How to search and eliminate several similar words?

[Eric]

I'm putting this conversation between Brandon and me here in the forums so I can find it in the future.

Note that according to White's Dictionary of the King James Language, Volume One (p. 122), "'Donkey' is a modern name for the ass, first used in A.D. 1785.")

Eric:

Hi, Brandon,

I'm trying to search the KJV for all forms of the word "ass" in the sense of donkey.

I tried this, but it seems it only eliminated the first of the items after the exclamation point.

*ass* ! assyri* ! asshur* ! asswag* ! assign* ! assemb* ! assur* ! assay ! Assos

I thought maybe only one exclamation point was needed and the items to skip go one after another, but that doesn't seem to work, either.

I realize another option is to use the English-Strong's Indexer, but that is more time-consuming.

Is there a way to do what I want?

Brandon:

This will do it:

ass* ! (assyri* | asshur* | asswag* | assign* | assemb* | assur* | assay | Assos)


I'm not really sure why the method you tried didn't work, I would have to really dig into that. But using the parens around the OR operator for all of the forms you don't want, and putting the logical not in front of the parens, should get you what you are looking for.

-Brandon