| FEATURE |
New Quicklaw |
WESTLAW
eCARSWELL |
CanLII |
| Default connector |
Defaults to phrase search |
Defaults to
OR |
Defaults to
AND |
| Searching without Boolean
commands |
|
Use the
search templates or natural
language searching |
Type terms
into query box without connectors |
| Order in which Boolean commands are evaluated |
1. phrase
2. terms in parentheses
3. OR
4. proximity connectors (/n, PRE/n, /S, /P, /SEG)
5. AND
6. AND NOT |
1. phrase in
quotation marks
2. terms in parentheses
3. OR
4. proximity connectors (+n, /n, +S, /S, +P, /P)
5. AND
6. % |
1. phrase in
quotation marks
2. terms in parentheses
3. OR
4. proximity connectors (/n, /S, /P)
5. NOT
6. AND |
| Unordered proximity searches |
/n (within
the number of words represented by n)
/S (within the same sentence)
/P (within the same
paragraph)
/SEG (within the same
segment or field) |
/n (within
the number of words represented by n)
/S (within the same sentence)
/P (within the same
paragraph) |
/n (within
the number of words represented by n)
/S (within the same sentence)
/P (within the same
paragraph)
|
| Ordered proximity searches |
PRE/n (within
the number of words represented by n) |
+n (within
the number of words represented by n)
+S (within the same sentence)
+P (within the same
paragraph) |
|
| Phrase searching |
Quotation
marks not required unless a word in the phrase is a connector or a stopped
word |
Use quotation
marks |
Use
quotation marks |
| Parentheses |
permitted - can be nested |
permitted - can be nested |
permitted - can be nested |
| Plurals and word variations |
If turned on,
searches for plural forms of singular and the reverse, and both masculine
and feminine forms |
Automatically
searches for plural forms of singular but not the reverse; in natural
language searching looks for word variations |
Automatically
searches for plural and singular and for usual word variations (contract,
contracts, contracted, contracting) |
| Truncation |
negligen! |
negligen! |
negligen* |
| Wild characters |
reali*ation |
reali*ation |
reali*ation |
| Hyphens |
hyphen is
treated as a space
should therefore search as one word and as two
words if term may be hyphenated |
automatically
searches for hyphenated search term as one word, as two words, and as
hyphenated
should therefore search using hyphenated form |
automatically
searches for hyphenated search term as a phrase and as a hyphenated term but
not as one word
should therefore search as one word and as
hyphenated term |
| Periods and Acronyms |
period is
treated as a space unless used with numbers or in an acronym
should therefore search with
and without periods if term may include periods |
if acronym is
entered with periods, automatically searches for acronym with and without
periods and spaces
should therefore search for acronym with periods |
acronyms will
be found whether searching with or without periods
should search with periods if
searching for number string that contains periods (eg., 13.7) |
| Default ranking method |
Case searches
use relevancy ranking but can easily be changed when viewing results to several other rankings
Statute searches sort by
chapter and section number but can easily be changed to other rankings |
Default for boolean
searches is reverse chronological order (grouped by court level); default
for statutes and some other material is table of contents order; natural language searches
are relevancy ranked
Change default in Preferences. No ability to
change ranking after search is run. |
Default is
relevancy ranking; can change to ranking by date or by citation frequency when viewing
search results |
| Text being searched |
cases and
journals - whole document is searched unless field search is specified
statutes - search terms must
appear in a single section
texts - search terms must
appear in section of text designated as a document |
cases and
journals - whole document is searched unless field search is specified
statutes - search terms must
appear in a single section
texts - search terms must
appear in section of text designated as a document |
cases - whole document is searched unless field search is
performed
federal legislation - search terms must
appear in a single section
provincial legislation -
whole Act or regulation is searched |
| Field searching |
select from
template |
select from template or use field(search
terms) |
select from
template |
| Display |
default
display is list of documents, with ability to display with key words, or
with search terms in context
statutes are by section, but
contiguous sections can be viewed by using Document Browse feature |
default
display is list in left frame and full document in right frame, with ability to go directly to hits
statutes and CED are by section, but contiguous sections can be viewed using
the Next and Previous links |
default display
is list of documents, with computer-generated keywords
user can control highlighting
of search terms in retrieved documents |
| Refining results |
can group search
results by topic, jurisdiction, court; use Modify Search to modify; use
Narrow Search to refine |
use Locate in
Result to refine search results or Edit Search to modify them; refine
KeyCite results using Limit KeyCite Display button while viewing Citing
References |
query box
appearing with results list allows modification and refinement of search,
including refinement of RefLex (note-up) results |
