Most Word Spy searches consist of just a single word. However, the Word Spy search engine supports more complex searches such as phrases, wildcard characters, and Boolean operators. To help you get better search results, here's a summary of the techniques you can use in Word Spy's Search box, above:

• To search for a phrase, type the phrase without quotation marks. For example, man cave.

• To search for entries that include two or more words, separate the words with the Boolean AND operator. For example, the search text food AND future matches entries that contain both the word food and the word future.

• To search for entries that include at least one of two or more words, separate the words with the Boolean OR operator. For example, the search text activist OR guerrilla matches entries that either the word activist or the word guerrilla.

• To match words that begin with one or more letters, type the letters followed by the asterisk (*) wildcard character. For example, searching for hack* matches hack, hacker, Hackett, hackneyed, and so on.

• To match all the grammatical forms of a word, type the word followed by two asterisks (**). For example, type sink** to match entries that include the forms sink, sinking, sank, and sunk.

• To search for entries that include two words and have those words relatively close to each other, separate the words with the NEAR operator. For example, the search text gardening NEAR seed matches entries that contain the word gardening close to the word seed.

• To seach for entries that do not include a word, use the Boolean AND NOT operator. For example, the search text surfing AND NOT Internet matches entries that include the word surfing but not the word Internet