Feb 19 2008
Where did the term boolean originate?
Internet savvy people know that a boolean search allows users to widen or narrow their internet search by combining or excluding words by including terms such as “AND”, “NOT” and “OR” in their search criteria. What many may not know is how the search method got such a funny sounding name. George Boole was a 19th century mathematician in England. He developed what he called “Boolean Logic.” Boolean Logic allowed him to combine certain concepts and exclude others while searching databases. Today, those wishing to perform a Boolean search can use either the word or the mathematical equivalent. For example, you can type “AND” or “+”. With the millions of web pages on the Internet, Boolean searches are often the easiest way to find the information you need quickly, without having to wade through hundreds of pages.
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this tells me nothing
Hi Simone,
Just to clarify “boolean” originated in the 19th century by George Boole, who created “Boolean Logic.” Basically, in regards to the internet, Boolean Logic is used by search items to group them together or exclude items from groups. So if you are looking for horses but you don’t want any searches pulled up on other farm animals, i.e. cows, the search engines would look for Horses NOT Cows. If you want to find a listing about means of travel, a search engine may use the word OR to highlight cars or trains. If you are looking about the relationship between two things such as “How many search engines use Boolean Logic,” the search would look for search engines AND “boolean logic.”
Hopefully, I haven’t confused the topic even more but a great site that really breaks down Boolean Logic into an understandable definition is this one, http://www.internettutorials.net/boolean.html. I hope that this helps in clarifying the answer to the question.
Sirena