Help Using the SHCOL Search Facility
This is the help file for searching the Surrey History Centre Collections Catalogue. The database contains the full text of the catalogues of the archives held at Surrey History Centre.
Searching
You can search the catalogue using word(s), phrases and (optionally) dates. A search will look for individual items within the catalogue containing the search terms you have used.
A series of words in one search box enclosed in quote marks (") will make a phrase search. The default for searching two consecutive words is an AND search. For example Henry Bryant will find Henry AND Bryant within an item, while "Henry Bryant" will only find that exact phrase.
You can look for separate words by using more than one search box. Click the plus sign (+) to the right of the search box to open another search box.
You can combine your search terms using Boolean search methods. There are 4 options: AND, OR, NOT and NEAR. NEAR is defined as two words within 10 words of each other.
Wild card searching is also supported. You can do single and multiple character wildcard searches within single terms (but not within phrase queries). To perform a single character wildcard search you can use the "?" symbol and to perform a multiple character wildcard search you can use the "*" symbol. The single character wildcard search looks for a string that matches the term with the "?" replaced by any single character. For example, to search for "text" or "test" you can use the search: te?t
Multiple character wildcard searches look for 0 or more characters when matching strings against terms. For example, to search for test, tests or tester, you can use the search: test*
For date range search options, see the table below. The date search works on individual items within a catalogue. From the results displayed it is then possible to browse other items within the catalogue.
Search results
Search results are displayed in a list, 30 items at a time. Use the 'next' and 'previous' tabs to move from one search results list to the next.
Click on an item in the search results list to load the full catalogue. The catalogue will scroll to display the selected item with the search term highlighted. Note that date search terms and phrase searches in quote marks are not highlighted.
You can use the arrow control (<< >>) either side of the highlighted search term to navigate to the next and previous instance of the search term. You can also right click on the search term to open a further navigation menu.
You can single click on headings beside folder icons within the catalogue to expand and collapse the views of the various levels of the catalogue.
Specifying a Date Range in the Search
The table below shows examples of specifying date ranges in the search and the results they should yield:
| From Date | Date | Result |
|---|---|---|
| 1939 | 1945 | Will find records between 1st Jan 1939 and 31 Dec 1945 inclusive |
| 1939-09 | 1945-05 | Finds records between 1st Sep 1939 and 31st May 1945 inclusive |
| 1939-09-03 | 1945-09-02 | Finds records between 3rd Sep 1939 and 2nd Sep 1945 inclusive |
| 1939 | omitted | Finds records from 1st Jan 1939 to the present day |
| 1939-09 | omitted | Finds records from 1st Sep 1939 to the present day |
| 1939-09-03 | omitted | Finds records from 3rd Sep 1939 to the present day |
| omitted | 1945 | Finds records 31st Dec 1945 (inclusive) and earlier |
| omitted | 1945-05 | Finds records 31st May 1945 (inclusive) and earlier |
| omitted | 1945-05-02 | Finds records 2nd May 1945 (inclusive) and earlier |
| 1939 | 1939 | Finds records 1st Jan 1939 to 31 Dec 1939 |
| 1939-09 | 1939-09 | Finds records 1st Sep 1939 to 30 Sep 1939 |
| 1939-09-03 | 1939-09-03 | Finds records with ranges including the 3rd Sep 1939. Note there may not be records with this exact date, but if a catalogue has the date range 1st Sep 1939 to 5th Sep 1939, it will be returned by a search. |
