Search problems
 

Is there something up with the search function on this board? I saw a post the other day that I decided I could help by responding to, but just searched it and it didn't come up. I know it was a recent post about Hotel Les Muscadins in Mougins, but nothing earlier than 2006 comes up when I search. When that happened, I entered in a few key words from one of my July posts, and nothing came up there either.

Two different kinds of answers:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35040365

Best wishes,

Rex

Thanks, Rex. In my defense, I searched using the word "search" before I posted my message, and the string that you posted did not come up. BTW, my search problems include things posted more than a week ago, so there's something else going on.

Thanks.

No need to defend yourself. Read my post again. The search function is broken - - for anything posted in the last 5 or 6 weeks - - until they get the indexing fixed.

Requests to look into it seem to be falling on deaf ears.

Emailed (once again) to [email protected]

Suggest that others do too.

Politely request the courtesy of a reply.

Thanks so much. I'll send an email off right away. Ann

Sent the email to the Fodors editors but haven't heard back from anyone. And the search function's still not working.

I did get a reply, finally. Acknowledged that a solution needs to come from "tech", not from "editors". Indicated that it would be worked on...

Still not fixed...

Still not fixed. Over seven weeks now. What gives, Fodors?

Mailed again to [email protected]

I find it best to search via google. Put the key words in, it helps if you can remember one of the poster's names and put their name in

BTW Give it a rest IJ. Get a life.

Perhaps the hotel name was misspelled and now you can't find it by using the correct spelling? Try searching on "Mougins" and maybe you can find it in one of those?

Was it this thread?

"Where to Stay in South of France" (last post: 5/8/2007)
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34994667

I routinely use google to search fodors using the following format

"hotel mougins site:fodors.com" will force google to only search on fodors.com website.

I was having the same problem a few weeks ago. As a test, I copied exact text from a year-old post (hotel and street name) then pasted it into the search box. The search did not find that thread.

Go to Google and click Advanced search. Put your search words in, scroll down to "Only return results from the site or domain"...enter www.fodors.com. Google will find your thread for you.

I just emailed Fodors also. I think everyone should, to keep up the pressure. This has gone on too long

Thanks to all for helpful information about searching on Google. But it sure would be more convenient if Fodor's could fix their own search function. Let's all email again.

I agree, FBC & thanks, JeanneB for the detailed google instructions.

It appears not to be fixed in terms of indexing recent posts -- I checked something from very early August and it wouldn't pull it up, even with a very unique search word. Maybe they haven't indexed things since June, which is really too long, but I remember originally Fodors never indexed posts on here that frequently, and they only did that in batch runs every 6 weeks or so, as I recall.

Other search problems some people have on Fodors are usually (not always, I agree) because they don't search properly. People search on way too many complicated phrases and text when it is unnecessary and won't find things appropriately, even when it works properly. I don't think it has ever worked on an extremely long phrase of text as someone tried, and most search engines won't. A search should be limited to one or two very unique words, if possible, or add one word that you think may be limiting, but may not really help much (like adding the word hotel to Mougins in this search isn't going to improve things much, so may not be worth the trouble -- most threads have the word hotel in them, and there can't be that many posts about Mougins to begin with, so I wouldn't do that myself).

It definitely shows posts from 2007, though, if you just search on the word muscadins, you find ones that began in May 2007.

We apologize for the search problems as of late; the search is certainly always perfect but it does appear that indexing is not occuring properly in some cases in the Forums. I have passed along your inquiries here (and those emails that you have sent) to our tech team; I'll do my best to post an update no later than the end of the week.

Thanks for your patience.

Katie:

Forgive my being uppity, but we are travelers, you know - - and your reply sounds way too much like "we realize you have been inconvenienced" - - when an airplane has been stranded out on the tarmac for seven hours.

...it's not "the search problems as of late" (makes it sound like the last few days or something) - - the problem was over a month old when you sent me a reply on July 30 (now two weeks ago).

And I feel 99% confident that "that indexing is not occuring (sic) properly in some cases in the Forums"... is also a gross "mis-underestiamtion" of the problem.

There has been no indexing of any kind, of even one word, in the message header, in the body of the message, or the e-mail address(es) of those who post - - not just "in some cases".

The airlines ae starting to use a little more common courtesy and decency in informing passengers truthfully when something is not performing right. Fodor's would do well to follow that example.

Looking forward to a proper fix of the problem.

Another two weeks, plus... and still no fix...

Hi Rex-
I wish I had a better update. The search problem turns out to be bigger than our past quick fixes. The good news--it's a major priority right now. The bad news--there's not a quick fix. While we are in the process of addressing our current search woes, we're also on the look out for more long term solutions. Please see this post to give your suggestions: http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35058660

Well, a prompt, and more forthcoming reply, at least...

The workarounds I know...

It's the newbies who suffer from a non-working search function. And the continuous influx of newbies is more vitally important to the life of this forum than any other thing that comes to my mind.

Why don't you use Google Custom Search?

It's free, and it can be implemented in 10 minutes.

http://www.google.com/coop/cse

It's a very good question. I can't count how many universities and similar, very large organizations with big unstructured "piles o' files" use google search right on their web site.

Not sure how/if Google site search implemented here could carry out boolean queries (especially across "fields" - - i.e. "screen_name=rex _and_ message_header=problems" - - but then, we can't do that right now either).

I leae for France today. When I started planning this trip, with a flurry of questions here in June, I would have never believed that the search function would end up out of commission form late June until now - - with still no end in sight, and no response to the straightforward question of why Fodors (Random House) wouldn't consider using Google search right ON this website to replace its long-ailing search function.

I guess they think they reached "Mission accomplished" some years ago.

No improvement, years later.

Sent to [email protected] again today.

rex - hope you're having a good trip. It seems like the search function is finally working now.

A fully upgraded search is in development as we speak; it should be out later this fall. Rex--- I hope you are enjoying your trip. I know our IT team did investigate using Google search but it was not the ultimate choice we went with. I'll inquire with them as to why it wasn't the right pick for the site.

Thanks for thinking of me while i was gone, yk and katie... as katie's message indicates, the "fix" is not in yet, even though there seems to be some proiperly working functionality for posts started recently (just not posts started in late June, July, August, and maybe most of September). This "black hole" phenomenon happened at least two or three times before. I hope it can be eliminated with the new solution under review.

This thread itself provides an appropriate test. Search for the word "Muscadins" (in the OP's message) - - as of right now, this thread does not come up.

Oh, and yes, we had a good trip. Details to follow...

Welcome back, rex.

I plugged in "Muscadins" in our test search; guess what came up first? This thread. Encouraging.

I meet later this week with the developers so I should have an updated progress report then.

In any project which is in progress, encouraging feels better than discouraging. But _completed_ will fell better than either.

I will be glad to do some test runs on any new implementation. For now, what we "end users" can "see", for results, remains largely unchanged. Quite new threads are getting indexed, but there remains the giant hole, spanning late June through sometime in September.

You met "later this week" (referring to the first week in October, Katie?

and... ???

I would like to see the requested search word(s) highlighted in a contrasting color in the matching threads. This saves a lot of time wading through sometimes lengthy threads to find the post(s) with the pertinent info. Thanks.

An improvement on that would be to return only the <u>posts</u> with all the search terms in them, as opposed to the <u>threads</u> as is currently done. Frequently one search term will be in one post, another in a different post, and so on.

&gt;I would like to see the requested search word(s) highlighted in a contrasting color in the matching threads. &lt;

Since you have to open the threads to search them, you can just do &quot;CTRL+F&quot; and enter the words you need.

((I))

I hardly ever used the search function, but today it seems it's returning much more comprehensive results. Maybe the &quot;new look&quot; is more than just look. They actually fixed/improved the search function.

Nope. Just did a search for a word that appeared in a post dated 10/03/2007.

Result: Zip. Nada. Zilch.

Darn. When I saw the new layout, I hoped that meant the search function was fixed, too.

Alas, I just searched on a hotel in Paris and the most recent thread it returned was from May. I've discussed that particular hotel several times in the last few weeks. So---no fix. :(

It's even worse. The &quot;find in this page&quot; and &quot;CONTROL + F&quot; functions no longer work.

Those functions only found the search word in the thread titles on the left. It no longer found the words in the thread itself. We're going backwards!