Code-Co's Internet Access to Utah Law: http://www.code-co.com
Search for words in the New Laws passed in 1996 (Both the General Session and the Special Session. This database searched includes the full text of every bill including the full text of every Utah Code Section that was changed by legislative action this year.
What you get back: We start at the end: here is what you are going to get after you do a search. If there are files that match your search request, you will first see a complete list of them showing the title and the size of the file.
Finding the exact place where the words you want are found. By clicking on the title of a file in the result list, you will go directly into the full text of that file. At the top of the document will be a special link that is not usually there. The link is to "FIRST SEARCH TERM FOUND." By clicking on that link you will jump in your document to the first location of any term that was part of you search. The word itself is a link to the next occurrence of any term. By clicking on these links, you can quickly see exactly the language you were looking for. The last occurrence links you back in a loop to the top of the document.
Getting back to the List of Files At the top and bottom of the file will be a link that will take you back to the list of files that matched your request. There are also links that let you start a new search at any time.
Detailed Explanation of Search Logic
Making an effective search request:
To know how to ask for what
you want, you need to know how we handle your request. We interpret
your request using simple but powerful rules built around the use of an
asterisk (*) and three logical
terms: AND, OR and NOT.
Multiple forms of a word using an asterisk (*)
If you would like the program to find any word that begins with a
common string of letters (such as rule rules ruled ruling) you can
type the common letters and follow them with an asterisk (*) (no spaces
between the letters and the asterisk). (Example:
rul* Please note that this request will also get words such as Rulon
that do not have in meaningful relationship with rule.)
THE ASTERISK ONLY GOES ON THE END. You can't use the asterisk feature in the middle of a term or at the beginning of the term. You will just get an error message or not find what you are seeking.
You may note that when the computer prints out your search request
after you use a term with an asterisk like "rul*", it replaces the
term with a phrase that looks like "( rule or ruled or ruling )."
It replaces your term with a list of the actual matching words that
are in the database you are searching.
Two Word Operators AND, OR
AND
means: Find files that contain BOTH terms (the terms on
either side of the AND.) In other words, if
your search request was "zoning and subdivision" we would find
files that contained both zoning and subdivision. A file that had
only one of these terms but not the other would not be found.
(PLEASE NOTE:
When you type words separated by just spaces)
we assume that the logical connecter to use is AND.)
OR
means: Find files that contain ONE OR BOTH of terms (the
terms on either side of the OR.) In other words, if your search
request was "zoning or subdivision," we would find all the files
that contained EITHER the word "zoning" OR the word "subdivision"
(or both.)
One Word Operator: NOT
NOT: When you want files that DON'T contain a word, you can
use NOT. NOT works on the term that FOLLOWS the NOT. If your search
was simply "not criminal" we would give you every file that did not
have the word "criminal" in it. Obviously, this operator, by itself,
is not too useful, but in combination as explained below, it is very
useful.
Combining search operations: Where the power is.
Briefly: Search requests are evaluated from left to right one operation
at a time, AND is understood when nothing is given, parentheses can
change the order of evaluation.
With more detail, here is how we actually do the request:
Example 1: "county and zoning or subdivision" We start on the left and make a "result list" all files that contain the word "county". We then go to the logic operator and the next term. Since AND means BOTH words have to be present, we then eliminate from the result list any files that don't have the word "zoning." Finally, since OR means either, we add to the list any files that contain the word "subdivision."
Example 2: "county zoning or subdivision" Again we start on the left and make a "result list" of all files that contain the word "county". We then go to the next word and find no logical operator. since we found no operator, we ASSUME an AND. (As a result, this example is evaluated exactly the same as example one, where the AND was typed explicitly. (Because it is the same, we won't go through the rest of this example.)
Example 3: "county and not zoning" We start on the left again, and make a "results list" of all files that contain the word "county". We then remove from the list any files that contain the word "zoning".
Example 4: "Jacobs or not Jones" We start on the left and get files that have "jacobs" We then add to the results list all files that don't have the word "jones" in them.
Example 5: "Jacobs not Jones"
This example is evaluated
exactly like example 3: the AND is assumed. Remember that the NOT
works just on the term after it (to the right of it.) This gives you
all file that have "Jacobs" and do not contain "jones"
Using Parentheses
By using parentheses you can change the order of evaluation and make
very specific requests. The portions of search requests in parentheses
are evaluated first from the deepest nested level out and then things
outside the parentheses are evaluated.
Example 6: county and (zoning or subdivision)
(Compare this example to example 1 above) This example first finds a
list of all files that contain the word "zoning" and adds to it a list
of all files that contain the word "subdivision" (in other words a
list of all files containing EITHER "zoning" OR "subdivision") It then
removes from the list all files that DON'T have the word "county"
Said differently, it takes a list of all files that contain the word
"county" removes any that don't have EITHER the word "zoning" OR the
word "subdivision" in them.
Capitalization, Numbers, terms we
don't index, and other things you ought to know.
Capitalization is ignored
. Brown brown BROWN are all the
same and will match any upper, lower, or mixed case occurrence of
the word "brown."
Terms with numbers are treated like words You can look up terms like these: 78-12-6 123 RE-106 and anything similar.
What is a word: We treat as a word to index any string of characters that starts with a letter or number and ends with a number or letter separated by a space or the end of line or by one of the following characters: ) ( / Square brackets are ignored when they are used by the court in quotes: The term [a]nother will be indexed as another. We remove the 's on any word ending in 's but a word like O'Dell is indexed as one word with the '. We remove any non-letter,non-number characters at the beginning or end of the term. Something in the text that looks like "(Jones)" will be indexed as jones. (Both the quote marks and the parentheses will be stripped.)
What we don't index: We don't index terms that are always found in essentially every file. (They make searches meaningless and the indexes very large.) These are words like: in, at, the, etc. You don't have to know the list. If you by chance use one of these "stop" words, we will let you know. You can reformulate your request to avoid the stop word.
MORE HELP
If you are a subscriber and need help formulating a request, send us
an email describing what you want to do and we will help you formulate
the request. Subscribers also receive an 800 number to call for help
during regular Utah business hours.
Start a search now! (Go to top of this page.)
