Advanced Searching
There is an 'Advanced Search' link located beside the basic search input box on each page. Clicking this link will take you to the Advanced Search page.The Advanced Search page gives you more options for defining your search than a basic search does.
Advanced Search Form
The Advanced Search page provides several criteria for searching:
Search Collection Options
The Advanced Search allows you to specify the collection you wish to search. The collections available for search are:
All
The default search which searches across all collections.
This Site
By choosing this option you will restrict your search to the indexes maintained by australia.gov.au. It is comprised of links to websites and key webpages to help you find government information and services.
Federal Websites
By choosing this option you will restrict your search to content on Australian Government websites. At 'Restrict Federal Websites Search To:' typing words or a URL in the 'This domain' input box will limit your search results to those which have your words contained in their URL.
Publications
By choosing this option you will search both content on Australian Government websites and the catalogue of Australian Government publications held by Australian libraries. This catalogue has been kindly provided by the National Library of Australia. This search can be further restricted to only Government publications held by Australian libraries.
Media Releases
By choosing this option you will restrict your search to content on Australian Government media release webpages. This search can be further restricted to media releases from specific portfolios.
Search Term Options
Any of the words
Like a basic search, typing your search words in here will return results containing one or more of those words. Results containing more of your search words will be displayed ahead of results containing fewer of your search words.
All the words
Typing your search words in here will only return results that contain all of the words you have nominated.
The exact phrase
Typing your search words in here will only return results containing all of the words you nominated where those words are also in the order you entered them.
Without the words
Typing words in here will specifically exclude results that contain these words. This field is generally only useful when results are being generated from one of the first four fields.
Sort By Options
Relevance
The default sort which sorts results by their relevance to your search query.
Date
Choosing this option will sort results by the date attached to the resource. Please note that resources with older dates will often contain current information.
You can use one, some or all of these options in a single search request; e.g. you can search for a specific phrase while excluding certain other words and sorting the results by date. Please note that searches that include and exclude the same search words will not generate any results.
Advanced Search Results Page
The advanced search results page has a 'search summary' at the top, showing the number of search results retrieved. You can also view the results for your search criteria in other search collections via the search tabs.
Refine Your Advanced Search
If your search didn't return the pages you were after, click on the 'Advanced Search' link (located to the right of the 'Go' button in the Search bar) and you will return to the Advanced Search form page where all of your previous search criteria will still be listed. From here, you can alter the search criteria and search again.
Search Term Operators can also be used in the 'any of the words' field in Advanced Search.
