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Search function ignoring "common words"
Posted: Sun Feb 12, 2023 4:46 pm
by vontresc
Hi Not sure if this is due to any recent changes, but I was searching for the term "fuel pump" (we're having some issues) and the search feature returns nothing but this.
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Information
The following words in your search query were ignored because they are too common words: pump fuel.
You must specify at least one word to search for. Each word must consist of at least 3 characters and must not contain more than 14 characters excluding wildcards.
I guess those Dukes fail a lot ;-) Is there some what we could fix this "feature"
Peter
Re: Search function ignoring "common words"
Posted: Sun Feb 12, 2023 5:20 pm
by mhoran
I've never found the built in search to be very good. I'm not sure which phpBB search backend we're using, but they are all pretty bad, though some better than others. When I search I go to Google (though any search engine will do) and direct it to search DAN by prefixing my search terms with site:diamondaviators.net.
Re: Search function ignoring "common words"
Posted: Sun Feb 12, 2023 6:22 pm
by Boatguy
That tip also works with other search engines.
Re: Search function ignoring "common words"
Posted: Sun Feb 12, 2023 7:48 pm
by dmloftus
mhoran wrote: ↑Sun Feb 12, 2023 5:20 pm
I've never found the built-in search to be very good. I'm not sure which phpBB search backend we're using, but they are all pretty bad, though some are better than others. When I search I go to Google (though any search engine will do) and direct it to search DAN by prefixing my search terms with site:diamondaviators.net.
Fantastic tip. Amazing how many more duplicate threads you can find using that filter on Google that the internal search engine doesn't find. It would be a great weekend project to consolidate a bunch of those duplicates on DAN ;-)
Re: Search function ignoring "common words"
Posted: Sun Feb 12, 2023 10:35 pm
by Chris
Matt is absolutely right that search engines such as Google will do a better job of searching DAN by using the "site:diamondaviators.net" keyword. The possible exception to this is if you want to search in a specific subforum or for a specific user's post, which you can do using the "Advanced" search box.
That being said, I've tweaked the search settings a bit by raising the bar a little on what constitutes a common word and reindexing the site. It at least doesn't bail out on "fuel pump" searches anymore (at least for now).