Introduction

• A travel writer rode on an inflatable boat down the Colorado River. She describes the water in a certain section of the river:
  • "The water flows smoothly in this broad swath of the river."
  • "The water is flowing smoothly, lulling us as we drift."
  • "The water flowed gracefully, lacking any impetus to rush."
  • "We watch the water flow idly by."
• You never know for sure how someone will use a word, much less write a single sentence, and, even more, how they will use language throughout an entire document. English is a rich language, offering us multiple ways of expressing ideas, even in variations of one root word. Consequently, the use of symbols ("wild cards" & "Truncation operators") that stand for one or more letters enable us to search for variations of a root word or multiple spellings of a word can be a valuable tool in online research.
• In particular truncating a word is a powerful tool in Dialog searching which increases your recall because it addresses the possible ways a writer may employ a single word that may be vital to your search need.

Operator

• Dialog provides one wild card/truncation operator, the question mark (?).
• The question mark, though, can be used in a variety of ways to specify one or more unknown letters:
• Within a word (wild card)
• At the end of a word or root word (truncation).
  • Warning: Do not truncate words too far as you may produce a far too broad set of largely irrelevant results. For example, if you want to find out about how a company is computerizing its packaging operation:
    • Good: s computeriz? and packaging - This finds computerize, computerizing, computerized, computerization.
    • Bad: s computer? and packaging - This finds the computerize variants, but it also finds computer, computers, computerdom, computerless, etc. Just the words "computer" and "computers" would produce a huge set of irrelevant results.

Formats

 

Function/Command	Format	Examples, Notes
truncation: any # of characters	?	flow? finds: flow, flows, flowing, flower, flowed, flowmeter, etc.
truncation: exact # of characters	??, ???, etc	catalog?? finds: catalogue, cataloged, catalog, catalogs, etc.
truncation: 1 additional character	? ?	cat? ? finds: cat, cats, Cato
embedded wild card: exact # of characters	??, ???, etc	wom?n finds: women, woman, womyn princip??s finds: principals, principles