**[ [[cqp:introduction|Collection: Introduction to CQP]] ]**

**[ Introduction to CQP: [[cqp:corpus-structure|Section 1]] -- [[cqp:simple-queries|Section 2]] -- [[cqp:advanced-querying|Section 3]] -- [[cqp:beyond-queries|Section 4]] -- [[cqp:expert-tricks|Section 5]] -- [[cqp:exercises|Section 6]] ]**====== 3a. Extending simple queries: Alternative attributes and values ======

//This section introduces an extension to simple queries in CQP: the possibility to search for more than one thing, It presupposes that you have read [[cqp:corpus-structure|Section 1]] and [[cqp:simple-queries|Section 2]].//

===== Alternative values =====

Often, we want to search for more than one type of expression. For example, we might be interested in differences between the words //love// and //friendship// and so we would want our query to return both words. In such cases, we can use parentheses and the pipe symbol ''|'' to specify alternatives (see [[cqp:special-characters|Typing special characters]] to find out how to type this symbol); ''(x|y)''. For example:

	[hw="(love|friendship)"]

Enter this query at the prompt and hit the ''RETURN'' key. You will see that the concordance now contains all word forms belonging to the lemmas //love// and //friendship//. We can include as many alternatives as we want in a query in this way, Try, for example:

	[hw="(love|friendship|indifference|irritation|hate)"]

Of course, we can also include alternatives in queries using other attributes, such as ''word'' or ''pos''. The following query finds all instances of the word forms //lovers// and //friends//:

	[word="(lovers|fiends)"%c]

And the following query finds all words tagged either ''NN1'' (for “singular noun”) or ''NN2'' (for “plural noun”):

	[pos="(NN1|NN2)"]

===== Alternative attributes =====

We can use a very similar notation to query two alternative attribute-value pairs in a single query. For example, you may want to study the conjunctions //and//, //but//, //or// and //because//; the first three are coordinating conjunctions, tagged ''CJC'' in the BNC. The last one is a subordinating conjunction, tagged ''CJS'' in the BNC. The following query will find all words tagged ''CJC'' and the lemma //because//:

	[pos="CJC" | hw="because"]

===== Summary and outlook =====

This section has shown you how to create concordances containing more than one type of expression. Building on this, you can look at the following sections in any order:

  * [[cqp:extending-queries-alternatives|Section 3b]]: Extending simple queries: Combinations of attributes and values
  * [[cqp:complex-queries|Section 3c]]: Complex Queries
  * [[cqp:metadata|Section 3d]]: Metadata
  * [[cqp:regular-expressions-basics|Section 3e]]: Regular expressions (basics)
  * [[cqp:concordances|Section 3f]]: Working with concordances
  * [[cqp:sorting-sampling|Section 3g]]: Sorting and sampling

**[ Introduction to CQP: [[cqp:corpus-structure|Section 1]] -- [[cqp:simple-queries|Section 2]] -- [[cqp:advanced-querying|Section 3]] -- [[cqp:beyond-queries|Section 4]] -- [[cqp:expert-tricks|Section 5]] -- [[cqp:exercises|Section 6]] ]**