Search Help

Searching Pennock's Fiero Forum

In the search query box you can specify keywords (e.g. "ignition", "egr", "wing"), boolean operators ("and", "or", "not"), parenthesis ("(" and ")") or phrases (delimited by double quotes).

Boolean Operators

You can use the Boolean Operators and, or or not in searching. Without these operators, the search will assume you are and'ing the words together. Boolean operators are not case sensitive. These three searches are the same:

ignition module
module ignition
ignition AND module

The not operator inverts the results of a search:

NOT ignition

finds all threads that do not contain the word "ignition".

Parentheses can be used to group searches:

NOT (ignition AND module)

The result is all threads that have none or one term, but not both.

Other examples:

tires OR tyres

Find threads containing either the words "tires" or "tyres".

steering wheel not tires
(steering AND wheel) AND NOT tires

Both queries retrieve the threads that contain both the words "steering" and "wheel", but do not contain the word "tires".

Phrase Searching

To search for an exact phrase in a thread use double-quotes to delimit your search terms. For example:

"tire pressure" or "tyre pressure"

finds threads containing either the phrase "tire pressure" or "tyre pressure". A phrase can consist of a single word, so this is how to search for the words used as boolean operators:

left "and" right

finds threads that contain all three words, but in any order.

Order of Evaluation

In general, the order of evaluation is not important. Search terms are processed from left to right. Parenthesis can be used to group searches together, effectively changing the order of evaluation. For example these three searches are the same:

engine NOT V8 V6
NOT V8 engine V6
V6 engine NOT V8

but these two are not the same:

engine NOT V8 V6
engine NOT (V8 V6)

The first finds all threads that contain both engine and V6, but do not contain V8. The second finds all that contain engine, and contain either V8 or V6, but not both.

It is often helpful in understanding searches to use the boolean terms and parenthesis. So the above two become:

engine AND (NOT V8) AND V6
engine AND (NOT (V8 AND V6))

These four examples are all the same search:

wheel NOT steering AND rim
(wheel) AND (NOT steering) AND (rim)
wheel NOT steering rim
rim AND wheel AND NOT steering


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