Simple 'OR' Search Using 'Find' Dialog

[MJA]

Hi -- I'm having an exceedingly difficult time doing something that should be mind-numbingly easy. I want to use Word 2013's Find dialog box to do a simple 'OR' search. I'm used to using the '|' symbol to do these searches in Google or in other programs, i.e.: 'pheasant|rabbit' should return any instance of either 'pheasant' OR 'rabbit'.

I found a Microsoft page that seemed to show this would work (as long as the 'Wildcards' option was checked) but it does not work.

I'm sure the problem must be with me. It's a common technique and I can't believe Word doesn't have the capability after all these years. Can anyone tell me how to do such a search using the Find dialog?

Thanks.

[macropod]

That's not how Find/Replace works in Word - or any other Office program produced by Microsoft or its competitors that I'm aware of. What you're describing is not wildcards; it's simply a series of alternate expressions. Besides which, you won't find a Microsoft page that suggests you can use | as a wildcard Find separator...

[MJA]

Hi Paul, thanks for replying. I did see this information somewhere on a Microsoft page, but I'm not sure where anymore. It could be I was reading something for VBA and confused it with Word 'Find'. My impression was that regex could be used in find and replace but only if the 'Wildcards' box was checked. '|' is certainly a standard part of regex, but I think what I've learned in reading around since I made this post is that Word's regex capabilities are pretty inferior, so it's likely this just hasn't been included in the functionality. It would certainly be useful, but I don't have any illusions I'm going to motivate a corporation with Microsoft's corner on word processing to add functionality to my liking Thanks again.

[macropod]

Regex and a Word Find/Replace (even a wildcard one) are quite different. Each has its strengths and weaknesses. For example, Regex can only be used programmatically (e.g. via VBA) and can't take formatting arguments, whereas a Find/Replace (wildcard or otherwise) doesn't require programming (though it can be used with it) and can take formatting arguments. While there is some overlap in syntax between a Word wildcard Find/Replace and Regex, there's a lot that doesn't overlap - including the Regex | separator.