Advanced Searching of the Collected Tantras of the Ancients

Note: All Tibetan terms must be entered using THDL's extended Wylie transliteration system and/or English.
For a description of the various searches, see below.

Contextual Search

Search for  
that contain the phrase
Search within:
Atiyoga | Anuyoga | Mahayoga | All

Proximity Search

Search for
within
Search within:
Atiyoga | Anuyoga | Mahayoga | All

Boolean Search

First Search Term Boolean Second Search Term Boolean Third Search Term
Search within:
Atiyoga | Anuyoga | Mahayoga | All

For an explanation of the search results, click here.

Edition to search:
mTshams brag
gTing skyes
Bai ro'i rgyud 'bum
Zhang zhung
All

Brief Description of Three Types of Advanced Searches

The advanced search feature allows for three types of searches. In the following list, short descriptions of each kind of search are given. More detailed descriptions may be found in advanced search help section or by clicking on a specific search name below:

Wildcards: Two wildcards are available for all searches. The question mark "?" represents any single character; e.g., "sky?b" returns both skyob and skyab. The asterisk (*) represents any set of 0 or more characters up to the end of the word, e.g., "sky*" would return skye, skyon and the English word, sky, as well as skyob and skyab. (Note: Due to an apparent bug in the software, the asterisk does not always seem to function as it should.)

Note on the Apostrophe (a chung): When performing searches on a Tibetan phrase containing an a chung, represented by an apostrophe ('), although the searching software recognizes the apostrophe, in some situations the apostrophe is not highlighted in the search results.

Do contextual search | Do proximity search | Do boolean search

Extensive Explanation of Advanced Searches

We offer three modes of searching textual collections: 1) the contextual search, 2) the proximity search, and 3) the boolean search. (Click on the name for further information on each search type.)

All three types of searches provide one with the option of narrowing the search to a particular doxographical category. The Collected Tantras of the Ancients is generally organized into three large categories: Atiyoga, Anuyoga, Mahāyoga. One can perform any of these searches within a particular doxographical category or in all of them, through the check boxes underneath each search form.

Contextual Searches

Contextual searches allow the user to specify which category of information in the collection they would like to search. For example, a user could search for a phrase only in "Tibetan text titles" or only in "places". The following is the full list of categories we currently enable users to search within contextually.

Note: When searching on text titles, if the search phrase is contained in the title listed in the TOC area, this is also counted as a hit but is not highlighted. Therefore, the number of hits listed in the TOC area may be one greater than the hits highlighted in the content area to the right.

When the results of such searches are returned, the left-hand frame still contains the table of contents, but red numbers now appear next to each level of the TOC indicating the number of hits in that item (i.e., edition, volume, or text). Only items with hits are shown. One can navigate through the TOC hierarchy to the text level, and the hits in each text will also be shown in red numbers next to the text title. The first text with a hit will be highlighted in blue and that text's record will appear in the right-hand frame. For a pictorial explanation of the search results, click here.

A few sample searches are offered below for a first time user to try out this facility. For each search, one can change the "Search within all" option to "Atiyoga", "Anuyoga" or "Mahayoga" and see the difference in results:

Do contextual search | Do proximity search | Do boolean search

Proximity Search

As the name of this search suggests, one can use this form for searching for words or phrases that are within a certain proximity to another set of words or phrases. In the Tibetan context, syllables are delimited by a dot, called a "tsheg", while phrases are delimited by a line or "shay". However, there is no clear demarcation for words, which can be composed of more than one syllable. In proximity searches, "word" actually means syllable so that one can search for two syllables or words within a designated number of syllables each other. This is useful for Tibetan searches as it is a common convention to abbreviate a word by leaving out essential syllables. The proximity search can allow one to find all such variants. Either a single syllable or a word composed of multiple syllables (separated by spaces) can be entered into any of the search phrase boxes. There is also an option to choose the order of the words, whether one word comes before or after the other. Thus, possible searches are:

Though in the first three the same terms are used (gsang ba or 'secret', and snying po or 'matrix'), each yields different results.

When the results of such searches are returned, the left-hand frame still contains the table of contents, but red numbers now appear next to each level of the TOC indicating the number of hits in that item (i.e., edition, volume, or text). Only items with hits are shown. One can navigate through the TOC hierarchy to the text level, and the hits in each text will also be shown in red numbers next to the text title. The first text with a hit will be highlighted in blue and that text's record will appear in the right-hand frame. For a pictorial explanation of the search results, click here.

Do contextual search | Do proximity search | Do boolean search

Boolean Search

The boolean search allows one to look for various combinations of words or phrases. In the advanced search form, one can enter up to three different search terms connected by any possible combination of boolean terms. The available boolean terms are:

The basic structure of the boolean search is:

phrase 1 and/or [not] phrase 2 [and/or [not] phrase 3]

One must use either an "and" or an "or" between phrases. The "not" is optional, as is the entire third phrase. Thus, one can search for:

Generally, as shown above, the "not" keyword is used in conjunction with the "and" keyword. The software claims to recognize the "or not" combination. However, this logically makes little sense, and the implementation does not appear to work properly.

When the results of such searches are returned, the left-hand frame still contains the table of contents, but red numbers now appear next to each level of the TOC indicating the number of hits in that item (i.e., edition, volume, or text). Only items with hits are shown. One can navigate through the TOC hierarchy to the text level, and the hits in each text will also be shown in red numbers next to the text title. The first text with a hit will be highlighted in blue and that text's record will apper in the right-hand frame. For a pictorial explanation of the search results, click here.

Do contextual search | Do proximity search | Do boolean search

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