Natural Language Search

The Natural Language search method utilizes regular spoken language phrases to generate search results. For example, suppose you enter:

Can I deduct landscaping expenses for my home office?

The search will return a list of results (up to a maximum of 100) that are the most relevant to that search phrase. Relevance is determined by an algorithm that weights factors such as the amount of keywords from the search phrase found in a document and the proximity of those keywords to each other. The most relevant results display at the top of the search results list.

Note: You have the option on all views to display or remove the display of the Best section (the most relevant section), which is displayed in green text.

To perform a Natural Language search:

1. Click Search on the Top Toolbar if you are not already at the search screen. The Search screen appears.

2. Select the Natural Language search option below the Keywords field.
3. From the Practice Area menu on the left sidebar, select a Practice Area for your search (for example, Federal, State & Local, International).
4. The source sets for the selected practice area appear in the Source Sets list.
5. Click the icon to expand a source set.
6. You can select for your search as many sources from a source set as you wish. Simply select the corresponding check box for each source.
7. To select an entire source set, click the check box to the left of the source set name (for example, Editorial Materials, Primary Source Materials, and so forth in the federal practice area).
8. You can also select a custom source set to search from the Choose Sources From drop down menu.
9. Enter your search phrase in the Keywords: field. Using Natural Language, this can be a complete sentence, phrase, question or list of keywords.  You can also click the Thesaurus/Query Tool link to access these advanced search functions:

• A select from previous keywords list is available on the Thesaurus/Query Tool screen allowing you to choose one of the last 10 queries you have used. 
  
• Click Get Thesaurus Terms for Current Query to generate a list of your search terms' synonyms that appear in the sources you are searching. Click the terms alternatives you would like to include in the search. To automatically include all synonyms, click the Include all alternatives in query link.
  
• Use the Restrictions panel to refine your search by requiring or excluding words from the current query.  

8. Click Search to execute your search.
   
   Once the search is complete, your results appear in the format determined by your Options screen selection.

Click Clear All to remove keywords from the dialog box, to clear selected sources, and to return to the default Search settings.

Related Topics:

• Introduction to Searching
• Keyword Searching
• Using the Checkpoint Thesaurus
• Setting Search Options
• Displaying and Navigating Your Search Results
• Performing a Search within BNA Daily Tax Report™

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