Search Term Reports – Knowledge Base

A search term report (STR) allows you to run multiple content and/or metadata searches simultaneously. The STR provides information about the number of documents that hit on any of the searches within a search term report.

Using search term reports, you can explore documents in the early phases of your project, before performing a more detailed review. Search term reports are also helpful for triaging your review and creating assignments.

This article explains how to create and manage search term reports in Everlaw.

Requirements

To create and use search term reports, you must have the appropriate permissions. These permissions are managed by Project Admins. For information about setting permissions, visit our article on document access management.

Below are the required permissions for accessing search term reports:

Receive: You can receive search term reports shared by others. On an search term report that is shared with you, the sharer can give you:
- View: you cannot view but not edit the report.
- Edit: you can change the searchable set and update searches in the report.
- Share and delete: you can change the searchable set and update searches in the report, as well as share and delete the report itself. You can access shared search term reports from the appropriate card(s) on the homepage, or from the attached card(s) in the message center.
Create: You can receive and create search term reports
Admin: You have full permissions on all search term reports in the project

Search term report term definitions

Searchable set: The searchable set defines the set of documents that you are running your searches across. If left undefined, the searchable set is simply the entire set of documents in the project.
Table of searches: The table of searches lists the individual searches that you’re running within a single search term report. The set of documents that you are running these searches across is defined by the searchable set.
Documents with hits: This is the number of documents that are returned by a given search. These documents could also be returned by any one of the other searches in the search term report.
Documents exclusive to search: This is the number of documents that are returned by a given search, and only that search.
Documents with hits (including attachment family members): This is the number of documents that are returned by the given search, plus the number of attachment family members those documents have. Please note that if a document is a family member of multiple documents that contain a hit, that document will be counted here once.
Daily auto-refresh: Turning on daily auto-refresh will re-run the search term report each day at approximately midnight PST. This will allow you to keep your results up to date when using the Search Term Report search term. Please note that the daily auto-refresh setting is toggled off by default for new search term reports.

Create a new search term report

To create a search term report:

Go to Document Analytics > Search Term Reports

This opens the Search Term Reports page.
Select + New report.
Select the report name field at the top of the page (Name your search term report). Then enter a name for the report.
[Optional] Define the report’s searchable set.
To do this:
1. Select Edit in the searchable set box.
2. Define your searchable set as you would a search. The available search terms are a bit more limited than the search page, but the general mechanics of building a search are the same.
  
  Note
  
  Permissions on the terms that you use to define your searchable set can impact the documents that others can access from your STR. For example, if you define your searchable set using a binder that another user doesn't have access to, they won't be able to access the hits from the STR.
3. When ready, select Save.
  
  Note
  
  By default, document deduplication is turned off, so leaving the searchable set unspecified allows Everlaw to look across all the documents in your project, including duplicates. To limit your searchable set to all the unique documents, edit the searchable set, and check the Hide all project duplicates box underneath the query builder. Similarly, you can limit your searchable set to the deduplicated set of documents matching your searchable set criteria by selecting Search settings and choosing Deduplicate within search hits.
  
  A document count of your searchable set is displayed. The bar in the middle displays the percentage of total documents in your project, along with their attachments, that are part of your searchable. The number on the right displays the total number of documents in your project.

Add search terms to the Search term document hits table. There are a few ways to do this:
- If you want to only perform a content search: Enter the term(s) directly into the Search term input box. This method is restricted to a content search. However, you can use all the advanced content search types and functionality that you can on the main search page. If dtSearch® syntax is detected in your search, a dropdown will prompt you to click on the dropdown to translate your search into Everlaw-supported syntax.
- If you want to build your search with metadata, content, and logical operator search terms: Select Query Builder and build your search using the options provided.
- If you want to bulk import search terms:
  1. Select Import multiple search terms.
    This opens the Import multiple searches dialog.
  2. Here you can manually type or paste in your terms, one search term per line. You can also upload them via a CSV or TXT file. The following steps will walk you through this process.
    
    Note
    
    There is a 100,000 term limit for imported files.
    
    To import a file:
    1. Create your CSV or TXT file (or export one from an existing project's search term report that you would like to use). The format requires two columns ("Search" and "Eql"). An example (pictured below) is attached to this article:
    2. Select Upload file.
    3. Select Select file.
    4. You are prompted to select a file from your computer. Select the file, and it will appear by name in the dialog.
  3. Once you’ve added your search terms, select Add search terms.

Depending on how many searches you add at a time, and the complexity of those searches, it can take anywhere from a couple seconds to a couple minutes for your search term report to update. You can perform other tasks on Everlaw while waiting for your report to update.

As you add terms, the results of your search term report update.

Too many potential hits

If you receive a "too many potential hits" error for a wildcard search, you can adjust the syntax to limit the potential hits to just letters.This eliminates potential hits that include numbers or other indexed characters that are likely coming from computer-generated, non human-readable text (that are therefore unlikely to be valuable for your search).

To limit your wildcard search to just letters: notif* becomes /notif[a-z]*/

You can read more details and examples in our Advanced Content Searching article.

Understand your search term report results

After adding a search to a search term report, the table at the bottom of the interface and the graph at the top of the interface adjust to reflect information about your updated search term report.

The Search term document hits table

Here is a description of each column:

Search lists all of the searches that are being run against your searchable set in a given search term report.
Documents with hits displays the number of documents within the searchable set that are returned by a particular search. This hit count could also include documents that include the other hits in the table. For example, in the image above 67 documents contain the word "enron." Since "documents exclusive to search" is only 49 we know that there are documents that include the term "enron" and at least one other term in the table. Specifically we know that 18 documents (the difference between 67 and 49) contain at least one other term besides "enron."
Documents exclusive to search displays the number of documents in the searchable set that are returned by a particular search, and only that search, within the search term report. In the screenshot above, the search "energy" returns 24 documents in our searchable set, but only 4 of those documents are returned by only that search, and by no other searches in the search term report. These 4 documents do not contain the words "meeting," "enron," "saturday", or "appoint*". On the other hand, the search "appoint*" has 0 hits exclusive to that search.
In thinking about these two columns together, the difference between Documents with hits and Documents exclusive to search is the number of documents that contain at least one of the other search terms in your report.
Documents with hits (including attachment family members) displays the count of all emails and their attachments that have been returned by the searches in your search term report. For example, if an email with three attachments hits on one of your search terms, the number displayed in this column will be four (the email, plus three attachments). If you normally review documents and their family members together, including the attachment family members will give you a better sense of the total number of documents needing review.

Search the hits table

To sort the hits table, select any of the headers: Search, Documents with hits, Documents exclusive to search, or Documents with hits (including attachment family members). You can sort by ascending or descending order.

Delete a search

To delete a search, select the appropriate delete button in the far right column. The row associated with the search will be grayed out, and the numbers on the table will adjust to reflect the deletion of the search. You can undo a deletion by clicking on the undo button that replaces the trashcan icon in the far right column.

delete str term.png re-add term.png

Select any of the numbers in the table to open a results table with those documents. This is the easiest way to access results from your search term report.

Search term report graph

A visualization of the total number of results relative to the total number of documents in the searchable set is in the upper left of the search term report page.

The blue number in the center of the circle labeled All results represents all results of the search term report
The maroon segment of the circle labeled Documents with hits refers to the documents returned by the searches in the search term report
The orange segment labeled Family members refers to family members of the documents with hits.

Click any of these numbers to open the results in a search using the Search Term Report search term.

Refresh a report

The box on the top left shows you when the search term report was last updated. Here is some additional information about refreshing search term reports.

Your search term report automatically refreshes three seconds after a new term is added
You can manually refresh the report by selecting Refresh now
The daily auto-refresh toggle allows you to automatically refresh the search term report each day at approximately midnight PST
The displayed refresh time reflects the time zone in which your browser is located

Copy a report

Copying a search term report results in a new report that is a carbon copy of the original. This is a good option if you want to make adjustments to a search term report, but retain the original report and result.

Required permissions: To copy a report, you must be the creator, have Project Admin permission, or have the STR shared with you with Full Access.

To copy a report:

Open the original report
Select Copy from the report toolbar.

This opens the Copy search term report dialog.
In the Name for search term report copy field, enter a name for the new report.
Select Copy.
The dialog closes and you are redirected to the new report.

Copy a report from an Early Case Assessment project to a review project

STRs that are useful in an Early Case Assessment (ECA) project can also be useful in a review project. Within an ECA database, you can copy a report from the ECA project to a review project.

Required permissions

ECA project: Must be in the Admin user group, or have had the STR shared with you with Full Access.
Review project: Have either Create or Admin permission on STRs (or be a Project Admin)

To do so:

In the ECA project, access any STR you have the proper permissions for.
Select Copy > Copy to another project.

This opens a dialog to copy the STR.
Choose the project to copy the STR to: In the Projects in this database field, select the destination project.
Give your copied STR a name in the Name for search term report copy field.
When you're done, select Copy. This adds the copied STR to the selected project. The copying action is preserved in Live and Historic User Activity in the review project.

Here are a few additional notes about copying STRs from an ECA project to a review project:

Not all searchable set criteria copy: Some criteria within STRs can be specific to the project they are in (e.g. a searchable set defined by a binder that does not exist in the review project). When this happens, you are warned: "Some criteria in this report are specific to the current project and will not be copied. You can add or update them in the destination project after copying."
STRs copied into review projects are private to the user who copied them: Regardless of access in the ECA project, STRs copied into a review project start off as private to the user who copied it (though it will be visible to all Project Admins, as is normal for all STRs). That user can share the STR with any user or user group with the proper permissions.

Export a report

To download a report, select Download from the report toolbar. Then select a file type:

CSV: Downloads a CSV file reflecting the information in the table
PDF: Downloads the entire search term report

Export all reports on the project

If you are closing down a project and want to export all the STRs at once, you can do so from the STR page.

Required permissions: Users with Receive or Create permissions on STRs can export all the STRs that they created or have Edit permission for.

Project Admins can export all the STRs in the project.

To export all STRs at once:

Select the three-dot menu at the top of the page, then select Export all STRs.
This opens a dialog to optionally change the name the export.
The default export name is "Project name_STRs." To edit the name, select the text in the input field and enter new text.
When you're happy with the name, select Export to start the export.
When the export is complete, you can download the STRs from the card in the Batches & Exports column of your homepage.

The exported format is one CSV per STR, contained within a zipped outer folder.

Update the homepage folders that the STR is in

Select the Add or remove from folders button.

This opens a list of folders that you have Edit or Full access permission on.
Select the checkbox for the folder(s) to add the report to.
Deselect the checkbox for any folders that you want to remove the report from.
When you're done, select Save. This adds the STR to the selected folder(s) and removes it from any that you deselected.

Learn more about homepage folders in our Homepage Views and Folders article.

Create persistent highlights from persistent hits

Required permissions: Project Admin

Project Admins can export search term report terms to persistent highlights. This results in a new persistent highlights category, assigned the report name, with all searches that include only content terms included as highlights. Any non-content searches are excluded (i.e. searches with metadata terms or with the use of logical operator NOT).

To create persistent highlights from your search term's persistent hits:

Open the report.
Select Persistent Hits from the report toolbar.
This opens the Export search terms to persistent highlights confirmation dialog.
Select Submit.
The New terms imported dialog lists the number of terms that were added as persistent highlights, the number of search terms skipped, and if relevant, whether no new highlights that will be transferred
Select Ok.

Share a report

Required permission:

Be the creator of the report
Have the report already shared with you with Full Access
Have Admin access on Search Term Reports

By default, only the creator and those with Admin permission for Search Term Reports can see an STR. To share a search term report with other users on a project:

Open the report.
Select the Share button.

This opens the Share search term report dialog.
In the To field, type to add recipients and select them from the dropdown menu.

Note

Only groups and users with Receive Search Term Reports permissions are shown in the To dropdown. If you select All users, or an Organization, only users with Receive Search Term Reports permissions will receive the message.
In the Permission field, choose a permission level:
- View: Recipients can only see the search term report
- Edit: Recipients can also make changes to the search term report (ex. modify the searchable set, add/remove searches)
- Share and Delete: Recipients can share and delete the search term report itself, as well as remove user permissions on the search term report for any user except themselves and the owner.
[Optional] To add a Subject line, select the edit button next to the suggested subject line. Enter text, then hit escape on your keyboard.
[Optional] Enter a personalized message in the text box.
Select Share.

Delete a report

Important

Deleted search term reports cannot be recovered.

To delete a search term report:

Open the report.
Select Delete from the report toolbar.
This opens the Delete search term report confirmation dialog.
If you are certain you want to delete the report, select Delete.

A deeper look into interpreting the search term report

Here are a couple examples to further illustrate how to interpret your search term table:

Documents exclusive to search: The search "'price fixing'~15" returns 381 documents with hits in our searchable set. This means that 381 documents in the searchable set had the words "price" and "fixing" within 15 words of each other. However, there were zero "Documents exclusive to search" returned by that search. This means that, of the 381 documents that fit the "'price fixing'~15" search criteria, all of them fit the criteria of at least one of the other searches (i.e. "energy", "price*", "california AND (energy OR commission)"). In other words, none of the documents returned by the "'price fixing'~15" search were only returned by that search. Put another way, the "'price fixing'~15" search returned no unique documents relative to the other searches in the search term report.
The difference between the Documents with hits and Documents exclusive to search: the number of documents that include at least one of the other search terms in your report. For example, the difference between the number of "documents with hits" and "documents exclusive to search" for the "energy" search is 8,206 documents (i.e. 14,049 hits - 5,843 exclusive documents = 8,206). This means that 8,206 of the documents that satisfy the "energy" search criteria also satisfy at least one of the other search criteria in the search term report.

Tips for creating search term reports on large projects

If you create STRs on projects with large document sets, here are a couple of tips to help you find the documents you are looking for:

Narrow down your wildcard searches so that they are not so broad that they end up returning documents that you don’t need. For example, if you are using the wildcard search "net*" to look for all instances of network or networks. This search will return any word that begins with net and is therefore too broad. In this case, you should create a wildcard search for network* to narrow down your search.
Look out for common words in your searches. If you are using a wildcard search that will return common words (like “in*” or “no*") narrow down your search by specifying which variations of the word you are looking for instead of using the wildcard search. For example, avoid using the search “check in*” because in* could be searching for thousands of word variations. Instead, simply list all the variants you are looking for, separated by an OR: “check in” OR “check ins” OR “check inning” OR “check innings”
The two most common reasons that search terms fail are because of syntax errors or overly broad searches. A useful troubleshooting step is to copy and paste the erroring term into a separate, regular contents search on the Project Search page. Run the term as its own search will to identify the specific part of the term that is causing the error, be it a syntax issue or an overly broad piece.
If you recently initiated an upload, wait until the upload is complete to run search term reports. Additionally, if your team is planning to upload more data that may be in the searchable set of a search term report, its results may change and terms that previously worked may now error.
The searchable set defines the set of documents that you are running your searches across. If the searchable set is left undefined, your search term report will search across all documents in your project. Utilize searchable sets on the search term report preview page to narrow down the number of documents you are searching across. For example, update your searchable set from all documents to a particular custodian or date range.