# forum search improvements



## mkellogg

Hi everybody,

I have just changed the forums over to a new search engine.  This new one should be _much _faster than the old search. 

Please let me know if you notice any problems.

Mike


----------



## nichec

Wow, I just tried and it's really very fast! 

Thanks for the efforts


----------



## dn88

I can feel the difference too, very well done.


----------



## Víctor Pérez

Impressing!

Just a small problem: once I'm at the page with the searched posts, I can't go back to the previous page by using the button "back" (top left green arrow).


----------



## Jana337

I can. Could you please try again? Didn't you open one of the found threads in another tab and close the one with results?

Just so we are sure we talk about the same thing: You found some threads/posts, clicked on one of them and then wanted to return to the page with search results, right?


----------



## cuchuflete

Tested this:

1: Entered search string-
"can't go back to the previous page by using the button"
2. Saw page stating that Search was under way.
3. Saw results page with this thread.
4. Clicked on Thread title, came to this thread.
5. Hit the Back button to return to, in sequence,
--Search results page
--Searching message
--Advanced search data entry page

Everything seems to work properly. Firefox2.0.6, Mac Os X (2.8)


----------



## Víctor Pérez

Jana337 said:


> I can. Could you please try again? Didn't you open one of the found threads in another tab and close the one with results?


 
I did it, Jana.



> Just so we are sure we talk about the same thing: You found some threads/posts, clicked on one of them and then wanted to return to the page with search results, right?


 
No problem with this. 
The problem comes when I want to return to the previous page I was before the search: I get stuck (after seing again the page stating that search is under way) to the results page.


----------



## Víctor Pérez

cuchuflete said:


> Tested this:
> 
> 1: Entered search string-
> "can't go back to the previous page by using the button"
> 2. Saw page stating that Search was under way.
> 3. Saw results page with this thread.
> 4. Clicked on Thread title, came to this thread.
> 5. Hit the Back button to return to, in sequence,
> --Search results page
> --Searching message
> --Advanced search data entry page
> 
> Everything seems to work properly. Firefox2.0.6, Mac Os X (2.8)


 

Now it works: I'd to double click on the back button! (Windows XP Professional)

Thanks Jana and Cuchuflete.


----------



## losher

Ah, I wondered if something had changed.

I regularly used to use the search function to look for postings that were 
"older than yesterday and had no replies" to find postings that
seemed to have stumped everybody.

That no longer seems possible with the new search page, or did I miss something?

Cheers,

Losher


----------



## Jana337

You are right, it is no longer there. However, it was unnecessary to use the search function here in the first place. 

Here's a way to do it more easily: In the forum of your addiction, scroll down just under the list of threads. In Display Options, select threads ordered by number of replies, ascending order, not older than two days. Here's a direct link.

The burden that sorting imposes on the forum server is much lower this way. And one more benefit: The link will always give you the up-to-date list of threads, so you can bookmark it and do not have to repeat the above mentioned sorting procedure every day.


----------



## losher

Jana337: it works as you describe, thanks!

Losher


----------



## mkellogg

Yes losher, there were a few options that we had to remove to get it to work with the new search index.  Hopefully they will return in a few months.


----------



## jonquiliser

Hmm, a little doubt: I was just searching for a thread I vaguely recalled (in Sólo Español). The result was no entries with those criteria. I tried again, now including a forum where I know for certain that the phrase appears (and entering that subforum I can open it so I know positively it's there!). Result _still_ comes up as "no result"! I basically only entered info in the word field (a phrase in parenteses, all words less than four letters), and chose to search through the entire threads. Then selected the forums I wanted, and pressed the search button. What do I do wrong? Or is the search function not functioning?


----------



## mkellogg

No results?  If you give me an example, I can investigate it.   Note that right now, the index is only updated once every ten minutes, so the post with the text must be at least 10 minutes old.


----------



## jonquiliser

mkellogg said:


> No results?  If you give me an example, I can investigate it.   Note that right now, the index is only updated once every ten minutes, so the post with the text must be at least 10 minutes old.



Yup. I searched for "yo que tú" and "yo de ti". Then I tried "yo que tu" as well, as the phrase appeared misspellt a number of times. I wanted to search through Sólo Español so first did a search only there. Then I added Esp-Eng vocab, Esp-Eng Grammar and Pt-Esp. Still no matches - and at least in the grammar forum and Pt Esp there are threads on the subject, recent but way older than 10 mins. 

I basically tried the phrases in parenteses and chose to search entire posts. And then tried "titles only" just in case (one thread is titled "yo que tu"), but search still fruitless... 

Thanks


----------



## mkellogg

jonquiliser said:


> Yup. I searched for "yo que tú" and "yo de ti". Then I tried "yo que tu" as well, as the phrase appeared misspellt a number of times. I wanted to search through Sólo Español so first did a search only there. Then I added Esp-Eng vocab, Esp-Eng Grammar and Pt-Esp. Still no matches - and at least in the grammar forum and Pt Esp there are threads on the subject, recent but way older than 10 mins.
> 
> I basically tried the phrases in parenteses and chose to search entire posts. And then tried "titles only" just in case (one thread is titled "yo que tu"), but search still fruitless...
> 
> Thanks


I'll investigate this.  Thanks.


----------



## jonquiliser

'Nother one: isn't it possible anymore to do searches with AND or OR etc? (I tried searching the OL forum with the OR option -> Finnish OR Estonian, it worked before -some months back- but now it doesn't turn up any results)?


----------



## mkellogg

AND is automatic
OR uses the "pipe"  dog | cat
NOT uses the minus sign  dog -cat
http://www.sphinxsearch.com/doc.html#extended-syntax


----------



## jana.bo99

After I was in wrong Forum: Solo Espagnol, I was told here what to search for and I have found it very quickly.

You only have to know, what exactly you want to find and then is no problem to find it.

Thank you all,
jana.bo99


----------



## jonquiliser

mkellogg said:


> AND is automatic
> OR uses the "pipe"  dog | cat
> NOT uses the minus sign  dog -cat
> http://www.sphinxsearch.com/doc.html#extended-syntax




Splendid! Thank you very much


----------

