Finding words within a word

Word Finder Tools / Dictionary Search Tools Operating On The
Litscape Default Word List (221,719 Words)

You can use this search to suggest words containing only the letters in your Scrabble® rack. All words in our word list (over 221,719) that contain some or all of the letters will be displayed.

Find words containing only, really only …

If you want all the letters to be used the same number of times that is specified in the requested set of letters, with no other letters present, then try our anagram search.

Find words containing only, but any number of times …

If you want to find words made from some or all of the letters, but have these words use only these letters in any amounts, then use the find words made from search.

So I have a database of words between 3 and 20 characters long. I want to code something in PHP that finds all of the smaller words that are contained within a larger word. For example, in the word «inward» there are the words «rain», «win», «rid», etc.

At first I thought about adding a field to the Words tables (Words3 through Words20, denoting the number of letters in the words), something like «LetterCount»… for example, «rally» would be represented as 10000000000200000100000010: 1 instances of the letter A, 0 instances of the letter B, … 2 instances of the letter L, etc. Then, go through all the words in each table (or one table if the target length of found words was specified) and compare the LetterCount of each word to the LetterCount of the source word («inward» in the example above).

But then I started thinking that that would place too much of a load on the MySQL database as well as the PHP script, calling each and every word’s LetterCount, comparing each and every digit to that of the source word, etc.

Is there an easier, perhaps more intuitive way of doing this? I’m open to using stored procedures if it will help with overhead in any way. Just some suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

When using wildcards to search for text between two specific markers, MS Word will find those markers and that text no matter how far apart they are.

If you want to restrict the search to finding that text/markers within a word or a paragraph, you need to be a bit clever about how you search, and think in the negative.

Find within a word

In my case, I wanted to find any place where I had used two carat characters (^) in the same unbroken string of characters, and prepend the first of those characters with a backslash. Turns out the replacement was not so easy either.

FWIW – this was the context I in which I was searching. I’ve highlighted the ^ characters for you.

fabric 1101,1201-2202 show lldp neighbors | egrep "Node|-|apic|^Spine|^Leaf"

Spoiler: the result looked like this – which will find text within any word that has two carat characters (^)

So let’s unpack this. The find pattern above is

([!^ ]@^^)([!^ ]@^^)

Firstly, I’ll remove the parentheses – they come into play for the replacement part.  That leaves us with

[!^ ]@^^[!^ ]@^^

The [! ] sequence says NOT a space character.  The @ symbol says “Any number of … non-space characters

Because the carat character is considered a special character in word search and replace, ^^ is actually searching for a single ^ character

So the whole sequence reads:

Find… any number of non-space characters followed by a ^ followed by any number of non-space characters followed by a ^

That’s the “find” part sorted. But why the parentheses?

The thing is, I want to insert a backslash before the first ^ character, so I have to group by search with () – the first group being all the characters up to, but not including the ^ character. ([! ]@) and the second group being the rest. (^^[! ]@^^)

Which gives us the find pattern as shown above. ([! ]@)(^^[! ]@^^)

The next problem is the replacement part.  For that I use the special MS Word tags 1 and 2 which correspond to the first and second search groups respectively.  But that causes another problem – I actually want to USE a backslash character in my replacement string – and of course it too is a special character. So you’d think, using the logic that if ^^ finds a single ^, then ^ (or even ) would do in the replacement section to insert a backslash.

But also no. Instead, you need to flash back to when you memorised the set of ASCII characters and remember that the character is character number 92

So now I can specify that my replacement string is

1^922

Nerd tip: If you want to find repeating patterns in MS Word, you can use the 1 construction in the search for box to, so searching for ( the)1 would find all occurrences of the word sequence ” the the”

OK. So that will work fine so long as my two carat characters don’t have any spaces between them.  But what about if my source text was a little less concise, with spaces between the target carat characters like:

fabric 1101,1201-2202 show lldp neighbors | egrep "Node|-|apic|^Spine| ^Leaf"

Find within a paragraph

The logic is exactly the same, except this time I need to search for “anything that is NOT a paragraph marker.

MS Word uses the special combination of ^p to mean “paragraph marker” – but it is NOT available when using wildcards!  Instead, I have to go back to that wonderful ASCII set and remember that a CR (carriage return) character is number 13.

So now I can search for “any number of non-CR characters followed by a ^ followed by any number of non-CR characters followed by a ^” using the following sequence.

[!^13]@^^[!^13]@^^

RedNectar

You don’t need to read why I was doing this.

I’m in the process of converting some documents to asccidoc.

In asciidoc, the ^ characters are used to delimit superscript, so my original line of

fabric 1101,1201-2202 show lldp neighbors | egrep "Node|-|apic|^Spine|^Leaf"

is rendered in asciidoc format as

fabric 1101,1201-2202 show lldp neighbors | egrep "Node|-|apic|Spine|Leaf"

I needed to “escape” the leading ^ character for it to render correctly.

I this site a great help when figuring this out https://wordmvp.com/FAQs/General/UsingWildcards.htm

RN

Enter Letters and word bank below to use the word search solver

Stuck on a word search? Have you spent what feels like hours hunting for that one missing word to solve your puzzle? You’re in the right place: welcome to our Word Search Solver! Whether you need help solving a school assignment or just want to finish your puzzle before you lose your sanity, you can use our tool to quickly and easily find the missing words you’re looking for.

How To Use the Word Search Solver

1. Create your board: In the ‘Create Board’ box, type all the letters that appear on your board in the order they appear. Don’t forget to hit return between lines to ensure correct formatting. The board preview will automatically update as you type, so you can check to make sure the board is accurate as you go.
2. Enter words to find: If you’re looking for particular words in your search, you can enter them into the ‘Find these words’ box. When searching for multiple words, make sure to separate them using commas. Spaces aren’t necessary between words.
3. Set searching parameters: Our tool allows you to search only for specific words or to search for any word found in the dictionary. If you don’t have specific words you want to search for, set the parameter to ‘Dictionary only.’ Even if you are looking for specific words, it can be fun to see all the words that appear in your search, whether intentionally included or not!

Tips for Solving Word Searches

This section describes some tips on how to improve at word search puzzles.

Scan each row for key letters.

Although this is not the quickest way to solve a puzzle, it is likely the most thorough when you are stuck. Instead of randomly searching the board, start at the top left corner of the board and, row-by-row, scan for key letters or letter combinations. For instance, if one of the words you are searching for is ‘puzzle’, scan the board for the letter ‘P’ or ‘Z’. This methodical approach can help ensure you don’t miss anything hiding in plain sight!

Look for the longest words first.

If your board includes long words, try searching for those first. They’re often easy to find, because they take up a significant amount of space on the board — and they can help you narrow down available search areas for other, shorter words.

Make sure you know your board’s rules.

Depending on the word search, there might be different rules about how words can appear on the board. For instance, some word searches might allow for words to be placed diagonally and backwards across the board, while others may not. Make sure you know your board’s rules, so you’re not missing out on different ways the word could appear.

Look for key two-letter combinations.

Sometimes, if a word contains a lot of common letters, that word can be harder to find on the board. To narrow down your search, try to find a unique two-letter combination within the word that you can search for. These combinations will be less likely to appear randomly on your board, and can significantly narrow down your search time. For instance, if you’re searching for the word ‘Aubergine,’ you might look for the ‘AU’ letter combination instead of only searching for ‘A’s.

Scan the board backwards, or turn it upside down.

If you find yourself stumped, a good way to change your perspective is to scan the board backwards or upside down. For instance, starting at the bottom right corner and looking for key letters might help you find something you missed when scanning from left to right. Similarly, physically turning the board upside down might help you notice patterns on the board that you previously missed.

Use your finger or a pen to keep your place.

It can be easy to lose yourself in all those letters. When you’re scanning the board, keep your place with your finger or a pointing device in order to ensure you don’t inadvertently skip any lines or letters.

Where to Find Word Searches of All Difficulty Levels

The Word Finder has our own word search puzzles to browse and play. Whether you’re a teacher looking for a way to entertain their students, or a hobbyist who just likes to keep their mind sharp, we have word searches for all different ages, topics, and difficulty levels. For many of our puzzles, you can even customize the difficulty level for different players. For instance, you can generate an ‘easy’ Taylor Swift word search for one child, and a ‘hard’ Taylor Swift word search for another, so they can work on the similar tasks customized to their abilities. If you’re looking for more of a challenge, we also have a unique ‘brutal’ setting for our word searches, which creates puzzles even the most skilled searcher would struggle to solve. We also have a tool that will allow you to make your own custom word search puzzle. These can be great for gifts, parties, or even the classroom. Word search puzzles have been around for a long time, and it’s fun to be able to create your own!

Feedback for Word Search Solver

What do you think about our Word Search Solver? Was this tool useful for you, or are there features you’d like to add? We’d love to hear from you! Reach out using the ‘Contact Us’ page linked below to share your suggestions. Also be sure to check out our new wordle solver for the popular new word game!