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Search window |
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The search window is where you start search runs and work with the results. You open a new search window with File > New Search In its minimized form, the search window consists only of an entry field for the query, a pop-up menu for selecting the search sets to be used, a Start/Stop button, and an Append button. In maximized form, it is divided into four tabs: Digest, Results, Log, and Settings. You can switch between minimized and maximized form by clicking the green window gadget. Also, you can choose whether you want to open new search windows as either minimized or maximized in the preferences, "General" tab. To start a search run, select the correct search set from the magnifier pop-up menu in the entry field, enter your query and click the Start button. DEVONagent Pro then queries all search engines and scans all webpages defined by the search set. As soon as the search run has finished (or you have clicked the Stop button), DEVONagent Pro expands the search window, if necessary, and presents the results in either the Digest or the Results tab, depending on your preferences. If you have already performed a search run, you can also use the Append button instead of Start to append the search results to the previously collected ones instead of replacing them.
Magnifying glass pop-up menu The magnifying glass pop-up menu User-defined plugins are listed in bold.
Plugins: In addition, this pop-up menu gives you direct access to every installed plugin. This way, you don't have to define a search set just for querying a special search engine once. You can simply pick the one you want to use, enter the query and hit the Start button. Tool tips give you more information about each plugin. Recent searches: The magnifying glass pop-up remembers the last 25 search terms (when private browsing is not enabled). You recall the terms simply by selecting them from the Recent Searches part of the menu. Remember to select the correct search set or plugin. Clearing the recent serarches empties the system-wide find pasteboard too. Recently used: Finally, find here the most recently used plugins or search sets for quick access. Status bar The status bar below the search field shows information about the number and size of the downloaded files, found results and objects, as well as unread results. Digest tab DEVONagent Pro's search window is divided into three views, each presenting different aspects of the information that has been collected in a search run. You switch between the views by clicking the tabs separating the search field from the rest of the window. The digest differs from what traditional search engines and applications display. This is what makes DEVONagent Pro unique. Instead of simply listing the URLs of found pages, the digest shows a list of topic words and two- and three-word expressions that DEVONagent Pro has extracted from the collected data. This list not only includes the entered search words, but also many other words that the artifical intelligence core of DEVONagent Pro found to be important and related to the query. You can sort this list by topic or relevance by clicking the column headers. The number of sentences with occurences is shown for each topic word.
Topics map: In the right-hand side pane, DEVONagent Pro shows short paragraphs from every found webpage until you select one or more topic words. DEVONagent Pro shows an AI-generated visual representation of the selected topic and its relations to other topics in a mind-map style. Two-and three-word word expressions do not show a topics map; for multiple selected topic words DEVONagent Pro always picks the top one. The selected topic becomes a big blob in the center of the map with related topics arranged around it. The larger a blob, and the more orange or red it is, the more important it is. Topics that are related to the selected word but are not part of the topics list on the left, are shown in blue. Light grey lines indicate closer relationships between topics. Move the mouse over the topic blobs to highlight the connetions to other topics in the graph; click a blob to select it. Double-click a topic in the map to make it the center of the graph. DEVONagent Pro will recalculate the map accordingly. This is similar to selecting another topic word from the list on the left. Use the arrow buttons in the bottom bar of the topics map area to navigate back and forth through the results in the digest. Summary: Finally, below the topics map, DEVONagent Pro shows a summary of the extracted information, sorted by relevance. At the end of each extract, you'll find a link to the original source where DEVONagent Pro extracted the data from (click the link with ⌘ held to open it on a new tab instead of in a new window). The summary delivers the actual answer to your query, effectively eliminating the need to go through a long list of links or visit hundreds of webpages manually. The summary dynamically changes with whatever topic word or words you select in either the left-hand side pane or the topics map. This way, you can use the topics map to navigate through the found information and refocus the summary to whatever you are interested in. You can also click words in the summary with ⌥ held to refocus the topics map on the clicked word.
Results Tab List or Cover Flow: The Pages tab is similar to what most search engines deliver: a list of all found URLs including the name of the webpage and a two lines excerpt from where the search terms are found on the page. Sort the list by all the criteria that you can find in the Sort menu. You can also drag results to DEVONthink to quickly archive them in your database.
You can browse the results also with Cover Flow. Double-click a page in Cover Flow to open it in a new web browser window; hold the ⌘ key to open the new window in the background. All pages that you haven't checked yet show a dot in front of them, similar to unread messages in Apple Mail. You can also select results and drag them to other applications, such as an open TextEdit window, DEVONthink, or the Finder, or delete pages from the list that you have found to be unrelated to your research. A badge shows the number of found scanner objects. Preview area: In the lower pane of the Pages tab, DEVONagent Pro displays either a text preview of the relevant text passages for pages selected in the list above, or all objects found by the automatically applied scanners. Switch between the text preview and the objects returned by the scanners using the navigation bar above the preview. In addition, you switch between small and large icons, download all or selected objects, and access the action menu from the navigation bar. Log tab The Log tab lists all pages that DEVONagent Pro has skipped. DEVONagent Pro skipped them because they:
You can find a complete list of all codes used in the log in the appendix. Effectively, the log lists all pages you did not have to look at yourself because DEVONagent Pro did that job for you.
You can sort the list by date, address, or error message by clicking the respective column headers. Click them again to reverse the sorting order. Use copy-and-paste or drag-and-drop to move or copy URLs to the Downloads panel, to a search set, to DEVONthink, or other applications, e.g., Safari. Settings tab The Settings tab contains some of the options from the General and Advanced of search sets and TEMPORARILY overrides these settings.
The Settings tabs offers the following options: Use the Settings tab to temporarily enable or disable options, e.g., to switch on a scanner without permanently messing up the search set. Toolbar The toolbar of DEVONagent Pro's main windows carries many commands for manipulating the way it displays information and for manipulating selected items. Many of these are simply shortcuts for menu bar commands. Here's a short list of the available tools:
Shortcuts & modifier keys Like any Mac application, DEVONagent Pro uses modifier keys or shortcuts to access frequently used functions or modify a standard behavior.
Context menu The context menu, which appears when you click something with the right mouse button or when you click while holding the ⌃ Control key down, offers a range of commands tailored to what you can do with the clicked object. Most of the commands offered by the context menu have counterparts in a main menu, so you'll recognize them immediately. However, to save menu bar real estate, DEVONagent Pro gives you access to some options only via the context menu.
In text areas, e.g., the text preview on the "Pages" tab, DEVONagent Pro also offers the standard context menu commands for text views:
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