Search or contents: which to use on exam day

What search is good at

Search is excellent for named things. A named equation, a named coefficient, a named diagram, a named standard. If the thing you want has a proper noun attached to it, type the proper noun and you will land on it.

It is also good for symbols and abbreviations that are distinctive enough not to appear everywhere. A three-letter abbreviation that only occurs in one section will take you straight there.

What search is bad at

Search is poor for concepts. If you want the general relationship between two quantities and you do not know what the handbook calls it, you will guess a phrase, get nothing, guess another, get thirty hits, and lose half a minute.

It is also poor for tables. You often want a specific table but you do not know its caption, and searching the quantity you want to read off it returns every page that mentions the quantity.

The decision rule

Ask yourself one question: do I know what this is called? If yes, search the name. If no, go to the section and use your knowledge of the section's internal layout.

That second half is the part that needs practice, and it is the part search cannot rescue. It is why knowing that a section runs geotechnical, structural, water, transportation, surveying is worth more on exam day than knowing that section starts on any particular page.

Practise both

Every drill item on this site suggests the search terms that would find it, so you can practise the search route and the navigation route on the same prompt and see which one is faster for you on that kind of question. Over a few rounds a pattern emerges, and the pattern is personal.