Using the Quick Search

The Quick Search lets you use search for records on the RRN in a similar way to searching on Google. This is a fast way to search if you know exactly what you want.

Performing a Basic Quick Search

Type musqueam into the quick search. As you type, you’ll see a number of suggestions appear to help you complete your search. By choosing one of these options, you can narrow your search down to just items from the Musqueam culture; just items provided to the RRN by the Musqueam Indian Band; just items made in Musqueam, BC; or by simply pressing enter, all items that contain the word Musqueam anywhere in their record.

Choosing a Facet

Choosing a single “facet” is a great way to exclude results you are not interested in. For example, if you are only looking for masks, you’d want to search for type: mask in order to exclude items made with “masking tape” or dance screens that may have had “masks placed behind them”. You can find a list of all the available facets by clicking the button beside the Quick Search.

Remember though, it sometimes useful to also do an all fields search to identify interesting items that may not have been classified as masks. This could include items such as headdresses or photographs of people wearing masks.

Advanced searching with ‘AND’, ‘OR’, and ‘NOT

Sometimes you want to perform a very targeted search. To achieve this, the RRN supports using the boolean operators AND, OR, and NOT.

Suppose that you wanted to find all masks that are made of both wood and metal. You could achieve that by typing type: mask, made of: wood and metal. Once you get the hang of it, boolean searches are a great way to find exactly what you want.

In the previous section, we talked about doing an all fields search for the word mask to find any other interesting items that weren’t classified as masks. We can use the NOT keyword get a list of all items that contain the word mask but aren’t classified as masks by typing contains: mask, type: not mask.

Experiment with using the button to select facets in combination with the AND, OR, and NOT keywords to create powerful and targeted searches.


Next: Viewing Your Results