Using Search

To use site search, enter your query terms in the search box and click the search button on the right hand-side. You can use single terms or type in a whole sentence or phrase but try to use terms that are likely to be within the text of the documents you are searching for.

site search will find documents containing as many of these words and phrases as possible, ranked so that the documents most relevant to your query are shown first. Don't worry about missing a document because it doesn't have one of the terms in your query because site search returns relevant results even if they don't contain all query terms.

You also don't need to worry about spelling your query correctly. If site search thinks you have made a mistake it will show the suggested spelling below the search box. Simply click the suggestion link to re-submit your query with the correct spelling.

You can make your query more specific by clicking on the radio buttons below the search box. By default, site search will match All Words (in your query) but you can force site search to only return results that have any of your query terms by selecting Any Words. If you are looking for an exact phrase then type the query exactly as it would appear in the source document and click the Exact Phrase radio button.

Click Find in Title only check box to restrict your search to only find documents that have your query terms in the document title.

For a more powerful search, use advanced search.

Your search results

Once you have submitted your query, site search will return a page of results. You will see the title of the document and a brief summary that is likely to indicate what the document is about. Click the title to go to the actual document.

Additional information about each document is also displayed on the results page:

The last modified date of the document.
The location of the document.

Results grouped by tabs

The results page includes four tabs, located just above the search results. These tabs can be used to refine your search. If you click on one of the tabs, a new set of results will be displayed, reflecting the specific information the tab encompasses. The four tabs are:

Stroud District Council - all documents available on Stroud's website are searched
County Council - all documents available on Gloucestershire County Council's website are searched
All Gloucestershire - all documents available on the six local council web sites (Cheltenham Borough, Cotswold District, Forest of Dean District, Gloucester City, Stroud District and Tewkesbury Borough) and Gloucestershire County Council's website are searched
Related Sites - external websites, directly linked by any of the local council or county council documents, are searched. Examples include DEFRA, Environment Agency, Gloucestershire Constabulary and Gloucestershire Health Services.

Using 'more from' links

The search hits themselves may include a 'more from this site' link. If you click this the search results are reformed to show only results from that site or section. A tab is automatically diplayed for that site/section, and while it displayed all follow on searches will be restricted to that site/section only. This is useful way to drill-down the search to a specific site. You can exit this mode by clicking on one of the other tabs.

Sorting your results

Results are sorted by their relevance to the specified query. Click sort by date to re-display the results sorted by their last modified date. Clicking sort by relevance will re-sort by relevance.

Showing more results

If your search has yielded lots of results, site search will divide these into several pages. You will see 10 results on each page. Use the Previous or Next links to navigate through the results, or jump to the page you want by clicking on the page number.

Refining your search

At the top of the results page is another search box allowing you to refine your search.