ACQuire Search Help

First know that both Search and Topic Search access the same documents. Search is the traditional method where keyword(s) are specified and used to provide a list of documents that semantically match. Topic Search is an alternate view of stored documents organized by categories and sub-categories. Both techniques result in the list of selected documents.

What is presented as "Top 5 Searches"?

The panel at the lower left provides easy links to lists of documents from the 5 most frequently requested searches.

Where do I go for help?

If you are unable to locate a specific document or need other assistance, contact the help desk at issc@dau.mil.

How do I search for something?

Search is located on the ACQuire home page. To search, enter words or phrases in the search input box and press the Search button.

By default, providing multiple words will return documents matching any (not all) of the words. To search for a specific phrase, enclose it in quotes, for example, "Field Manual".

What does the Search function actually search?

The search feature in ACQuire searches the full text of the documents hosted by selected web sites. By default, search selects all Sites. Sites may be searched individually or in combination by selecting the corresponding check boxes.

Currently there are six included web sites:
1. Defense Acquisition University Home Page (DAU Homepage)
2. Defense Acquisition Portal (DAP)
3. Acquisition Community Connection (ACC)
4. Defense Acquisition Guidebook (DAG)
5. Ask A Professor (AAP)
6. Browsable Courseware (CL&DL)

More web sites are expected to be listed to expand the ACQuire search. Please help us grow by sending the URL links of your suggested site(s) to us so that we can add them in the next release.

How can I search only on document titles?

By default, both document titles and contents are searched. By clicking the "Search Titles Only" check-box, only the document titles will be searched.

Can I search on specific site(s)?

Yes. Sites may be searched individually or in combination by selecting the corresponding check boxes.

The search generated too many documents, what should I do?

If you get too many documents, narrow your search by providing more specific words or phrases or try search within results and / or filter results by deselecting the undesired sites on the search result page.

What does Search Within Results do?

This option is only available after an initial search has been performed. Search Within Results will only search the documents in the search results list. This is a quick way to narrow your search field when an initial search yielded too many documents.

You can Search Within Results more than once. However, the "Back" navigation button on the web browser is not guaranteed to work during Search Within Results. Some result information of the previous search may be lost while using the "Back" button.

Are there any special search characters?

There are some special characters treated as wildcards. Use wildcards as substitutes for unknown parts of words or numbers. The word will be expanded based upon the wildcard. For example, the query term over* might expand to: overact, overcoat, overdo, overhand, etc.…

Here is the list of wildcards:

Wildcard	Example	Description
@	c@re	match exactly one alpha character
#	#600	match exactly one numeric character
*	pharma*	match any character(s)
?	a?er	match exactly one character
[ ]	199[1-6]	search expression; match any single character within the brackets, can include a hyphen to indicate a range of numbers or letters, or a comma to separate ranges
[^]	199[^1-3]	match any single character except those within the brackets, can include a hyphen to indicate a range of numbers or letters, or a comma to separate ranges

What if I can't find a specific document?

Searching by the exact title of a document can cause problems when the document contains special characters, such as /, -, and &. Try your search using just the major keywords contained in the document title name.

If you are still unable to locate a specific document, contact the help desk at issc@dau.mil.

How do I search for some topic?

The Topic Search is initiated by menu or link selection from the ACQuire home page. It provides a list of major categories and the top sub-categories in each. Selection of any category or sub-category provides both links the next lower level of sub-category and the documents listed at the current level.

What does the Topic Search function actually search?

The Topic Search feature in ACQuire categorizes documents hosted by selected web sites. By default, Topic Search selects all Sites. Sites may be searched individually or in combination by selecting the corresponding check boxes.

More web sites are expected to be listed to expand the ACQuire search. Please help us grow by sending the URL links of your suggested site(s) to us so that we can add them in the next release.

What is the "Category" path?

The path shown with "Category" is the hierarchical navigation path leading to the current page, e.g. Browse Home >> Location >> DAU Locations >> DAU West Region. Clicking any category link in the path will bring the result page of that category topic. It is a handy and preferred way to navigate for browsing other categories.

What are "Categories With Results" and "Categories Without Results"?

ACQuire associates documents within categories. "Categories With Results" identifies those in which documents or sub-categories logically reside. "Categories Without Results" have been identified and reserved as future document repositories.

What are the numbers next to some categories?

The number in the parenthesis beside a category indicates the number of documents directly latched to that particular category. Lack of a number indicates the existence of documents latching further sub-categories.

What is the gray bar at the top of the search results page for?

The search statistics bar tells you how many documents are currently displayed and how many were retrieved in total.

Why are my search results displayed in different colors? What does it all mean?

In the search results list, the information is color coded to differentiate between different types of information.

The document title is displayed in blue and can be clicked on for direct access to the document.
The summary consists of "best sentences" which are displayed in black and markups (any search term(s) occurrence) which are displayed in colors ranging from bright red (for strongest hits) to bright blue (for weakest hits).
The web address or URL and the relevance rank are displayed in gray.
Highlighted View is displayed in brown and can be clicked on for direct access to a text-only, marked-up copy of the document.

Result sample

What is the relevance rank?

The higher the relevance rank, the better the document matches your query term(s).

What is the Highlighted View?

The Highlighted View is a text only version of the result document cached on the server. The search terms are color-coded, ranked by best match raging from bright red (strongest hit) to bright blue (weakest hit). Title Only searches are not marked up.

What about ctrl-f?

You can use the keyboard combination of the "ctrl" key and the "f" key to search in the results list or any open document for a search term(s).

How can I exclude documents from the complete search results?

Both Search and Topic Search provide the ability to further narrow the results listed. At the bottom of each documents list page, "Filter Results By" provides check-boxes for excluding documents from one or more of the same sites originally listed for the Search Selected Sites feature.