Combining Boolean Expressions - Parenthesis, OR

The commercial databases and Internet search engines that recognize boolean operators [such as "AND", "OR", "NOT"] generally allow the use of the parenthesis and "OR" operator to perform multiple activities simultaneously.

The "OR" statement is used to broaden a search. A search where results containing either the term boxer OR dog are sought will result in material on dogs, boxer shorts, hot dogs, the Boxer Rebellion, the dog days of August, Senator Boxer, dog breeds, boxer George Foreman, and so forth.

Unless seeking either of two obscure terms or phrases, using the "OR" operator by itself provides too many irrelevant results for practical research. If a database or search engine recognizes the use of the parenthesis, the "OR" operator can be used to perform multiple actions. Consider the following search:

boxer NOT (shorts OR rebellion OR senator OR fight)

This search requests any document containing the word "boxer", but then sifts-out any documents containing the terms "shorts", "rebellion","senator", or "fight". As a result of the multiple siftings, most of the results will be documents about boxer dogs. One can also use the parenthesis and "OR" statement to broaden a search - for example:

boxer AND (dog OR canine OR puppy)

_-DD