Plain Text Search
Plain text search may be used to search for single or multi-word phrases, while a regular expression search accepts only single words such as "frustrat*". The following table shows characters that may be used to perform special functions when using plain text search.
Character |
Function |
Example |
Meaning |
---|---|---|---|
- (minus) |
Exclude |
-not happy |
Files that do not contain "not happy" |
& |
AND |
cell phone & tablet |
Files containing both "cell phone" and "tablet" |
| |
OR |
cell phone | tablet |
Files containing either "cell phone" or "tablet" |
* |
Wildcard for 0+ characters |
help* |
Will return results for help, helping, helpful, and other variants of the word stem. Does not work with multi-word searches. |
? |
Single character wildcard |
th??? |
Will return results for "there", "thank", "those". Does not work with multi-word searches. |
~n |
Search for phrases appearing up to n words apart within the same speaker turn |
cancel account ~4 |
Files containing "cancel" and "account" within the same speaker turn and no more than 4 words apart. For example, "cancel your, the account", "cancel my daughter’s membership account", and so on. |
~t |
Search for phrases appearing within the same speaker turn |
cancel account ~t |
Files in which "cancel" and "account" appear in the same speaker turn |
^ |
Search for phrases found at the beginning of a speaker turn |
^ thank you |
Files containing "thank you" at the beginning of a speaker turn |
$ |
Search for phrases found at the end of a speaker turn |
account number $ |
Files containing "account number" at the end of a speaker turn |
^
(beginning of line) and $
(end of line) characters were added in V‑Spark Version 3. Data uploaded prior to Version 3 cannot be searched using these characters.