SteveR Rambin

How's about going back to the original search results. The new one is a real pain in the tail feathers. You give too many unwanted answers. The old way let you choose from results and forums. I really don't like the Beta way. Nice idea to move forward as catch phrases go but sometimes when you have it right to begin with changing what works only messes things up.

mvigod

It does not look like we are moving back to the old inferior search. It was RCU's number one complaint from our members so we addressed it. This engine actually finds words you want. After you search you can narrow your search results by the filters on the left with a single click. You can also click the link under the search box for advanced options like searching subject or body only.

The reason you have so many answers is because it actually finds posts that have your search terms in it. The old one didn't find half the results so you had to hope that it found something you wanted but you didn't know what you might be missing.

The new one is analgous to google search. It works in similar way and it does so very fast and accurate. If you search for a term and it finds it you cannot fault the engine for not finding what you want in the top result as it looks for WORDS that match what you entered.

Also this one you can search within a forum from the forum pages and within a thread and actually find answers. the other one failed 3/4 of the time.

if that isn't enough just bookmark the old one at http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/search.asp and when it fails to come up with your results use the new one. I'm sure it won't be long until the old ones lack of results become frustrating enough when you see the new one actually finds the matches and doesn't make you wait 90 seconds to tell you it could not find a word or phrase that we all know exists on rcu. Try searching for futaba with the old search. No results. That can't be good.

mazdaprotege4

My Feedback: (32)

I guess the only thing that I liked about the old search is that it showed how many people replied (and what forum it was posted to) so you could be sure that you were looking at a thread that had plenty of information (instead of getting a thread which only has one post).  Is it possible to have that built into the new search?

mvigod

the new results show you what forum and who the author was for the post. It is just formatted slightly different. If you read under the summary it shows what forum it was posted in and by who.

It does not show the reply count and that isn't possible with this kind of search. what it does do is find the words you are looking for. there are advanced options to narrow by author, forum, date, etc and a link to show you how to do that or you can use the one click links after you enter the term. The idea is enter a term and find matches. Then allow the user to filter them down. This helps avoid no match scenarios. Imagine searching for "servo xyz552" in monster truck forum and get no results BUT maybe it appears in 3 other forums. Maybe it would be useful to know it was in those other forums and you would find what you wanted. Also say it is a popular term and is found in many forums then AFTER the search you can click on the filters (to the left) and pick what forum you want to filter down into. Results are all sub-second so you can literally play with 15 options before the old search would even return the first "questionable" result set.

I put a link on the new search to the old one for those that want to try their luck with that. Also you can now search within a thread or within a forum from the thread/forum search boxes on those pages and get actual results with no need to enter or select a forum or thread.

Bax

My Feedback: (11)

The new search also gives you a long list of useless forums.  I triedto locate a thread about transmitter springs in the Futaba SupportForum, which we've discussed a few times.  I put in "Springs", and thentried "stick springs", and each time I got a useless list ofthread options, and none of the forums on the left-hand side of thepage were relevant to my search.  They were all car forums withabsolutely no way that I could see to select the specific forum Iwanted to search.  And that was starting out in the Futaba SupportForum.

RCKen

My Feedback: (9)

Bax,
If you go to the Forum you want to search in and locate the "Search This Forum" right above the forum listing, this will seach only the forum you want to find your results in.

http://search.rcuniverse.com/search....25+&i2=Springs

This link will give you the results of the spring search in the Futaba Support Forum

Ken

Bax

My Feedback: (11)

Ken,

OK, missed the box at the top of the forum.  I went directly into the search tool at the top, right-hand part of the page.  From there, the search engine is quite difficult to use and very non-specific.  Going into the window at the top, left-hand part of the page did work nicely.  Something's got to be done to make searching work well when a user clicks on the "search" box at the top, right-hand side.

mvigod

Bax,

the new search is still in beta.  the link to the old search is at the top of that page for cases where the new search is not suited yet.  The new search is above and beyond better then the old one.

At the top and bottom of the forums and threads are search within search boxes so you can just type from within any forum or thread to search those areas exclusively.

I added a search by body, subject or both over the weekend. I also increased the left side filters to show the top 40 forums vs 17 before as a stopgap.

I will be adding a forum selection box to an advanced search page but the idea is to keep the front page simple and to provide exhaustive results from which you can then narrow and filter them down.  In other words the idea is to have a big funnel starting at the top and then you can narrow after thus ensuring hits.

Here is why..imagine searching for "hanno prettner magic" in the pattern forum.  In the old search you might have selected just the pattern forum and that would yield no results.  In this case you search the site, maybe get some results in other forums but not pattern. You can at least then have the option to view results and maybe find what you were looking for before you narrowed things down. In cases where the match exists in multiple forums you would want to narrow down your choices afterwards.  This increases chances you find what you want.

Now I have to user interface options for forum selection on the advanced page I am deciding between

1) Show a list like the old search where you can select MULTIPLE forums to narrow the search before you actually search.

2) After the search is made show a dropdown menu like we have here in the forums to jump to other forums.  You would simply select the forum from that menu and submit to narrow to that forum. This would be on the results page preferably IMHO so you can narrow down AFTER you see the full possibility of hits on your search term