Some Hints on Search

Q1. Can I browse the Table of Contents?

A1. Yes. But simple manual browsing of large lists may not be convenient. Using 'Find in page' facility of your browser you can hit the title(s) of most relevant chapter(s). Clicking any relevant title you can enter the full text under the chosen chapter title.

Q2. The search with a set of words gives a very large number of documents under several subject categories. What can one do with such a very large set of search results?

A2. The large size of search results may be due to the following reasons. The search was conducted in 'All Categories' and with 'All Words' option. The EOLSS body of knowledge is vast, disciplinary, interdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary. There are interconnecting elements of knowledge across many disciplines. It is due to this specific feature of interplay, the number of hits in a search in the EOLSS body of knowledge is likely to be higher than expected in a disciplinary context of direct relevance although the search system is designed with the standard facilities. Due to the integrative nature of the EOLSS body of knowledge some search terms may appear only in passing remarks in chapters that may not deal with the subject of the search terms in depth and detail expected as a separate discipline.

Q3. What should one do under such circumstances? Very large set of search results are unwieldy and their usefulness reduces with the size of results.

A3. Search can be narrowed either by selecting a specific encyclopedia (instead of all encyclopedias) or by searching for an exact phrase (instead of all words) or both. The resulting number of hits will be less than in the case of global search with all words and such hits will also be more relevant in a disciplinary context. On the other hand, in an interdisciplinary and/or transdisciplinary context, relevant hits are outside the disciplinary set.

Q4. What is the material immediately following the titles in the search results?

A4. The search results list the titles of hit chapters (articles/documents) and each title is accompanied by an abstract below it describing the nature and content of that chapter. This provision is deliberate as it will be helpful to the user in ascertaining the relevance which may not always be clear from the mere title.