It is sometimes useful to have a degree of flexibility while performing searches - you might not always require a document to match your query exactly, and only getting 1:1 results can sometimes slow you down. GoldFynch's 'slop' feature helps with this.
Slop dictates how far apart the terms in a search query can be in a document for it to still be produced as a valid search result. Think of this as the number of times a term in a document would need to be moved to match the terms of a search query. All the words from that search query would still need to be present in the document - it's only the arrangement and distance between words that slop makes allowances for. Using slop can greatly increase the speed of your searches while maintaining their accuracy.
The higher the slop value the wider the search net. The default slop value is 4. For stricter (tighter) searches, set the slop to 2, wider (looser) searches, set a value higher than 3.
Here's how to use the slop feature:
1: Navigate to the 'Advanced Search' view by clicking the button in the left pane
2. Click on the 'Create New Search' button
3. Click anywhere in the condition box to enter the search criteria. Alternatively, click the edit icon (the pencil) that appears when you hover over the condition box
4. Enter your search query into the 'value' field
5. Enter the slop value you wish to use into the 'optional slop' field
5. Click on the run search button
For example, here the search query "create file" using a slop value of 0 (the default) produces no results:
At a slop value of 1, GoldFynch finds a result that contains the terms "create" and "file" separated by a single word: "load".
Increasing the slop value to 3, two additional files are found:
And at slop 4:
NOTE: The order in which the queried words occur in matter. For example, for "email data" to register "data email" as a valid result, the slop value will need to be 2.