So what you can see?

On the left, you will see a number of what we call paragraph and document “cards”, each of which corresponds to a different document or its subsequent paragraph within the database.

On the right, you will see a number of preliminary filters such as:

• entity type (paragraph or document),
• document type, and
• body.

On the top left, you will find the search bar, with a pop up explanation with key tips and tricks in the “search tips”.

You will also note than under the search bar, users have the opportunity to sort their results, according any of the individual properties of documents and paragraphs.

When you first enter the database, a number of preliminary filters will appear on the right-hand side. When you select the first filter of “paragraph”, you will note than the following additional filters then appear:

• Legal status
• Body
• Document type
• Means of adoption
• Topic(s)*
• Person(s) affected*
• Year
• Paragraph type

For each filter you wish to apply, you simply click on the box on the right side of your desired filter. For example, if you want to see all paragraph from documents produced by the Human Rights Council:

1. Navigate to the “body” filter list
2. Scroll down to find “Human Rights Council” or type it into the search bar at the top of the list
3. Select the box next to your desired producing body

All filter lists can have multiple items selected.

*For topics and persons affected lists: In addition to being able to select multiple items from these lists, they have an addition function of the “and/or” button. This button allows for you to indicate whether you want results which correspond to all of your selected criteria from these two list, or any of them.

For example, if you select women and girls, on the persons affected list:

• With the button on “or”: you will see results which either have the tag of women OR girls
• With the button on “and”: you will see results which mention both women AND girls

This also applies to the topics list.

How can filters also give you aggregate data?

Next to each filter option, you will see a number. This number corresponds to the total number of results which fit into that filter. For example, when you enter the database, next to the filter of paragraphs, you will see a number that is approximately 293’000, indicating the total number of results corresponding to this filter.

As you move through your search and continue to apply filters, the numbers will continue to reduce as the intersecting properties are taken into account.

Once you have selected the desired filters and/or indicated the relevant search terms into the search bar, you may want to change how you view your results. Under the search bar, you will should see “Sorted by” next to a drop-down list. Click on the small downwards arrow in the drop-down in order to select your new filtering property. You can filter by:

• Title
• Date added
• Date modified
• Body
• Legal status
• Document type
• Means of adoption
• Year
• Document code
• Paragraph

To search through an individual document’s text, first find a document you are interested in. Once you have found a document relevant to your search, click on the “View” button at the bottom of the document card to enter the full document view.

At this point, you should see a column on the right hand side of the screen, listing the key information of the document. At the top of the column you will also notice a number of icons going left to right, as listed below:

• Search text (magnifying glass)
• Table of contents (capital A)
• References (flow chart)
• Information (lowercase i)
• Connections (backwards and forwards arrows)

To search through the text of an individual document, click on the magnifying glass at the top of the column. A search bar will appear, which has the same functionalities as the search bar in the main database area. Once you enter a keyword or phrase, a list of matching results will be shown on screen. You can click on any of these results to be brought to its location in the document. You will notice that the search term is now highlighted in yellow in the document so you can easily identify it.

Perhaps you have decided to conduct your search according to paragraphs rather than documents. Sometimes, you may find yourself interested in seeing the full document once you have identified a relevant paragraph of text to your search. As such, you will want to navigate between paragraphs to their parent document.

Once you find a paragraph which is relevant to you, click on the “view” button in the bottom right-hand corner of the paragraph card. This will bring you to the full screen view of your paragraph. On the right-hand side you will see a column with two icons at the top:

• Information (lowercase i)
• Connections (backwards and forwards arrows)

Click on the connections. This will now show you the relationship between a paragraph and its parent document. You will see a line connecting the paragraph you are currently reviewing to a document – to see the full document, simply click on View.

To return to your original result, simply click the back button on your browser.

If at any point in your research you wish to export your results in an excel document, simply turn your eyes to the bottom right hand side of your screen. You will notice a button labelled “export CSV”. This will download your current results into an excel file, with all of the corresponding data related to each result, including:

• Title
• Document code
• Body
• Paragraph text
• Etc.

Please note that if you export a csv of your results which feature documents, rather than only paragraphs, properties such as relationships between paragraphs and documents will not appear, nor will the text from the actual document.