We would all benefit, I think, if people posting about a specific country would include tne name of the country in the post title. I'd love, for instance, to be able to scan for France or Germany.

Your reminder is/was useful for about ninety minutes... and now, maybe another ninety minutes. And then, it drops to the bottom, like every other post.

Barring some instructions to new registrants from Fodors (they send out that initial e-mail confirming each new registration; I don't know why they won't/can't provide some basic instructions with that), an effective solution seems to need to be one new registrant at a time.

So... since any one post doesn't do any <i>lasting</i> good in getting this message across, I choose to be a broken record, and share this with new registrants, one by one, when I see message headers (at least some of them) which give NO destination info.

By the way, Underhill - - you can &quot;select&quot; France or Germany (or any country) in the country select box, you know!

Best wishes,

Rex

Yes, Rex, but you know how effective the search engine isn't.

Despite the &quot;broken-ness&quot; of <i>text</i> searching here (and in separate correspondence, Fodors has confirmed to me that it isn't going to be fixed easily, nor tomorrow) - - the &quot;select country&quot; function has always worked (except to the extent that an OP fails to select a country when making a new post).

It certainly works right now. Click on France - - you get all of today's France postings.

ttt

I've always thought selecting the country in the search box works quite well, also -- as long as the person starting the post selected the proper country. They don't always, but usually do. The search function doesn't depend only on words in the title, either.

Rex: &gt;&gt;Click on France - - you get all of today's France postings.&lt;&lt;

Of course you know that ONLY applies IF the OP clicked France in the first place. Unfortunately, probably 1/2 or more posters forget to do that until they are previewing their text. And then it is too late. to go back and click the country.

Look a the UK for instance - click on it an you will only get a few threads today - where as if you scan the thread list, there are several more.

&lt;&lt;as long as the person starting the post selected the proper country.&gt;&gt;

&lt;&lt; that ONLY applies IF the OP clicked France in the first place. Unfortunately, probably 1/2 or more posters forget to do that until they are previewing their text.&gt;&gt;

Fodors is clearly having enough trouble with data system (structure)/software inadequacy. The human error(s) described above can not be included in that realm.

If nothing else, this thread makes for an easy &quot;Please see...&quot;

I just didn't want folks to think clicking on France, or Italy, or Austria will bring up every thread about that country -- or even a majority of them . . . . .

ttt so people will see this request!

ttt

The search function really stinks. If I type Trip Report:, my last one does not come up; not even if I type Paris to the Dordogne, which is the next part of the title. It is unfortunate that we cannot trust the search engine in a forum that is used to exchange information.

For anyone who &quot;didn't get the memo&quot;... the search engine is non-existent for anything posted since May 2 - - except for &quot;select country&quot;, and &quot;click on your own name&quot;.

I used to think it was only newer threads that were hard to find using the search function -- the ones not yet &quot;indexed&quot;.

About a year ago I posted a trip report. To test the search, I just tried searching by the title, by several exact phrases, by some pretty unique words w/i the post - almost 10 different searches and the thread didn't come up.

If you can't find a thread when you know its exact wording, how on earth can you search for anything and hope to get useful returns????

janis, great point, how do you find the posts when you know the search words and yet they don't appear when you do the search. As soon as I find a post that is of interest I now email it to myself so I can save it for a return visit. My folders are getting rather bulky but what else can I do? Thanks for any suggestions, Deborah

I guess, janis, if it's important to you to have access to it - - http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34511389 - - or have other see it again this year, then you can just top it.

There was the seemingly more obscure problem of &quot;black holes&quot; in the indexing - - but I see no signs (your trip report notwithstanding) that one existed in July of 2004. A search on &quot;rbmd&quot; for example, retrieves posts every day during that period.

No Rex - I have the link. I was testing the search function as someone might try to use it. It does not work.

DeborahAnn, I email threads to myself too and have them filed in a Fodors mailbox that's getting very bulky. I'm thinking about originating a Word file with the URLs from my saved email messages. For example, there's a thread in the mailbox with the title &quot;Germany in September.&quot; I'll cut and paste the URL in the mailbox to the Word document with the notation &quot;Germany in September.&quot; So instead of having a mailbox with an e-mail message for each thread, I'll have a list of topics with their URLs. What do you think of this way of organizing saved threads?

Yes, yes. Perhaps Fodor's could update their registration process to include a simple quiz on how the Forums work before the registration is finalized...