Photo Stock Source - Help and Information for Using the Search Tool

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Overview

A Search Tool allows you to quickly search the contents of a website without having to visit each page looking for what you want. The Photo Stock Source search tool, like virtually all others, works using "keywords" - words that describe what you are looking for. Because its so important, you'll find this tool in the upper right, and at the bottom, of all web pages.

This tool provides two general types of searching. You can either search for photos or search for text on pages of this website. If you're searching for photos the results will be displayed in the same gallery format that you'll see when you explore the Galleries. If you search for text on web pages, the results are displayed in a list format with links to the matching pages.

There are also two general search "modes". You can obtain matches for ANY of your searchwords (e.g. word1 OR word2), and you can obtain matches for ALL of your searchwords (e.g. word1 AND word2).

The Search Tool, located at the top right and bottom of all web pages, as well as both types of Search Results pages, all contain access to the button which will display this help page.

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Index

Search Overview

Advanced Searching

Choosing Keywords

Basic Usage

To search for photos or webpage text, first click the button of which type you want to search for: Photos Website.
Then choose which search mode you want: Any All

Searches for results that match ANY searchword will return more results than those matching ALL searchwords.

The button will "default" to Photo searching so to search page text, you'll have to purposely select Website searching. Both types of searching work the same way - you first enter one or more descriptive keywords into the entry area . Then you can either just hit your "Enter" key, or click on the button to perform the search. The search mode defaults to "Any".

All results will be displayed in decending order of the most relevant first. At the top of the Search Results page you'll see how many matches were found, and a place to enter new searches.

Photo Searches

Photos that match the keywords you entered will be displayed in the familiar Gallery format - complete with Order Buttons for working with the photos. If your search returns more than 100 matches and you used more than one search word, a HINT message will appear describing how to refine your search. Refer to 'Help' for specifics on searching tools.

Website Text Searches

Website text matches will be listed as page links followed by a (e.g. [1.33]) number that indicates the relative relevance score of the results. The search results are sorted by this score with the most relevant sorted first. For example, a website search on "pricing" returns:

Frequently Asked Questions [2]
In order to make pricing as quick, consistent, and easy as possible, all of our product's prices are determined using a different price calculator for each product type.

Clicking on the blue link of the "Frequently Asked Questions" link will take you directly to that page. The [2] is the relevance score of this link.

Website text searches are currently limited so they return no more than 100 results. If you find that's not enough - please let us know.

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Advanced Searching

This search engine automatically performs what is called "stemming". If you search on the word "running", the stem of that word, "run", will also be included in the search. For the same reason, if you search on a plural word like "lakes", the stem of that word, "lake" will also be included.

We've kept this search engine easy to use and simple to understand. Besides searching on "Any" or "All" search words, there is one more way to refine your search. If you want to further restrict the results of your search to those that match the exact key phrase you're entering, enclose the entire or partial phrase in single or double quotes.

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Choosing Keywords

Capital letters are ignored. All matches are made using lower case. Searching for "United States" is the same as searching for "united states".

Choose the most specific keywords. If you're looking for photos of Spain, enter 'spain' instead of 'europe'. Be aware that all keywords are convert to, and stored as, lower case. So "Spain" is stored and read as "spain". However, it doesn't cause any problem if you enter upper case characters.

By default, your search will return results that match any of your search words. If you want to specify results for all of your keywords, just click on the "All" button.

Common short words like 'and','or','the','it','is', etc. are ignored. Double or single quotes work the same way - "mountain man" or 'mountain man' for specifying search words that should be treated as a whole phrase.

You can check the Keyword List to see a complete list of active keywords in alphabetical order.

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Search Hints

If you see too many results:

You can refine your search further by refining and possibly increasing the keywords you use. You can also make use of quotes described in the Advanced Searching section.

If you didn't get enough results:

You may have entered too much information. The search will find only those items that match all your specifications and keywords, so the more info you enter, the fewer items you will find.

If you get no results:

It could be that there are no photos or text that match your search specifications, but if you think that there should be some matches to your search request, here are some tips:

Double check your spelling. If it is a foreign word or place, try spelling it in its native language, or in english.
Eliminate some of your keywords or select keywords that are more general.
Verify that you typed all of the keywords correctly.
Try a related keyword.

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