Using the COS Search Function
How do I search it?
The search interfaces
search all
search/browse within an institution
search geographically
search/browse by researcher name
search by COS Keyword Index
Search All option
Use for searching the entire database
Tip: The ‘Limit search to Full
Profiles’ box will limit your search to more complete
profiles. To also include short profiles in your search
– those that contain contact details and limited expertise
information – deselect this box.
Click a name to see a full profile.
Search/Browse by Institution option
for searching for experts at a COS member institution.
To search for experts at a COS Member institution, choose
‘Search’ and click the institution name. This finds any
researchers at institution that you specify who use the
exact phrase in their expertise statements. You may view
each entry separately or you may view all items that you
check from the viewing manager box.
To browse by researchers’ names at a particular institution,
choose ‘Browse’ and click the institution name.
Tip: All search forms have
a ‘Number of results to view’ picklist. Increase the number
to increase the number of results that show per page.
Lists appear alphabetically by surnames.
Search Geographically option for searching
in particular countries or regions.
Choose a country from the picklist or click the map to
zoom in. … or search within a particular country by clicking
the country name or choosing it from the picklist.
For example, Click ‘Experts in South Africa’ to do a search
for researchers based in that country. This form looks
the same as the main search form, except that the search
is restricted to South African researchers.
Click ‘Experts at Research Institutions in South Africa’
to do a search for researchers at a particular South African
institution.
Tip: The institution names
are linked to a search screen only if there are over 20
experts listed for that institution. You also can use
the ‘institution’ field in the search interfaces to find
people at particular institutions.
Search/Browse by Researcher Name option
for finding particular people, particularly if you are
unsure of their exact name. For example, Entering ‘ST’
into the search box will pull up all researchers in the
network whose surnames start with ‘ST’. This interface
automatically inserts a wildcard (*) at the end of your
search term.
In COS Expertise Workbench in the Search function, select
a name to view that researcher’s COS profile, or select
one of the alphabetical links below to move further into
the index.
Search by COS Keyword option for finding
people whose profiles are labeled with particular COS
Keywords.
Step One: Go to the keyword browser
and open browser window and then search for terms in the
keyword browser hierarchy.
Tip: Selecting the Explode
option will include all terms in the hierarchy underneath
the chosen Keyword(s).
E.g., exploding the Keyword Education will include the
150+ terms within that category, such as Higher Education,
Special Education and Women’s Education.
Special Features of COS Expertise
search methods
refining a query
saving your search
viewing more than one profile at a time
Search Methods – and/or/not
If you connect your search terms or fields with:
And then the search will only find the
opportunities that contain all of the parameters you set;
e.g. if you type WIND AND ENERGY the search will find
profiles that contain the word WIND AND the word ENERGY
somewhere within the search field(s) you are searching.
OR – e.g. ENVIRONMENT OR ECOSYSTEM will
find all records that contain the word ENVIRONMENT or
the word ECOSYSTEM, or both words.
NOT- e.g. CHINA NOT HAMSTERS will find
records that contain the word CHINA but exclude the word
HAMSTERS even if the word CHINA also appears.
Search Language – other tricks
Wild Card * - find variations on a word e.g.
Environment* finds profiles with words such as Environmental
and Environments.
Exact Phrase’’ – find a precise phrase e.g.
‘Wind Energy’ in quotation marks finds profiles where
these two words appear together.
Proximity w/#- find words used together but
not necessarily in an exact phrase e.g., WIND w/2 ENERGY
finds profiles where these two words are separated by
not more than three words, such as those with the phrase
WIND TURBINE ENERGY.
Precedence 0- execute a series of search commands
in a particular order e.g., (HIV OR AIDS) NOT EDUCATION
finds profiles with the terms HIV and/or AIDS, then excludes
those with the word EDUCATION.
Tip: See http://expertise.cos.com/quickguide.shtml
for full information about searching. This help documentation
is available via the ‘instructions’ link from every COS
Expertise page.
Step One: Type key word in All Fields
this will search on the key words in All Fields.
Step Two: Refine Query, searching in
All Fields will yield results up over 11,000 profiles,
click “refine your query’ to search within these results.
Step Three: Entering Additional Search
Terms, type in second keyword e.g. first key word and
second key word will search terms within the 11,000+ profiles
found in the original search.
Previous Searches
Click ‘Previous Searches’ to review, re-run and save any
queries you have done during this browser session.
Save a Search
To save a search to run later, go to File, Save As and
save the page to your hard drive. Then open the file at
any time in your browser to run same the search against
COS Expertise in the future.
View Multiple Records
To view more than one profile on one page, select the
relevant profiles in your results list and then click
‘View’ on the Viewing Manager. The Viewing Manager is
at the bottom of every Expertise results list.
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