Search tips

The following tips will help you get the best results when you're looking for files.

Specifying the search text

In the Search text field, you enter one or more words. Basic search returns files that contain these words, whether they are in the body of the file, in keywords, or in other file properties. The more words that you enter in the Search text field, the more specific your search.

Basic search finds files that contain various forms of the words you enter in the Search text field. For example, if you look for "swim", Basic Search finds any documents that contain "swim," "swimming," or "swam." Basic Search uses word forms only if you are searching in English, French, Spanish, German, Dutch, Italian, or Swedish documents.

You can use wildcard characters in when you use Basic Search:

• The asterisk character "*" represents any group of one or more characters. For example, if you enter "s*nd", Basic Search finds any documents that contain "sand," "sound," or "send."
• The question mark character "?" represents any single character. For example, if you enter "f?nd" , Basic Search finds any documents containing "find" or "fund," but would not find documents containing "friend."

When you use basic search to look for items in your Outlook mailbox, you can use natural language in your search text. In natural language search, you formulate searches by using conversational phrases such as "Find all messages sent yesterday." You can use natural language search to find e-mail messages, calendar items, contacts, tasks, and notes. Natural language search is only supported in English versions of Office XP.

Specifying where to search

Before you search, you must specify at least one location in the Search in field. If you know exactly which folder or Internet address you want to look in, enter the name of the folder or the Internet address.

To search across multiple folders or network places, use the Search In list to specify where to search:

• My Computer contains all the drives and folders on your computer. Selecting a folder automatically selects all sub-folders.
• My Network Places contains all the network places that you use. Note that some network places do not support searching, and some only support searching of document libraries.
• Outlook contains all your messages, appointments, contacts, tasks and other information stored in Outlook. If you only want specific types of Outlook items, such as tasks, or E-mail messages, you specify them in the Results should be field.

Specifying the types of documents to find

You specify the types of files to find in the Results should be field. You cannot enter a file-type directly into this field. Use the Results should be list to specify the types of files to search for:

• Anything specifies the broadest set of file types, including file types unfamiliar to Office.
• Office Files specifies Microsoft Office documents. You can narrow the search by selecting specific Office applications.
• Outlook Items specifies e-mail messages, calendar items, contacts, tasks, notes, and journal entries.
• Web Pages specifies Web page (.htm or .html), Web archive (.mhtml), and other Web page related formats (.mht and .asp).