Search styles in character fields
Each character field on a form is assigned a specific search style that determines how it finds matching requests. Your administrator will set these for you. Three search styles are available:
Search style | Definition | Example |
|---|---|---|
Equal | Searches for exactly what you entered in the field. | If you enter Bob Smith in the Created By field, you find all requests created by Bob Smith, but none created by Bob Smithe. |
Leading | Searches for the entered sequence of characters only at the beginning of the field, ignoring any subsequent characters. The search will return every request with this field that contains the first characters exactly as you entered plus any following characters. | If you enter Bob in the Created By field, you find all requests created by Bob Smith, as well as those created by Bob Smithe and Bobby Jones. You will not find any created by Jill Bobbington. (The characters Bob in the name Jill Bobbington are not leading characters.) |
Anywhere | Searches for the entered sequence of characters anywhere in the field. | If you enter Bob in the Created By field, you find all requests created by Bob Smith, as well as those created by Bob Smithe, Bobby Jones, and Jill Bobbington. |
Equal and Leading searches are faster than Anywhere searches because Anywhere searches compare each character in the field while Equal and Leading searches do not.