* or ab*c).

• The query contained more than 3 asterisks and the word length is less than 3 (such as ab*).

• The entire query consisted of a single letter and an asterisk (such as a*).

For more details, see Feedback Messages.

Display Limits

For Primo cloud institutions, the maximum number of viewable records is limited to 2000. For example, if the number of search results exceeds 2000, paging beyond the first 2000 records will be prevented.