Tag hits missing from concordance results

[Tom]

Dear Mike,

My name is Tom and I’m an applied linguistics postgrad student using Wordsmith Tools 5.0 on Windows XP as this is all I have access to currently.

The issue relates to concordance results for a corpus I am analysing. The corpus contain 915 tags yet the concordance search results on the ‘plot' tab show the total hits as 110.

The tags take the following example forms: <m-motion>, <m-living being>, etc

These tags identify metaphors in the text.

Where these co-occur they are marked together in the text, for example <m-motion><m-force>

The search term I have been using to identify all tags are: <m-*> and <*>

I wanted to try using a tag file instead, but this option is greyed out in my version.

I have attached a screenshot showing the results, for reference.

Do you know why this issue is occurring? Would using a newer version of WordSmith Tools resolve the issue?

Thank you very much indeed for your time,

Best regards,

Tom

[Mike Scott]

Tom, hi

1. I don't know why WS5 has the tag file option greyed out. You should be able to create and save a tag file and then select and load it.

2. Usually tags are right next to the word they apply to (as are yours), preferably to the left (not the right).

3. I think you want to search on tags (as you are doing), not on any other search word. Something like <m-*>, that should work.

4. You pointed me usefully to another query from a user needing WS7, so I guess that answers point 1. I cannot fix any version below 9 now.

5. XP is unsafe re hacking etc, best not to use it. If you have to, WS8 might work. WS9 (the current 64bit version won't I think as there are functions that call on resources in Windows 7 or better.) I will email you a one month licence for WS8 for you to try. You can try that on your XP computer, or else install on a memory stick and take it to a friend's more up to date PC....

Cheers 

[Mike Scott]

Correction to 3. Your tags come immediately after a word so you need *<m-*> as search word. If you move them to the left (use Text Converter) you would need to put an asterisk at the end instead of the beginning.

Cheers

[Tom]

 Hi Mike,

 

That is remarkably helpful of you - thank you.

 

Yes, your prescription was correct. My error was the search term and tag placement.

 

Again, thank you,

 

Tom