MHonArc Search Engine Documentation

This document provides a brief description of the various options for Eric D. Friedman's MHonArc Search Engine.

Search

This is the field in which you should enter the words or phrase you wish to search for in the archive.
NOTE: The complete set of Perl5 regular expressions is at your disposal.

Find

This phrase

Returns messages in which your keywords appear as a literal phrase on a single line in the message.

All of these words

Returns mesages which contain ALL of your keywords: a boolean AND search.

Any of these words

Returns messages which contain ANY of your keywords: a boolean OR search.

Prefer

New messages

Searching starts with the most recent messages and continues toward the oldest.

Old messages

Searching begins with the earliest messages in the archive and continues toward the newest.

Case

Insensitive search

Ignores capitalization in your search terms.

Sensitive search

Respects capitalization in your search terms. For example, a case sensitive search for the word 'MhonArc' would not count the word 'mhonarc' as a match, and vice versa.

Match

Partial words

Allows successful matches for messages in which your search terms are part of a larger construct. For example, a partial word search for "the" will match "the," but also "these" and "atheist."

Exact words

Returns messages which match your keywords or phrase exactly. An exact word search for the phrase "My love is like a rose" would not match "My love is like a rosebush."
NOTE: This option is equivalent to anchoring your Perl regular expression with '\b.'

Return XX results per page

Controls the number -- XX -- of results to return to your Web browser at any one time. If the limit you set is reached before all of the messages in the archive have been searched, you will have the option to continue searching where you left off.

Search Area

The keywords and parameters of your search can be applied to any or all of the following areas. Body searching is the default if no other options are selected.

From

Searches the message field which contains the author's name and email address.

Subject

Searches the message subject.

Date

Searches the date and time field of each message.
Note: This field uses the following format: Thu, 6 Jun 1996 14:28:22 -0700 (PDT)

Body

Searches the entire body of the message. This is the default if no other options are selected.