Search Results Page

The search results page lists descriptions of documents that meet your search criteria. This page appears following a search using global search or advanced search.

Search Results Overview

The top of the search results page provides a search summary, sorting and navigation tools, and an action bar. For example:

• Search summary: The summary lists the search phrase, followed by any parameters applied to the search. In the above illustration, cloud computing was searched and the search was refined to include only journal articles published between 2010 and 2015.
• If the initial search yields few or no results but a similar term would yield a higher number of results, IEEE Xplore returns a search suggestion. For example, if you search for rfiid, no results will be returned but rfid will appear as a search suggestion. You can click on rfid to run a new search.
  
• Sorting and navigation tools: By default, search results are organized by relevance in descending order with 25 results per page. You can change the number of results per page and the sort order using the drop-down menus. Users who sign in can specify the number of results per page and sort order in the Preferences dialog.
• Action bar: The action bar includes options for setting search alerts, downloading selected citations, bulk PDF download, exporting documents to Collabratec, and downloading search results.
• Search within results: You can enter a keyword to search the results of the previous search. The keyword you enter is added to the initial search using the AND operator. For example, if you search for Java and then search within results for XML, the search will match records containing both Java AND XML. The search within results searches metadata only (not full text) unless you have set your preferences to search full text and metadata by default (You must sign in to your IEEE Account or create an IEEE Account to set your search preferences.).
• Content Type, Publication Year, Author, and more: These areas correspond to facets of the search you can use to narrow the results. You can also use facets to expand a narrowed results set.

In the main area of the Search Results page:

• Format of search results: The default Title & Citation display format includes the document title and author(s)/editor(s); publication title, volume, issue, DOI, date, page numbers, and number of citations; and content type (IEEE Journal, IET Conference, etc.). Users who sign in can use the Preferences dialog to choose to display the title only, the title and citation, or the title, citation and abstract, which includes 30 to 40 words of the document abstract with each result.
• Full-text access: The subscription identifier iconindicates documents where you have access to full text.

Search Results Page Actions

All Users

• Email all or selected search results.
• Print the search results page.
• Download citations for all or selected search results.
• Click to view document's abstract on the search results page or click the document title to display the abstract page with complete bibliographic citation and abstract information.
• Purchase articles in publications to which you do not subscribe, to get full-text access to the articles.
• Revise your search specification to generate narrower results using the Filter These Results area, or to generate broader results by removing refinements listed in the search summary. You can also generate broader results by including additional values from the facets. For example, if you used the Content Type facet to narrow results by journals and then decide to include conferences, you can click on conferences within the Content Type facet to expand the results.
• Start a new search by clicking a search suggestion or entering a new search query.

Institutional Subscribers, IEEE members, and Guest Users (sign-in or access authentication required)

• View more detail for all results by choosing Title, Citation & Abstract on the Preferences dialog.
• Save the search to receive an email alert when new titles added to IEEE Xplore match the search.
• View a list of your most recent searches in Search History.

Publication Subscribers

• View full text of articles by clicking the link.
• View multimedia for an article by clicking the link when available.
• View algorithms associated with the article by clicking the Algorithm link when available.

Adjusting the Search Results Presentation

There are several options available within the search results page for adjusting the presentation of results.

Controlling the Number of Results Per Page

On the search results page, you can change the number of results displayed on each page (default is 25). Select the number you prefer using the Results per page drop-down menu:

Choices are 25, 50, 75, and 100.

Users who are signed into IEEE Xplore can specify the number of results per page for all searches in the Preferences dialog.

Controlling the Sort Order

On the search results page, you can change the order in which titles are presented (default is by relevance). Select the order you prefer using the Sort By drop-down menu:

Choices are Relevance (sorted by how well the result matches the search query as determined by IEEE Xplore), Newest First (in chronological order by publication year, beginning with most recent), Oldest First (in chronological order by publication year, beginning with oldest), Most Cited (sorted by the number of citing documents, beginning with the article that has the highest number of citations), Publication Title A-Z (in alphabetical order, ignoring leading articles such as "a", "the", and "an"), and Publication Title Z-A (in reverse alphabetical, ignoring leading articles).

Users who are signed into IEEE Xplore can specify the sort order for all searches in the Preferences dialog.

Broadening a Search

If IEEE Xplore finds few or no documents matching your criteria, you can broaden your search criteria to find more matches. Try these techniques:

• Use advanced search to search full text by selecting the Full Text & Metadata radio button.

• Add an alternative search term to your original specification using the OR operator. (See Specifying Multiple Criteria.)
• Add truncation and the * wildcard character to specify additional variations of the search term. For example, to find documents about photosensitive materials or photosensitivity, search for photosensitiv*.
• If you misspelled a search term, click the correctly spelled term in the search suggestions to rerun the search.
• Reenter the query in the global search box, and choose one of the search suggestions IEEE Xplore offers after you type the first few characters.

Narrowing a Search

Your first search attempt might produce a long list of results. To reduce the number of results and improve their relevance, you can narrow your search criteria in the following ways:

• Refine your search by content type, year, author, publisher, topic, or other facets.
• Read the citations of relevant titles, looking for additional keywords related to your search. Then use those additional keywords to search within the current set of results.
• Analyze the results list for relevant titles, and note recurring authors or publications. Then use advanced search to add an author or publication keyword to your search query using the AND operator. (See Specifying Multiple Criteria.)

Note: Observe the guidelines for nesting search operations when you combine OR and AND operators.

Refining Search Results

You can narrow a search and reduce the number of search results by using facets to refine the search. Here are guidelines for using each facet:

• Refining by Affiliation
• Refining by Author
• Refining by Conference Country or Location
• Refining by Content Type
• Refining by Publication Title
• Refining by Publication Year
• Refining by Publisher
• Refining by Standard Status
• Refining by Supplemental Items (Algorithms and Media)
• Removing Filters

Not all facets may be available for a set of search results. In addition, filtering the results may affect which facets are available for further refining the results.

Affiliation

Search results can be refined to include results based on a particular author affiliation. You can select from a list of the top 25 affiliations sorted by record count or, if there are more than 25 affiliations, you can use the type-ahead feature to find any affiliation in the search results.

Note: Affiliation refers to the affiliation of the primary author.

To refine author affiliation:

1. If necessary, click to expand the Affiliation section.
2. (Optional) In the Search for Affiliation box, begin to type the name of the affiliation you want to use to filter results. After you enter the first three characters, a list of suggested affiliations replaces the top 25 affiliations.
3. Select an affiliation by clicking the checkbox next to its name or by clicking the name itself. You can select multiple values.

The selected values appear below the Affiliation list in a You Have Selected section.

4. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Note: To deselect an affiliation before applying the filter, click the checkbox next to its name in the You Have Selected section.

Refining by Author

Search results can be refined to include results from a particular author. You can select an author from a list of the top 25 authors sorted by record count or, if there are more than 25 authors, you can use the type-ahead feature to find any author in the search results.

To refine by author:

1. (Optional) In the Search for Author box, begin to type the name of the author you want to use to refine results. After you enter the first three characters, a list of suggested names replaces the top 25 names. The suggestions match first or last names in the full set of search results.
2. Select an author by clicking the checkbox next to his or her name or by clicking the name itself. You can select multiple values.
   
3. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Note: To deselect an author before applying the filter, click the checkbox next to his or her name in the You Have Selected section.

Refining by Conference Country or Location

Search results that contain conferences can be refined to include results from conferences that took place in a particular country or location (city). You can select from a list of the top 5 locations sorted by record count or, if there are more than 5, you can use the type-ahead feature to locate locations in the search results.

To refine by conference country or location:

1. If necessary, click to expand the Conference Country section.
2. (Optional) In the Conference Location box, begin to type the name of the country or city you want to use to refine results. After you enter the first three characters, a list of suggested locations replaces the top 25 countries.
3. Select a location by clicking the checkbox next to its name or by clicking the name itself. You can select multiple values.
   
   The selected values appear below the Conference Location list in refinements box.
   
4. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Refining by Content Type

Search results can be refined by the following content types:

• Books
• Conferences
• Courses
• Journals & Magazines
• Standards
• Early Access Articles (advance electronic versions of new journal content)

The available content types are sorted by record count and are relative to the initial search term. For example, if you search for 802.11j, there are only conferences and standards containing this term; journals and magazines, courses, and books would not appear as values.

Using the Content Type Facet

1. Select content types by clicking the checkbox next to its name or by clicking the name itself.
   
2. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Note: To deselect a content type before applying the filter, click its checkbox in the You Have Selected section.

Refine by Publication Title

Search results can be refined to include results from a particular journal, conference, or standard. You can select a title from a list of the top 5 publication titles sorted by record count or, if there are more than 5, you can use the type-ahead feature to locate any publication titles in the search result.

To refine by publication title:

1. If necessary, click to expand the Publication Title section.
2. (Optional) In the Search for Publication Title box, begin to type the title you want to use to filter results. After you enter the first three characters, a list of suggested titles replaces the top 5 titles.
3. Select a title by clicking the checkbox next to the title or by clicking the title itself. You can select multiple values.
   
   The selected values appear below the Publication Title list in a You Have Selected section.
   
4. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Note: To deselect a publication title before applying the filter, click its checkbox in the You Have Selected section.

Refining by Publication Year

Search results can be refined to a particular year or date range:

1. Click the Single Year or Range radio button to indicate that you want results for a particular year or for a range of years.
2. For a particular year, move the pointer arrow on the slider to that year. For a range of years, move the left pointer arrow to the starting year and the right pointer arrow to the ending year of the range. The selected year or years appear in the text boxes below the slider. You can also enter the years directly into the text boxes.
   
   
3. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Refining by Publisher

Search results can be refined to include results from a particular publisher (IEEE, IET, OUP, MIT Press, VDE, Wiley, AGU, River Publishers, IBM, Nokia Bell Labs, SAIEE, SAE, BIAI, TUP, KICS, URSI, SGEPRI, CSEE, Packt Publishing, CIE, Artech, now, Princeton University Press, CES, PTP, CMP, CPSS, Ericsson, IEICE, Manning, De Gruyter, and IAPP). Values are sorted by record count and are relative to the initial search term.

To refine by publisher:

1. If necessary, click to expand the Publisher section.
2. Select a publisher by clicking the checkbox next to its name or by clicking the name itself. You can select multiple values.
   
   The selected values appear below the Publisher list in a You Have Selected section.
   
3. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Note: To deselect a publisher before applying the filter, click its checkbox in the You Have Selected section.

Refining by Standard Status

Search results that contain standards can be refined to include results that are active, archived, redline, or withdrawn standards. Values are sorted by record count and are relative to the initial search term.

1. If necessary, click to expand the Standard Status section.
2. Select a status by clicking the checkbox next to its name or by clicking the name itself. You can select multiple values.
   
   The selected values appear below the Standard Status list in a You Have Selected section.
   
3. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.
   Note: To deselect a standard status before applying the filter, click its checkbox in the You Have Selected section.

Refining by Supplemental Items (Code and Media)

Search results can be refined to include results containing Code and Media.

To refine by publisher:

1. If necessary, click Supplemental Items to expand the Supplemental Items section.
2. Select the supplemental item you want to refine by.
   
   
3. Click to apply the filter and display the new search results.

Removing Filters

The top of the search results page provides a search summary that lists the search phrase, followed by any parameters applied to the search. For example:

Click to the right of a refinement to remove it. You can remove individual values within any of the refinement fields; however, you cannot remove the initial search terms.

Searching Within Results

Your first search attempt might produce a long list of results. To reduce the number of results and improve their relevance, you can search within the current set of results. The keyword(s) you enter will be added to the initial search using the AND operator. For example, if you search for Java and then search within results for XML, the search will match records containing both Java AND XML.

If you have started your search via the global search box (located in the IEEE Xplore header), the search within results option searches metadata only (not full-text) unless you have set your preferences to always search full-text and metadata by default (IEEE Account users only). Also, if you select to search against full-text and metadata via the advanced or command search pages, the search within option will also search full-text and metadata.

Be advised that searching full-text will retrieve a much larger number of articles than the metadata search. However, articles are much more likely to be less relevant. For most precise search results, we recommend using the default metadata search. Full-text can still be searched as needed via the Advanced Search page.

1. Read the citations of relevant titles, looking for additional keywords related to your search.
2. Type the additional keywords in the Search within results box.
   
3. Click the magnifying glass or press the Enter key to search.

Search Suggestions for Misspelled Terms

If you misspell a search term, IEEE Xplore looks for text in the database that is spelled the same way and may find some matches. To ensure your query returns expected results, the system also displays a search suggestion listing an alternative spelling for the search term and the number of records matching that spelling. Click a suggestion to run that search.

For example:

In this illustration, your search for rfiid yielded no results. IEEE Xplore suggests searching for rfid, which will return 7568 records.