Rant: search is no longer my friend!
03-16-2009, 01:47 PM
#1
Race Car
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Rant: search is no longer my friend!
Is it just me, or is the search function just not useful anymore? I've noticed that ever since IB started running the place, I can't seem to find useful threads based on the search function. Signal-to-noise ratio is just too low -- the search result give you pretty much every single thread.... 
03-16-2009, 05:33 PM
#5
Burning Brakes
Naive string matching isn't terribly useful for finding meaningful results. Since the current state of the search module does not appear to support multitoken strings, or any sort of prioritization by token proximity, you're not going to get very much.
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03-16-2009, 07:23 PM
#9
Burning Brakes
Well, at a guess, they might have changed some configuration settings on their search db.
They're using closed-source off the shelf bulletin board software, so there's not a lot they can do to change things. But the majority of the work in search is done in feeding data into a digital search trie (prefix tree), so how that's being updated can make a lot of difference in how, or if, search works.
They're using closed-source off the shelf bulletin board software, so there's not a lot they can do to change things. But the majority of the work in search is done in feeding data into a digital search trie (prefix tree), so how that's being updated can make a lot of difference in how, or if, search works.
03-16-2009, 10:23 PM
#10
RL Community Team
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
The trick is to put all of your search terms in quotes, and it will pretty much work like it did before. So if you wanted to search for if fuchs will fit an '87, you'd put
fuchs offset early late fit
Now you should type
"fuchs offset early late fit"
fuchs offset early late fit
Now you should type
"fuchs offset early late fit"
03-16-2009, 10:34 PM
#11
Nordschleife Master
OR search by specific forum to look in, I have been doing it that way for a few weeks, and have had little issue...
03-17-2009, 10:00 AM
#13
Lazer Beam Shooter
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
I dunno I call bs. I tried looking for threads on seat bolts, and it was returning threads with just the word "bolt" in it. So I had about every single recent thread on the front search results page.
03-17-2009, 05:21 PM
#15
RL Community Team
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Yeah, IB definitely BUSTED the search function. But if you use the "" trick or apparently the + trick, it works like before. Otherwise, like Rock said, you get hits for each individual word.