Word Searching on Geograph

---

[This reference refers only to the 'Word Search' box of the main image search, see also General overview of the search]

Main Features

• Enter multiple keywords separated by spaces, in any order
• matches whole words
• punctuation is ignored
• uses stemming, so bridge matches bridges, bridging etc
• can match phrases ("road bridge")
• supports OR keyword (bridge OR bont OR pont)
• can exclude words (-river)
• not case sensitive

Currently searches

• title, description, category and photographer name
• image taken date (20071103, 200711 or just 2007) fields
• subject grid-reference (SH1234, SH13 or just SH)

If you wish you can also limit your matches to just particular fields. See below.

Field Searches

text:oast house (searches the title, description and category only)
title:bridge
description:road
category:road
year:2007 (the year the photo was taken)
month:200605 (the month, eg May 2006)
day:20060521 (the day, eg 21st May 2006)
myriad:SH
hectad:TQ49
gridref:TQ4192
name:"Fred Smith"

(Note: it is recommended to put fields at the end of the query - ie normal keywords should be first)

Other features

• Prefix a keyword with = to match exactly; disables stemming for that keyword (otherwise bridge matches bridges, bridging etc) (road =bridge)
• Start with ~ to match any keywords, as opposed to all. (~bridge road river) Note: can't be used with many features, such as phrases, brackets, OR and negations (-).
• Quorum: "the world is a wonderful place"/3 The example will match all images that have at least 3 of the 6 specified words.
• hyphenated words are a special case, fox-hole will match fox-hole, "fox hole" and foxhole! So this is the recommended way to search for placenames where you don't know if it's hyphenated or not - if in doubt hyphenate!

More examples

bridge -description:road
=river title:bridge
"road bridge" OR "river bridge"
road bridge -"suspension bridge"
=bridge category:road
junction TQ category:"a road"
river myriad:(tq OR nt OR so)
~river afon =stream watercourse =brook
(river OR road) tree (brackets optional)