Bunny in a Hat Magic Database Help Bunny in a Hat

Find Trick Tutorial

The search facility of The Magic Database allows complex searches of the tricks in your database, by any of the criteria you have entered. You may search for tricks using AND logic; or OR logic. You may also use NOT logic to select all those items that don't match a specific criteria.

Using OR logic means: find the tricks that match ANY of the criteria you search on. For instance find all the tricks that are associated with Simon Aronson OR Simon Lovell.

Using AND logic means: find the tricks that match ALL of the criteria you search on. For instance find all the tricks that are associated with Simon Aronson AND use a memorized deck.

Using NOT logic means: find the tricks that DO NOT match the criteria you search on. For instance, if you search on "Cards" in the Prop tab, and check the NOT box, this will return all the tricks that do NOT have cards associated with them. You should be aware that NOT searches can take longer than normal searches, as all the records in the database must be searched individually. On a database of 3000 tricks, you might expect a NOT search to take from 15 to 30 seconds.

Database searches are done only for the criteria in the tab selected when the search is started. If you enter an authors name, a keyword, and a prop, the search will find only those items matching the criteria on the active tab. If however you enter more than one criteria on a single tab, such as Elmsley Count and Jordan Count on the Sleight tab, the search will be done with OR logic (tricks done with either Elmsley Counts OR Jordan Counts will be included in the answer table.)

Procedure

Before starting ANY searches, you should first be sure that there is no data in the answer table. Press the Clear Ans. Tab. Button to remove data from previous searches from the answer table.

Enter the first criteria in the appropriate tab, and then click on the Search Database button. All the records that meet these first criteria will be displayed in the answer table. Now, if you wish to search on another criteria using AND logic, enter the criteria, and the click on the Search Ans. Tab. Button. The tricks that meet BOTH of these criteria will now be displayed in the answer table.

If you wish to use OR logic, enter the second criterion, and click on the Search Database button again. The information in the answer table will now have those tricks that meet the first criteria OR the second criteria.

Examples

In order to best follow these examples, it would be best to backup your database, and then restore the "tutorial.bk" file that is included with The Magic Database.

AND logic: Example 1

To find the tricks that use coins AND make use of a switch do the following. . .Click on the Prop tab, scroll down to the coins prop, and double click on it to add it to the right hand side of the search list. Now press the Search Database button.

Now click on the Sleight tab, scroll to the switch sleight, and add it to the right-hand search criteria. Now click on the Search Ans. Tab. Button. The records meeting both criteria will be displayed.

AND logic: Example 2

To find the tricks that use Elmsley counts AND use Double Lifts do the following. . .Click on the Prop tab, scroll down to the Elmsley count, and move it to the right hand criteria window. Click on the Search Database button.

Now move the Elmsley count item out of the right hand window by double clicking on it, which will move it back to the left hand list of sleights window. Now scroll down to the Double Lift/turnover sleight, and add it to the right hand criteria window. Click on the Search Ans. Tab. button. The records shown in the answer table will be those tricks that use both the Elmsley count AND the double lifts.

AND logic: Example 3

To find the tricks that use a stacked deck AND do NOT use any sleights, do the following. . .Click on the prop tab, and add the item stacked deck to the right hand criteria window. Click on the Search Database button.

Now click on the sleight tab. Click on the first sleight in the window, then scroll down to the bottom of the window, hold the shift key and click on the last item in the sleight window to select all of the sleights. Now move all of them to the right hand window by clicking on the Add button.

Click on the NOT checkbox; then click on the Search Ans. Tab. Button. The records shown in the answer table will be those that use a stacked deck, AND do not have any sleights.

OR logic: Example 1

To find the tricks that were in books, or created by Ed Marlo OR Richard Kaufman, do the following. . .Click on the Author/Magician tab, click on the down arrow key to view the drop down list of authors, scroll to Marlo, Ed, and click on the Search Database button. Now, type the letters Ka into the criteria box, and press the <down arrow> key until you see the Name Kaufman, Richard. Now press the Search Database button once more. You'll now see all the tricks from either Ed Marlo OR Richard Kaufman.

OR logic: Example 2

To find the tricks that use a pass OR a half-pass, do the following: Click on the Sleight tab, scroll down to the Half-pass, and click on it once to select it. Now scroll down to the Pass, hold down the <CTRL> key, and double-click on it. This will move both items into the criteria area. Now click on the Search Database button. All the tricks that use either a pass OR a Half-Pass will be displayed in the answer table.

Combination logic - Example 1

Sometimes you might want to do a query that has ANDs and ORs in it. Examples might be find all the tricks that were written or created by Larry Becker OR Ted Lesley AND involve a prediction.

You can look at this logically in two ways:

  1. (Keyword = Prediction) AND ((Author = Becker) OR (Author = Lesley))
  2. ((Keyword = Prediction) AND (Author = Becker)) OR ((Keyword = Prediction) AND (author = Lesley))

As you see, this can get pretty messy!!!

Since you only can do queries one at a time, you must know how to order them to achieve the desired result. All you have to know is that to make these queries come out properly, you must get all possible records that meet your criteria into the answer table via the Search Database button, and then narrow the results via the Search Ans. Tab. Button. This is the same as saying you must do ALL of your OR operations first; and then the AND operation(s).

Looking at the two different logical expressions of our desired query, we see the first logical expression allows us to do the OR operation before the AND. You can do a database search to bring in all the tricks associated with Larry Becker by entering his name, and clicking on the Search Database button. You can now enter Ted Lesley's name, and click on the Search Database button once again (doing an OR operation.) Now we have all the tricks in the answer table created by Becker or Lesley. Finally you can do the AND operation by going to the keyword tab; moving the Prediction keyword into the right hand criteria box; and clicking on the Search Ans. Tab. button.

Combination logic - Example 2

It would seem that some queries would require you to do AND expressions before ORs, and not be doable, but in the most common type of situation that might occur, there is still an easy way to do the query.

If you wanted to find all the tricks that had the keyword Location OR the keyword Revelation, AND used either a Faro shuffle OR a stacked deck, the logical expression would look like this:

(keyword = Revelation OR keyword = Location) AND (Sleight = Faro Shuffle OR Prop = Stacked Deck).

Since we must do the OR operations first; we start by going to the Prop tab, selecting Stacked Deck and clicking on the Search Database button. Now we go to the Sleight tab, select the Faro Shuffle and click on the Search Database button again. This places the tricks in the database that match the (Sleight = Faro Shuffle OR Prop = Stacked Deck) part of the expression. Since the (keyword = Revelation OR keyword = Location) part of the expression involves a singe tab (Keyword), we can do an OR operation and simultaneously do the AND operation as follows: Go to the Keyword tab and move BOTH keywords (Location and Revelation) into the criteria window. Now click on the Search Ans. Tab. button. This will search the answer table for those keywords that match EITHER Location OR Revelation and simultaneously doing an AND with the contents of the answer table.

Problem Queries - and solutions

There are some queries that will not be able to be directly accommodated by this program, but we expect that such problems will arise very infrequently. Queries of this nature will look like:

(criterion 1 OR criterion 2) AND (criterion 3 OR criterion 4); where the OR logic cannot be accommodated within a single tab. In this case you'll be forced to do two separate queries, as follows:
Search the database for tricks that match criterion 1, and now do another database search for criterion 2. Finally do an answer table search for criterion 3. The tricks now in the answer table will be some of those that you are looking for. Now click on the Restore Ans. Tab. button, and then do an answer table search on criterion 4. This will let you see the rest of the tricks you are looking for.

What this means is that if you wish to find all the tricks by Simon Lovell OR Simon Aronson, AND use coins OR involve a transposition, you'll have to do the following:

  1. Make sure the Answer Table is empty.
  2. Click the "Person" tab, and enter the name Aronson
  3. Click the "Search Database" button
  4. Enter the name Lovell
  5. Click the "Search Database" button again.
  6. Click on the "Prop" tab, and move "Coins" to the right hand list box. (See: Moving Items to an Attribute List.)
  7. Click on the "Search Ans. Tab." button. This will show you all the tricks by either person that use coins.
  8. Click on the "Restore Ans. Tab." button. This will return the Answer Table with ALL the Lovell and Aronson tricks
  9. Click on the "Keyword" tab, and move "Transposition" to the right hand list box.
  10. Click on the "Search Ans. Tab." button. This will show you all the tricks by either person that involve a transposition.

Obviously, all the tricks you are looking for have been found, even though they are not all in the Answer Table at the same time.