Why is there the limit that words have to be a certain size? For example, I am not allowed to search on "O2 sensor" because "O2" doesn't have enough letters! Problem is, everyone says "O2", almost nobody says "oxygen", so I can't get all the results.

Also, is there a way to search on phrases? I wanted to search on "open loop idle on", but it always searched for all the terms in any order.

Great site though. Is it funded fully with banner ads?

 

Yeah that also pisses me off when I want to search for a specific year like 82 or somethin, since most people say 82 instead of 1982.

 

i'm not with TGO, but I have some learned knowledge.

There has to be a limitation somewhere in reference to the minimum search word length. By default for this software, i believe it is 4 letters. The admins here have set it to 3.

If they go any lower with the minimum search length, the search database will grow considerably. For a forum this size, we're probably talking about data in gigabytes.

One other problem is with the way vB's search function works. When a post is submitted into the database, vB records any words in that post that are equal to and greater than what the current minimum search length are, and that info is kept track in a search table. When you perform a search, the search is not actually searching each individual post, but instead is checking for any occurrence of those words in the search table that it is always building on.

Because of this, if TGO were to decrease the minimum search length from 3 to 2, they would also need to reindex the search, so that all prior posts with 2 letters are also included. Doing that on a forum such as this with almost 2 million posts would probably make the server crunch hard for atleast a day, i would guess.

However, the admins will know about things here than i on this side of things.

 

well heres where i can chime in..

everyone says use the search..

but for example you searching fora specific term.. cant find it, so u go back and search again with a different choice of words just to find out you have to wait 45 seconds between searches.. lame.

thats why i hardly search.

if it was perhaps 10seconds between searches that would be better, alot easier to do research then only doing one phrase every 45seconds ugh.

 

I hate the 45 seconds between searches too. I don't know if vB could do it easily, but it would be better to have a limit something more like 4 searches in 3 minutes, or whatever.

 

Until TGO does some hardware and software upgrades, with a forum this size and as much activity, these things will probably not change right away, especially since the server already has some problems at times as it is. But an admin would have a better say on that.

Having the search flood for 45 seconds helps keep the server load from getting too out of hand with too many search jobs going. The search feature is one of the biggest performance hits.

This isn't good for the people who search a lot, but it is good for the majority of the users and the overall performance of the forum. They could do away with such limitations, but it would make the forums almost unusable for everyone else. i'm sure the admins would love to make everyone happy, but right now, they have to make due by having limitations to keep the server load down so that the overall forum performs adequate for the majority of the users who are just doing light searches, browsing and posting.

i'm sure TGO is looking into making things better in the not so distant future.

 

if we are so limited to our searching abilities, ie the 45 second rule and 3letter minimum, then i would expect to see more answers in these posts instead of the usual "use the search"

 

Yes, some people are rather harsh about that, yet the limitations of search make it tough.

I'm really surpised vB doesn't support putting phrases in quotes. As far as I can tell, it just ignores the quotes altogether.

I agree also about the 45 seconds. I understand the rationale, but there should at least be a loophole if you get an error. Like if I search on "O2 sensor" and it gripes about "O2", I shouldn't have to wait 45 seconds to search for "oxygen sensor".

 

This version of vB does not support phrase searching. But i believe this will be supported and is another feature of mysql's full-text searching capability.

 

Doesn't vB 3.x or whatever version is being waited upon have phrase searching?

 

I've never really had a problem with the search. Try putting in the keywords of your question. What about the O2. Try oxygen. Too many threads come up, limit the board. You just have to learn how to use it, and not be lazy.

TraviZ, sorry man, but , imnsho, that is a lame excuse as to why you don't search. You'd rather post a question and wait how long for an answer? Rather than try and do a search?

This site takes up Dirk's time and money. It takes up a whole lot of resources and a ton of the Admin's and Mods' time! In addition to that if it is one commonly asked, you just aggrivated a whole bunch of people that have been here for a long time. For crying out loud, it's a tad disrespectful to just brush aside the use of the search beacause you're lazy and want instant gratification! You are not limited by anything but your own thinking in our search feature. I have no prob, Vader, RB, ede, trickster, Guido, none of them have problems searching. Hell they make a point of it by posting links to relevant threads!

Mastiff, if it gives you an error and you hit the back button, you don't have to wait. I just tried it.

If you have been around a while you know that a whole lot of the old timers sometimes take 'breaks' from the bbs. Usually from aggrivation. Hell I don't know how many times on this specific board I've seen 'Why don't we have non-tech' type questions and the damn issue is addressed in a Sticky right at the top of the board!!! As an example, mark my words, this fall you'll start seeing threads on gen tech for 'How do I store my car?' (in that vein). Not that that has been asked a few thousand times , but we'll see it again this year.

Ok, rant off.

 

Mabye on the main page or something Dirk should have a paypal donation button?

 

Here is a little hint that works for me. You are searching for a 2-letter word, ad a * IE search for o2* or 89*. This will make the 3-letter min, and give you some usefull results. of course the return is usually HUGE. (that probably has something to do with why you are not supposed to do it )

~Joe

"o2*" search;

https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sea...der=descending

 

i don't believe the Admins have said that you're not suppose to do it, but the reason why many times it is huge is because you've made the search more broader as well. Sometimes that is not good for someone wanting a more precise search without being flooded with other results tossed in. The search can be bad enough for users as it is.

You may or may not know this, but your results where returned only for any matching post/thread that contained characters after the o2 (the * part). You will see examples of this as "o2mv", "o2(oxygen)" in your search results. Those are the real words that your search was based on and why the results were returned. Of course in this example it works because those words are going to be used often where "o2" is used as well.

Remember, the way this vBulletin software works, you are not searching the actual original posts when you perform a search. Instead, you are only searching a search table that this software builds based on certain criteria. This is important because since TGO only allows a 3 or more character word search, this means that this software is only indexing 3 or more character words for its search table. That search table is what you're actually searching within.

o2 and other 2 letter/digit terms aren't in that search table that is used. Because of this, you will miss a lot of posts that just reference o2 as o2. In this example, it works better than others. But i can think of many examples where this will not work or be much useful.

It is better than nothing, though. But it isn't a magical method to bypass a limitation here. You cannot search for something in the database that it does not contain. Currently, any 2 letter/digit are not in that search database. Because of this, you are going to miss a lot of valid entries with that method, as well as add a lot of irrelevant entries too.

Just thought i'd point that out to try to help.

 

i ran in to this the other day while searching for production numbers for an 83 L69 trans am. i finally gave up and posted.