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Search Tips

The following tips have been provided to help users develop effective queries to retrieve relevant hadith quickly. This list has been compiled from the official documentation of the Lucene search engine which has been incorporated into the database.

1. Terms

A query is broken up into terms and operators. There are two types of terms:

1. Single Term: A Single Term is a single word such as pledge or allegiance.
2. Phrase: A Phrase is a group of words surrounded by double quotes such as "pledge allegiance". Multiple terms can be combined together with Boolean operators to form a more complex query (see below).

2. Wildcard searches

Single and multiple character wildcard searches within single terms (not within phrase queries) are supported. To perform a single character wildcard search use the "?" symbol. To perform a multiple character wildcard search use the "*" symbol. The single character wildcard search looks for terms that match that with the single character replaced.

For example, to search for "near" or "neat" you can use the search nea? Multiple character wildcard searches looks for 0 or more characters. To search for test, tests or testers, you can use the search test* You can also use the wildcard searches in the middle of a term, such as in "te*t". Note: You cannot use a * or ? symbol as the first character of a search.

3. Fuzzy searching

To do a fuzzy search use the tilde, "~", symbol at the end of a Single word Term. For example to search for a term similar in spelling to "swore" use the fuzzy search: "swore~". This search will find terms like swore, snore, score, etc. Furthermore, an optional parameter can specify the required similarity. The value is between 0 and 1, with a value closer to 1 only terms with a higher similarity will be matched.

For example: swore~0.7 will yield only results that are close to the original query, such as swore, score, etc. A search query swore~0.3 will yield results that are slightly similar to the original query, such as swore, stone, swords, etc. The default that is used if the parameter is not given is 0.5.

4. Proximity Searches

To do a proximity search use the tilde, "~", symbol at the end of a Phrase. For example to search for a "pledge" and "migration" within 10 words of each other in a hadith use the search: "pledge migration"~10. This will yield results in which the words pledge and migration are separated by no more than 10 words. This is extremely useful when you only know the context of what you are searching for.

5. Boosting a term

You can increase the relevance level of matching hadith based on the terms found. To boost a term use the caret ("^") symbol with a boost factor (a number) at the end of the term you are searching. The higher the boost factor, the more relevant the term will be. Boosting allows you to control the relevance of a hadith by boosting its term.

For example, if you are searching for pledge hijrah and you want the term "pledge" to be more relevant, boost it using the ^ symbol along with the boost factor next to the term. You would type: pledge^4 hijrah This will make results with the term pledge appear more relevant. You can also boost Phrase Terms as in the example: "pledge of allegiance"^5 requested. By default, the boost factor is 1. Although the boost factor must be positive, it can be less than 1 (e.g. 0.2)

6. Boolean operators

Boolean operators allow terms to be combined through logic operators. The "+" or required operator requires that the term after the "+" symbol exist somewhere in the field of a single hadith. To search for hadith that must contain "pledge" and may contain "allegiance" use the query: +pledge allegiance

The "-" or prohibit operator excludes hadith that contain the term after the "-" symbol. To search for hadith that contain "pledge allegiance" but not "allegiance to the Messenger" use the query: "pledge allegiance" -"allegiance to the Messenger".