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Improving the search engine

Robert-Y

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We (the moderators) would like to improve on the search engine so we are asking that you provide us with examples of failed search cases in this format in order to help us:

1. What are you trying to find exactly
2. How did you approach this search (What keywords are you trying/What search criteria are you using)

Thanks!
 

TimMc

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To be honest, I use query terms like "blah site:speedsolving.com" in Google's search engine.

Forum search engines used to suck about five years ago so I don't bother with them. Then again, if it's a private forum and Google can't index anything then I'll use it...

Tim.
 

Bryan Chia

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It would be great to have a search engine on every thread, otherwise if you are trying to find a specific word form a particular thread, you have to search all thread on the forum and the loading takes so damn long (sometimes i dont even bother to wait)
 

MaeLSTRoM

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It would be great to have a search engine on every thread, otherwise if you are trying to find a specific word form a particular thread, you have to search all thread on the forum and the loading takes so damn long (sometimes i dont even bother to wait)

You mean like the search thread button at the top of the page.....
 

qqwref

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Honestly, the search-for-text part is pretty much completely useless for most things. I only use the search for stuff like finding posts/threads by a specific person, and that's pretty rare, so I certainly couldn't give an example of how it's failed me within recent memory. Is there any way to integrate Google search into this site?
 

kinch2002

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I search for 2 things:

1. I use the 'Google powered' search bar to search for Thread titles. These usually come up with lots of useless duplicate results. E.g. First result could be "UK Cubers - Page 21" and then it's "UK Cubers - Page 37" then "UK Cubers - Page 5". It seems so random with the pages as well, but I guess that's because it's searching inside the threads.

2. Posts by a certain person in a thread, because I'm trying to find a specific post. This works ok I guess, with the auto-infilling of usernames.

I don't use anything else ever.
 

Artic

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Is there an efficient way to search within a users posts? For example, I remembered having asked a question several months ago. So I clicked on my name and then on "Find latest posts" But there was no way for me to search through my own posts to find the one I was looking for. I had to manually cycle and read every single one of my posts until I found the entry I was looking for :p

Did I miss something? If not, that type of functionality would be great.
 

TDM

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Is there an efficient way to search within a users posts? For example, I remembered having asked a question several months ago. So I clicked on my name and then on "Find latest posts" But there was no way for me to search through my own posts to find the one I was looking for. I had to manually cycle and read every single one of my posts until I found the entry I was looking for :p

Did I miss something? If not, that type of functionality would be great.
You can click 'Advanced Search' below the search bar and look for a user name.
 

Sa967St

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As Daniel mentioned, it sometimes says the page number of a thead in the result, and the result links to that page in the thread. The page number is correct only if you have your settings at "10 posts per page", which is changeable in your settings (I set mine to "40 posts per page" years ago). It would be nice if the result linked to the specific post rather than the page.
 
Last edited:

mark49152

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Desktop site search has always worked OK for me, but the mobile and Tapatalk searches are useless because the results link to thread not post. Pretty useless if what you're looking for is in the OAQT.
 

Parity Case

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I tried searching for [FreeFOP] and ended up with almost all of the 10 pages of hits directing at people's signatures, where they just say they do FreeFOP (main return was 'Trying FreeFOP for a while").

Search would be more efficient/useable if it didn't include signatures by default. -Perhaps there could be a check box in a person wants to include signatures in their search.
 

obelisk477

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I tried searching for [FreeFOP] and ended up with almost all of the 10 pages of hits directing at people's signatures, where they just say they do FreeFOP (main return was 'Trying FreeFOP for a while").

Search would be more efficient/useable if it didn't include signatures by default. -Perhaps there could be a check box in a person wants to include signatures in their search.

this. I hate getting sigs as search results
 

Jlvs2run

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It would be great to have a search engine on every thread, otherwise if you are trying to find a specific word form a particular thread, you have to search all thread on the forum and the loading takes so damn long (sometimes i dont even bother to wait)
You mean like the search thread button at the top of the page.....

This is hard to find, buried inside search, and appears to not be working.
I clicked search > typed niklas in the search box > checked search this thread only;
The same 272 results show up whether searching the thread, the forum, or the entire site.
Am I doing something wrong, or is there some other way to search through an individual thread?
 

pjk

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This is hard to find, buried inside search, and appears to not be working.
I clicked search > typed niklas in the search box > checked search this thread only;
The same 272 results show up whether searching the thread, the forum, or the entire site.
Am I doing something wrong, or is there some other way to search through an individual thread?
Sorry about the delay in getting back to you. Once you search, you need to click on the Site Results tab:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ao3fant6nu68q5e/Screenshot 2016-08-01 21.37.41.png?dl=0

Does that solve your issue?
 

pjk

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Bumping this. A couple quick questions for the community in general:
1) How often do you use the search?
2) Does it return useful results for you?

Looking to make some improvements.
 
U

Underwatercuber

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Bumping this. A couple quick questions for the community in general:
1) How often do you use the search?
2) Does it return useful results for you?

Looking to make some improvements.
2 year bump lol

I use search whenever I have questions which can vary to multiple times a day or just once or twice a week. It usually returns useful results :)
 
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