Definition of "search"
search
noun
countable and uncountable, plural searches
The act of searching in general.
Quotations
Where we once sent love letters in a sealed envelope, or stuck photographs of our children in a family album, now such private material is despatched to servers and clouds operated by people we don't know and will never meet. Perhaps we assume that our name, address and search preferences will be viewed by some unseen pair of corporate eyes, probably not human, and don't mind that much.
2013 June 14, Jonathan Freedland, “Obama's once hip brand is now tainted”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 1, page 18
verb
third-person singular simple present searches, present participle searching, simple past and past participle searched
(intransitive, followed by "for") To look thoroughly.
Quotations
He tried to persuade Cicely to stay away from the ball-room for a fourth dance. […] But she said she must go back, and when they joined the crowd again […] she found her mother standing up before the seat on which she had sat all the evening searching anxiously for her with her eyes, and her father by her side.
1909, Archibald Marshall [pseudonym; Arthur Hammond Marshall], chapter I, in The Squire’s Daughter, New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead and Company, published 1919
Investors face a quandary. Cash offers a return of virtually zero in many developed countries; government-bond yields may have risen in recent weeks but they are still unattractive. Equities have suffered two big bear markets since 2000 and are wobbling again. It is hardly surprising that pension funds, insurers and endowments are searching for new sources of return.
2013 July 6, “The rise of smart beta”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8843, page 68
(transitive, obsolete) To probe or examine (a wound).
Quotations
Now torne we to the xj kynges that retorned vnto a cyte that hyghte Sorhaute / the whiche cyte was within kynge Vryens / and ther they refresshed hem as wel as they myght / and made leches serche theyr woundys and sorowed gretely for the dethe of her peple(please add an English translation of this quotation)
1485, Sir Thomas Malory, “xvj”, in Le Morte Darthur, book I
Now to the bottome dost thou search my wound.
c. 1588–1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act II, scene iii]