Search doesn't actually search where it's supposed to

[Nirkon]

This is more of a suggestion,

but the search on the main page (or even this page, on the top right corner of the website),
only searches the forums, and not the actual Techspot articles, I was going to search for an old article, but it only came up with the forum's results.

Just a suggestion, because I think this is critical, theoretically it would takes hours instead of a few seconds or minutes (in the worst case), to go through the archives to find something you need (that is.. IF, you find it anyway).

Nirkon

 

[raybay]

I find that searches are easy and full featured. You can search for posts based on username, word(s) in the post or just in the subject, by date, and only in particular forums.
To access the search feature, click on the "search" link at the top of most pages.
You can search any forum that you have permission to search - you will not be allowed to search through private forums unless the administrator has given you the necessary security rights to do so.
you can search by keywords, posts, threads, user name, forums, FAQ's, and can save your search preferences.
I find that pretty good searching, as I have been able to find everything of interest for which I was search. It isn't Gurgle, but it isn't bad.

 

[Nirkon]

Please read my post.

 

[Rick]

Hey Nirkon.

I agree with you that the search is a bit sketchy. It searches the entire site, but the majority of the content is on the forum itself, so naturally you'd get a LOT of hits from the forum. A custom-fitted search rather than the one-google-search-fits-all approach would be nice.

Here's what I do. When I use the search feature on the main page - lets say I'm looking for 'boot failure' - I would type in: "boot failure" -vb

The google-driven search only shows results that don't contain vb, which is every single thread on the forum. You can narrow it down further by including terms like +reviews (to find mostly reviews) or +tweaks (to find mostly tweaks). Feel free to get creative with google syntax and get the results you want.

It doesn't address the issue, but it is a work around in the meantime.

 

[Nirkon]

Hey Nirkon.

I agree with you that the search is a bit sketchy. It searches the entire site, but the majority of the content is on the forum itself, so naturally you'd get a LOT of hits from the forum. A custom-fitted search rather than the one-google-search-fits-all approach would be nice.

Here's what I do. When I use the search feature on the main page - lets say I'm looking for 'boot failure' - I would type in: "boot failure" -vb

The google-driven search only shows results that don't contain vb, which is every single thread on the forum. You can narrow it down further by including terms like +reviews (to find mostly reviews) or +tweaks (to find mostly tweaks). Feel free to get creative with google syntax and get the results you want.

It doesn't address the issue, but it is a work around in the meantime.

thats smart,
still my suggestion stands, they should make a check box that says
"Search forums" "Search Techspot news" "Search images",
instead everything is jumbled up into one, it makes it very hard to find something.

anyway I think the search needs to be improved, i tried to search for an article I had the link to and used keywords from the article and in some cases it wouldn't find it at all.

 

[Julio Franco]

Ok, so it goes like this (the official word) ...

As you have pointed out, there are two major search engines used on this site: Google search & vBulletin's built in search.

In my experience the Google search engine works really well but does not index pages by the hour but it will usually work on a week by week basis, which means that for up to the minute, forum-related search, vBulletin's engine is recommended.

That leaves the rest of the site and historical search to Google.
Besides the fact that you can use the google search syntax, we have also divided the site into sections (news, downloads, drivers) which are accessible from its respective section indexes (news archives, downloads mainpage, drivers mainpage).

This basically covers the whole site but the articles which unfortunately do not have its own search, though it's quite reachable using the sections and browsing through it.

Last but not least, on the next revision of TechSpot (FYI redesign is coming along nicely), we will use a tabbed search interface at the top of all pages which should enhance the search experience with one click.

 

[Nirkon]

"tabbed search interface" is the ability to search the different sections?

 

[Julio Franco]

Probably not all of them (that would be like 10+ tabs) but the most important, and given your feedback I should be including an "advanced search" link for further specific search per section.

 

[Nirkon]

Yeah, not all of them I mean, but the most important like News(main page items), Images, Reviews, Software

(forum has it's own search so two searches is not necessary? really up to you)

Techspot is one of the best sites i've ever been to because they actually take into consideration user feedback, i've seen countless forums just ignore user ideas, simply because they are either lazy or just don't care.
Thanks again