OFF95: When to Use Speed Up Phrase Searching

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An index that uses Speed Up Phrase Searching includes proximity information for each word in the index. A regular index will have information stating that "word" is located in "doc1." A Speed Up Phrase Searching index will have information stating that "word" is located in "doc1" at position x, y, and z.

Take for example the phrase "word1 word2 word 3" (you must include the quotation marks to denote a phrase):

• An index with Speed Up Phrase Searching, will have this information and the results will be returned faster.
• In a regular index (one without Speed Up Phrase Searching), the query will be converted to search for 'word1 and word2 and word3' all in the same file. The index will have this information and the results will be returned quickly. Then, of the results (from that search), the original phrase "word1 word2 word3" will be searched for, but as if there was no index. Hence, the results for the final search are returned somewhat slower when compared with the index with Speed Up Phrase Searching.

The speed differences will be noticed on larger file sets, especially over a network. If you do not see any appreciable speed difference, you may want to save hard disk space and use the regular index.

To change enable Speed Up Phrase Searching, do the following:

1. Click Start on the Task Bar and point to Settings.
2. Click Control Panel and double-click the Find Fast icon.
3. Click Create Index on the Index menu. Select the Speed Up Phrase Searching check box.