Improve the search feature, please
the_x5
the Xzianthian Join Date: 2004-03-02 Member: 27041Members, Constellation
the Xzianthian Join Date: 2004-03-02 Member: 27041Members, Constellation
Currently this is the xhtml syntax for the search field you can at the top right hand corner of the page when viewing these forums:
<div class='codetop'>CODE</div><div class='codemain' style='height:200px;white-space:pre;overflow:auto'><form action='http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?act=Search&CODE=simpleresults&mode=simple' method='post'>
<input type='text' name='keywords' id='mod_searchbox_word'/>
<button type='submit'>Search</button><input type='hidden' name='forums[]' value='all'/>
</form></div>
For those that are not literate with the script here, know it will only search in the simple mode (one key string, no inclusive or exclusive) and only search for matching characters forming words from that string <i>in posts/replies</i>. Valid "word" matches to the user-entered string get a &hl="word" suffix added on so that it highlights the word nicely for you. This is how it's worked for IPB (the commerical forum javascript product we are using here) for many versions now. (pretty much from the advent of IPB)
What does that mean?
You <i>can't</i> search by topic.
You <i>can't</i> search by username.
You <i>can't </i> search by cross referencing (i.e. posts by username string "Comprox" in at topic with "Cheese" in the title with the string "I like cheese" somwhere in the reply).
You <i>can't</i> search by exclusion (i.e. find posts with the keyword "ironsights" but not the username "the_x5")
Basically search is not very useful. This isn't a big deal in most of the forum, but in the Ideas & Suggestions it has always been a pain and half the reason why people keep reposting stuff. (since it is ranked by how recent the last reply is in descending order and most people don't know how to do advanced 3rd party searches, change their view date cut-off setting to "show all", or browse past the first page)
At least you can access "view all posts" and "view all topics" when viewing somebody's profile on this site, but since it's not easily accessible either it's no wonder so few people are aware of it.
These are simple fixes (provided one had access to edit and upload new files to the IIS server of course) which would benefit everybody here and give a bit more weight to saying "please use search"
A temporary solution for the time being would be to simple add a second search field next to the current one (somewhere in the "toolbarwrap" div) with this
<div class='codetop'>CODE</div><div class='codemain' style='height:200px;white-space:pre;overflow:auto'><form action='http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?act=Search&CODE=simpleresults&mode=simple' method='topic'>
<input type='text' name='keywords' id='mod_searchbox_word'/>
<button type='submit'>Search</button>
<input type='hidden' name='forums[]' value='all'/>
</form></div>
and then provide two versions of <img src="http://www.unknownworlds.com/templates/ns2/images/search_hover.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />, one with "by topic" one with "by post". Heck , make it a pop-down if you want it to be a bit more complex and look nicer; but please improve this feature for the love of bbqkittens!
Or if you prefer the ultra-short summary:
We would all benefit from an improved search feature.
Thank you.
<img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />
<div class='codetop'>CODE</div><div class='codemain' style='height:200px;white-space:pre;overflow:auto'><form action='http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?act=Search&CODE=simpleresults&mode=simple' method='post'>
<input type='text' name='keywords' id='mod_searchbox_word'/>
<button type='submit'>Search</button><input type='hidden' name='forums[]' value='all'/>
</form></div>
For those that are not literate with the script here, know it will only search in the simple mode (one key string, no inclusive or exclusive) and only search for matching characters forming words from that string <i>in posts/replies</i>. Valid "word" matches to the user-entered string get a &hl="word" suffix added on so that it highlights the word nicely for you. This is how it's worked for IPB (the commerical forum javascript product we are using here) for many versions now. (pretty much from the advent of IPB)
What does that mean?
You <i>can't</i> search by topic.
You <i>can't</i> search by username.
You <i>can't </i> search by cross referencing (i.e. posts by username string "Comprox" in at topic with "Cheese" in the title with the string "I like cheese" somwhere in the reply).
You <i>can't</i> search by exclusion (i.e. find posts with the keyword "ironsights" but not the username "the_x5")
Basically search is not very useful. This isn't a big deal in most of the forum, but in the Ideas & Suggestions it has always been a pain and half the reason why people keep reposting stuff. (since it is ranked by how recent the last reply is in descending order and most people don't know how to do advanced 3rd party searches, change their view date cut-off setting to "show all", or browse past the first page)
At least you can access "view all posts" and "view all topics" when viewing somebody's profile on this site, but since it's not easily accessible either it's no wonder so few people are aware of it.
These are simple fixes (provided one had access to edit and upload new files to the IIS server of course) which would benefit everybody here and give a bit more weight to saying "please use search"
A temporary solution for the time being would be to simple add a second search field next to the current one (somewhere in the "toolbarwrap" div) with this
<div class='codetop'>CODE</div><div class='codemain' style='height:200px;white-space:pre;overflow:auto'><form action='http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/forums/index.php?act=Search&CODE=simpleresults&mode=simple' method='topic'>
<input type='text' name='keywords' id='mod_searchbox_word'/>
<button type='submit'>Search</button>
<input type='hidden' name='forums[]' value='all'/>
</form></div>
and then provide two versions of <img src="http://www.unknownworlds.com/templates/ns2/images/search_hover.gif" border="0" class="linked-image" />, one with "by topic" one with "by post". Heck , make it a pop-down if you want it to be a bit more complex and look nicer; but please improve this feature for the love of bbqkittens!
Or if you prefer the ultra-short summary:
We would all benefit from an improved search feature.
Thank you.
<img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />
Comments
It's odd that you can't search for <=4 characters but you can easily search with 0 characters...
...Want me to fix it?
In short, this whole thread (and any others like it) is pretty much assured to go nowhere unless there is a policy change. (If I had to guess it has to do with resulting paranoia from when the site got hacked -- yet more ways we've let the hack successfully terrorize our community...) To be honest, I left to wonder why this particular subforum exists then. Is it just to log for future reference? Is it just a "bottomless complaint box"? Seriously though, can anybody tell me why this forum was created? What's its meaningful purpose here, really?
Actually at the bottom of the forums, the "forum jump" lets you get there. Just select "Search" and then "more options" on the search page.
<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?s=&act=Search&mode=adv&f=0" target="_blank">Advanced search</a> that locallyunscene already mentioned is as good as it gets for the latest release of IPB. What's inconceivable is that the link to it's been removed from the header. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wow.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":0" border="0" alt="wow.gif" />