Problem searching on a word - Glitch?

[ericjdaniels]

I don't understand something happening on a search I am doing, so any help would be great.

I am searching in the WTM and doing a lemma search on the Hebrew word used in Gen. 3:7 for leaf - 5th from the end of the verse. (rt. click, select lemma search)

When I do this it comes up with many hits, but they overlap with the Hebrew verb used to express ascension - as seen in Gen. 2:6, 13:1, etc.

Now this wouldn't be that big of a problem if that particular verb was fairly rare, but there are 1195 hits in 1027 verses. Weeding through that doesn't make much sense.

So, can anyone tell me if this is a glitch that needs to be fixed, or an inability for BW6 to recognize different vowel pointings in different words?

Thanks for the help.

Eric

[Ben Spackman]

When you run the search that way, BW is indeed looking for the lemma.

However, it doesn't specify a part of speech, so you're also picking up all foms of noun and verbfrom 'lh.

WTM morphology doesn't distinguish between the lemma or root.

If you turn on Vowel point sensitive searching and copy/paste the following to the command line, you get what you're looking for.

Åhl,['@nÁ

[ericjdaniels]

Thanks for the help by the way. But I have one more question for you.

Why would this option be turned off by default. I guess what I mean is, what is the downside to searching using vowel sensitivity?

Thanks for the help.

Blessings,

Eric

[Philip Brown]

I think that option is off by default because of the way in which BW developed historically: first the consonants were available, then vowels, then accents.

I wouldn't interpret defaults as 'preferred' settings, just base settings.

One of the very first things I tell my Hebrew students about WTM searches is that you have to have vowel-point sensitive searching turned ON.

On the other hand, if you wanted to do a search that included nominal and verbal cognates, you would want the vowelpoints off.

All depends on what you're looking for.