Use the keyword search if you know clearly defined terms or names for which you are looking for matching documents. Proper names such as “Joseph Smeets”, building names such as “Ludendorff Kaserne” or events such as “Allerheiligenkirmes" can yield useful results.

Caution: If terms or names are clearly defined but used in a variety of ways, the keyword search will return a confusing multitude of results. Searching for countries such as "Preußen", cities such as "Dortmund" or phenomena such as "Bergbau" is likely to yield too many results for a successful search. Even supposedly specific search terms such as “Marienkirche” or "Uniform" can still yield many hits given the volume of archive material.

The use of filters is therefore very important when searching by keyword. This allows the keyword search to be narrowed down

• to a selected archive or archive section and/or
• exclusively to finding aids and/or
• exclusively to catalogue entries and/or
• exclusively to catalogue entries with digitised material and/or
• to a specific time period.

In addition, logical operators (also found behind the question mark in the search field) can be used in keyword searches, i.e.

• multiple keywords can be linked with AND in a search, meaning that all words must appear in the same data record,
• several keywords can be linked with OR in a search, i.e. a data record must contain one of the two words,
• word groups enclosed in quotation marks („ ”) lead to an exact search for this word group; you can exclude any number of words by placing a minus sign (-) in front of each of them,
• truncation (*) can be used for unknown word parts,
• letters can be replaced by a question mark (?) as a placeholder for the search,
• a phonetic search is performed by entering a tilde (~) after a search term.

Navigation search, on the other hand, does not follow a keyword, but opens up the path through the internal structure of an archive down to the individual documents. The path begins at the selected archive and first leads through its tectonics, i.e. the hierarchically structured overview of the holdings. Once the appropriate holding has been found, there are usually several more levels to traverse, which divide the confusing large number of documents in a holding into increasingly finer categories according to content. At the end of this structure, known as classification, are the inventory units, each of which describes a document or group of documents, be it a deed, a file, a photograph or a collection of individual sheets. Classifications and inventory units of a collection are usually recorded in a finding aid, which also provides further information on the origin and contents of the collection (although in the archive portal, "book" is now only the traditional term for the related inventory units of a collection).

Because navigation search allows users to browse through an archive from top to bottom, from general to specific, it is possible to explore the contents of a collection in a logical manner and thus conduct systematic research independently of keywords and specific search terms.

Since collections are usually organised according to the context in which the documents were created and thus follow the structure of the authorities, navigation searches require a certain basic knowledge of the political or administrative order of the respective era; you should have a rough idea of which institution was responsible for the topic you are looking for and in which archive its records can be found. But don't worry: archivists are happy to help (and no one will be angry with you if your enquiry has gone to the "wrong" archive; you will certainly be referred to the appropriate place).

What do the symbols in the archive search mean?

Function symbols:

• Link to digitised material: If catalogue entries have been digitised, clicking on the symbol opens the DFG Viewer, which can be used to view the corresponding catalogue entry.

• Persistent reference: The click generates a persistent link that permanently opens this element again and again.

• Shopping basket: Click on this symbol to add a catalogue entry to your shopping basket. The shopping basket allows you to pre-order catalogue entries for your next visit to one of the participating archives. Please note that the desired date must still be confirmed by the archive. You can only use the shopping basket function once you have set up a user account at archive.nrw.de. This user account is not (yet) identical to the account you may have already set up when visiting a participating archive.

• Watch list: By clicking on this icon, you can add an item from the navigation search (cataloguing unit, classification node, finding aid, collection or tectonic node) to your watch list. You can only use this function once you have set up a user account at archive.nrw.de. To do so, click on "LOG IN" in the upper right-hand corner of the screen. This user account is not (yet) identical to the account you may have already set up when visiting a participating archive.

• Navigation search: Clicking this button changes the view from the keyword search results list to the navigation search. You can return to the keyword search by clicking on "Keyword search".

Symbols of tectonics:

• Inventory: A physical unit of archive material, usually formed according to the context in which the documents were created and thus following the structure of the authorities, consisting of more or less cataloguing units.

• Finding aid: Result of cataloguing a (partial) collection with all catalogue entries organised according to a systematic classification system.

• Cataloguing unit: The smallest (physical) unit of a collection, be it a document, a file, a photograph, a bundle of individual sheets, or similar.