How to Use/best use the search function
After reading all the issues relating to the use, misuse, and lack of use as well as my personal experiences with the "search" I thought I'd start a thread to offer tips and advice to users, new and old alike.
I like many have been frustrated with the results I've gotten while using search to find simple problems. The issues usually are either an excessive return of semi relevant results requiring hours to find exactly what I want or a return of totally unrelated results altogether. But recently I spent some time trying to learn the quirks of our search.
First and simply putting the word "and" between each word your searching for is a huge help. I for one have become complacent with using google but frankly the forum search algorithm doesn't seem to be quite as advanced in terms of ranking relevance so go a tad "old school" while searching.
Next, if you don't come up with anything at all try using fewer words and eliminate irrelevant words like to, the, ect... Instead use just a few key words rather than phrases.
If your getting alot of results and your only interested in those relating to a cucv then use the "advanced search" and you can select which of the sub forums your searching, in this case you'd select and highlight the cucv area. I believe you can select multiple by holding the ctl key while clicking.
Dont give up after one search, try changing up the words your using; replacing "wheel" with "rim" for instance might change the outcome drastically.
And finally, don't concentrate on just the titles of the threads, we often use wacky or irrelevant words and phrases for threads that otherwise contain very useful information. Don't be afraid to poke around a bit.
If anyone else has suggestions post them up, I'm certainly not perfect at this and I know some of use have better methods than others.
After reading all the issues relating to the use, misuse, and lack of use as well as my personal experiences with the "search" I thought I'd start a thread to offer tips and advice to users, new and old alike.
I like many have been frustrated with the results I've gotten while using search to find simple problems. The issues usually are either an excessive return of semi relevant results requiring hours to find exactly what I want or a return of totally unrelated results altogether. But recently I spent some time trying to learn the quirks of our search.
First and simply putting the word "and" between each word your searching for is a huge help. I for one have become complacent with using google but frankly the forum search algorithm doesn't seem to be quite as advanced in terms of ranking relevance so go a tad "old school" while searching.
Next, if you don't come up with anything at all try using fewer words and eliminate irrelevant words like to, the, ect... Instead use just a few key words rather than phrases.
If your getting alot of results and your only interested in those relating to a cucv then use the "advanced search" and you can select which of the sub forums your searching, in this case you'd select and highlight the cucv area. I believe you can select multiple by holding the ctl key while clicking.
Dont give up after one search, try changing up the words your using; replacing "wheel" with "rim" for instance might change the outcome drastically.
And finally, don't concentrate on just the titles of the threads, we often use wacky or irrelevant words and phrases for threads that otherwise contain very useful information. Don't be afraid to poke around a bit.
If anyone else has suggestions post them up, I'm certainly not perfect at this and I know some of use have better methods than others.
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