Kings versus King's

[williamk]

In NKJV, I did a whole Bible search (using Exact Search) for "kings". The search returned 567 hits, but it also included "king's".

 

I then searched for "king's" using Exact Search and got the same 567 number containing both "king's" and "kings".

 

This doesn't seem correct to me. Why is an Exact Search for "kings" returning results containing both "kings" and "king's"?

 

Is there a setting I am overlooking? Thanks for any replies!

[Timothy Jenney]

[Chuckle] That's because there is a difference between an exact search option and an exact search. Confusing, no?

 

Selecting an exact search option means a search for "kings" will return only "Kings, kings, king's and King's." It won't find "king" or "kingliness" (if there is such a word).

 

To order Accordance to match capitalization, breathing marks, end forms, and possessives (some of these are only used in other languages), just put an equals sign (=) in front of the word, like so: =kings

Edited April 13, 2016 by Timothy Jenney

[Λύχνις Δαν]

Yep.

 

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kingliness

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/kingly?q=kingliness#kingly__6

 

Thx

D

[Timothy Jenney]

Thanks, Daniel!

 

...and I thought my wife had just made that word up to describe me! ;-)

[williamk]

Thanks Timothy -- I can't say I understand, but I will use "=" going forward. 

 

I've been using Accordance from the beginning, have done innumerable searches, and have never used "=" in front of a search term -- and never, until today, noted any curious returns. Maybe I just haven't noticed -- but this seems odd to me.

 

Nonetheless, thank you for responding and providing the "=" tip. I don't know why an Exact Search doesn't just do what the "=" sign does. I'll assume it's above my pay grade.     :-)

 

William K. 

[David Lang]

William,

 

It's not above your pay grade, it just requires a little understanding of Accordance's history of development.

 

Accordance has always ignored case and apostrophes when you do a simple search. That's because we don't want someone to enter "king" (lowercase) and miss all the occurrences of "King" (uppercase).

 

Somewhere around version 4, we added the equals sign to enable you to search specifically by case and apostrophes. Thus, "=king's" will find "king's", not "kings," nor even "King's".

 

Fast forward to around version 10 or 11, and most new Accordance users have been trained by Google to expect an even more flexible approach to entering a search. For example, a Google search for king's will find not just "king's" and "kings", but also "king," "kingdom," and even Tim's personal title of "his kingliness." ;-)

 

In an attempt to approximate the flexibility of a Google search, we added the Flex search option. We then used the term Exact search to describe the way we had always done searching, but as Tim pointed out, that's something of a misnomer, since using the equals sign is required for a truly exact search.

 

I hope that helps clear up at least a little of the confusion.

Edited April 14, 2016 by David Lang

[williamk]

David, thanks for the explanation! Maybe I just haven't been paying careful attention to search results -- but I'll definitely take advantage of the "=" sign going forward. I'm sure it will enhance my use of Acc. 

 

Thanks again!

[Solly]

Thank you, David! I always enjoy information about product development history, because it helps me remember and make sense of the current commands and logic of the software.