1. A system for searching a microelectronic device physical layout, the system comprising: a physical layout definition having plural physical layout names defined by one or more associated physical layout layers, each physical layout layer represented by a string having at least one letter; a name conversion module operable to convert the physical layout names of the physical layout definition from the string representation to a numerical representation; and a search engine operable to find a selected physical layout name by comparing a numerical representation of the selected physical layout name with the converted physical layout names of the physical layout definition.