Please ignore the whitespace you see between title parenthesis.
Below query returns 94 records: (Expectation: titles containing word pregnancy) - PASSED
title:(pregnancy)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
Below query returns 3 records: (Expectation: titles containing word pregnant) - PASSED
title:(pregnant)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
Below query returns 97 records: (Expectation: titles containing words that start with preg) - PASSED
title:(preg*)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
Below query returns 3 records: (Expectation: titles containing words that start with preg and end with nt) - PASSED
title:(preg*nt)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
Below query returns 3 records: (Expectation: titles containing words that start with preg and end with t) - PASSED
title:(preg*t)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
Below query returns 0 records: (Expectation: titles containing words that start with preg and end with cy) - FAILED - Excepted at least 94 records
title:(preg*cy)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
Below query returns 0 records: (Expectation: words that start with preg and end with y) - FAILED - Excepted at least 94 records
title:(preg*y)&$count=true&queryType=full&searchMode=any&$skip=0&$top=12
I read these two articles: Lucene query syntax in Azure Search and How full text search works in Azure Search
I am almost ready to believe the * in above queries acts like a prefix operator, meaning, finding the words that start with "preg", instead acting like a wildcard search indicator.
Does anyone have any suggestions as to how to rewrite my queries to include titles that "start with certain" characters, and "end with certain" characters in the search results? Can I not use wildcard character * for this purpose?
Please do not get hung up on the term "pregnancy", I have used other words for searches as well, like "potato", "tomato", "exercise", "cancer", etc.
