agressive search advice commentary December 13, 2004 5:08 AM Subscribe
Should this advice on searching for previous posts be on the search page?
I think the search page should at least note that it searches for exact phrases, not all words. Any search with more than one word has a high probability of being useless, and it would help if people knew that so they could search accordingly.
posted by stopgap at 5:18 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by stopgap at 5:18 AM on December 13, 2004
I think the search page should at least note that it searches for exact phrases, not all words.
stopgap, this is exactly what happened. I thought it would pick up individual words, not glue them together as a fixed phrase.
posted by SpaceCadet at 5:33 AM on December 13, 2004
stopgap, this is exactly what happened. I thought it would pick up individual words, not glue them together as a fixed phrase.
posted by SpaceCadet at 5:33 AM on December 13, 2004
Yes. The exact string search is really useful, but I get the impression that many people either (1) don't understand that it is an exact string search or (2) don't understand how to use such a search effectively. I think all the search pages need a "how to use these searches" paragraph. Maybe something like this:
"This is an exact string search: it will list pages that contain exactly the characters you type in the box (it is not case sensitive). Use this search when you have a single keyword or exact phrase that you expect to find in the search results. You can also use this search to find a post or comment that contains a particular URL (or just part of a URL). For best results, strip off any leading "http://www." strings, and just start with the domain (e.g. "nytimes.com/2004/12/13"); such a search will match URLs that begin with "www." as well as URLs that do not.
If you want to search using multiple keywords, use the Google search box below."
posted by Galvatron at 6:17 AM on December 13, 2004
"This is an exact string search: it will list pages that contain exactly the characters you type in the box (it is not case sensitive). Use this search when you have a single keyword or exact phrase that you expect to find in the search results. You can also use this search to find a post or comment that contains a particular URL (or just part of a URL). For best results, strip off any leading "http://www." strings, and just start with the domain (e.g. "nytimes.com/2004/12/13"); such a search will match URLs that begin with "www." as well as URLs that do not.
If you want to search using multiple keywords, use the Google search box below."
posted by Galvatron at 6:17 AM on December 13, 2004
It would be important to know that, because it completely changes the logic by which you search.
I agree with Ryvar that many people clearly haven't mastered even basic search logic. But even if you are an accomplished searcher, you need to know the parameters before you can get the results you need. I have good search skills, but I am pretty well in the habit of considering separate words, without quotes and without +these, as separate pieces of information, and I'm asking for posts that contain both words without having them be connected. Since MeFi's search works differently from the big commercial search engines, it would be well to notify new searchers of the difference.
posted by Miko at 6:20 AM on December 13, 2004
I agree with Ryvar that many people clearly haven't mastered even basic search logic. But even if you are an accomplished searcher, you need to know the parameters before you can get the results you need. I have good search skills, but I am pretty well in the habit of considering separate words, without quotes and without +these, as separate pieces of information, and I'm asking for posts that contain both words without having them be connected. Since MeFi's search works differently from the big commercial search engines, it would be well to notify new searchers of the difference.
posted by Miko at 6:20 AM on December 13, 2004
I would definitely include instructions with the search:
Before you post, please search:
1. Basic keywords related to post.
2. An exact phrase related to search (e.g. "an exact phrase")
4. Unique parts of the URL(s). Strip out http:// for best results.
Btw, in this case the guy search the words google and suggest, so I still don't understand why the search didn't return a hit.
posted by xammerboy at 6:34 AM on December 13, 2004
Before you post, please search:
1. Basic keywords related to post.
2. An exact phrase related to search (e.g. "an exact phrase")
4. Unique parts of the URL(s). Strip out http:// for best results.
Btw, in this case the guy search the words google and suggest, so I still don't understand why the search didn't return a hit.
posted by xammerboy at 6:34 AM on December 13, 2004
xammerboy, the behavior of the mefi search is only exact phrase searching. See Galvatron's comment above.
posted by stopgap at 6:41 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by stopgap at 6:41 AM on December 13, 2004
Then you can hardly blame this guy for not knowing that. There's nothing to indicate it doesn't do an AND search by default as most search engines do. Read the current search instructions below:
"Search comments, threads, and users over the selected time period below:"
posted by xammerboy at 6:44 AM on December 13, 2004
"Search comments, threads, and users over the selected time period below:"
posted by xammerboy at 6:44 AM on December 13, 2004
xammerboy: The search feature searches for the phrase you provide, not the individual words. He searched for "google suggest", and "google suggest" doesn't appear in the first post (even if "google" and "suggest" both appear alone), so no hits. That's the surprising behavior that people are advocating documenting.
posted by mendel at 6:44 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by mendel at 6:44 AM on December 13, 2004
Sorry, stopgap, didn't catch your comment in preview.
xammerboy: This thread is about documenting the weird search behavior on the search page, not about calling out a double post.
posted by mendel at 6:47 AM on December 13, 2004
xammerboy: This thread is about documenting the weird search behavior on the search page, not about calling out a double post.
posted by mendel at 6:47 AM on December 13, 2004
Personally, I am just as sick of callouts like the one listed as I am of doubleposts, incorrect formatting, etc. This kind of thing should be taken to Meta. The people making these mistakes simply don't know better. Being called a piece of crap isn't helping.
Blasdelf (the poster) himself has been here less than a year, posted no links to Metafilter, no threads to Metatalk, and one question to AskMe. I doubt he'd be acting this way if he wasn't seeing the older members do so. The reasons he gave for the post being inexcusable, that the poster should be aware of everything posted in the last couple days - no exception, is ridiculous.
What I remember from the last couple times new users came was that there was a grace period where newbies were given the benefit of the doubt. It wasn't assumed they were lazy or stupid, just that they didn't know.
I'm sick and tired of reading threads with these kinds of explosions.
posted by xammerboy at 6:58 AM on December 13, 2004
Blasdelf (the poster) himself has been here less than a year, posted no links to Metafilter, no threads to Metatalk, and one question to AskMe. I doubt he'd be acting this way if he wasn't seeing the older members do so. The reasons he gave for the post being inexcusable, that the poster should be aware of everything posted in the last couple days - no exception, is ridiculous.
What I remember from the last couple times new users came was that there was a grace period where newbies were given the benefit of the doubt. It wasn't assumed they were lazy or stupid, just that they didn't know.
I'm sick and tired of reading threads with these kinds of explosions.
posted by xammerboy at 6:58 AM on December 13, 2004
as most search engines do.
how did you mistake metafilter for a search engine? which other fallacious assumptions are you laboring under?
posted by quonsar at 8:55 AM on December 13, 2004
how did you mistake metafilter for a search engine? which other fallacious assumptions are you laboring under?
posted by quonsar at 8:55 AM on December 13, 2004
The reasons he gave for the post being inexcusable, that the poster should be aware of everything posted in the last couple days - no exception, is ridiculous.
Such a suggestion would be ridiculous. However, it's equally ridiculous for someone who's posting about a new development in Googling, which SpaceCadet knows is routinely, exhaustively covered by MeFi, to not do more work than typing in one phrase in the Search box before posting it. Either he could have gone back and read the FPPs for the past week (horrors! what a trial!) or used the Mefi search on "Google" and scrolled down a whole screen.
If people are not willing to do this amount of work, yet start crying about how piss-poor the search is once their triple post is pointed out, well... no, I'm not gonna tar-&-feather them, but "ridiculous" they certainly are.
posted by soyjoy at 9:19 AM on December 13, 2004
Such a suggestion would be ridiculous. However, it's equally ridiculous for someone who's posting about a new development in Googling, which SpaceCadet knows is routinely, exhaustively covered by MeFi, to not do more work than typing in one phrase in the Search box before posting it. Either he could have gone back and read the FPPs for the past week (horrors! what a trial!) or used the Mefi search on "Google" and scrolled down a whole screen.
If people are not willing to do this amount of work, yet start crying about how piss-poor the search is once their triple post is pointed out, well... no, I'm not gonna tar-&-feather them, but "ridiculous" they certainly are.
posted by soyjoy at 9:19 AM on December 13, 2004
I used to link to a post I made about searching for distinguishing features, but for some reason I dropped it. I'll put it back this week if I can dig it up.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:28 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:28 AM on December 13, 2004
Quonsar and Soyjoy,
Some users will expect the Metafilter feature to work like most search engines (e.g. Google) does. That is, to conduct an AND search by default. One line of text explaining how the search works would remedy this.
Nice to call the new users lazy than want to easily fix a basic usability problem with the site.
Quonsar,
I labour under the observation that you're a prick who spends all day inserting snarks into threads.
posted by xammerboy at 9:36 AM on December 13, 2004
Some users will expect the Metafilter feature to work like most search engines (e.g. Google) does. That is, to conduct an AND search by default. One line of text explaining how the search works would remedy this.
Nice to call the new users lazy than want to easily fix a basic usability problem with the site.
Quonsar,
I labour under the observation that you're a prick who spends all day inserting snarks into threads.
posted by xammerboy at 9:36 AM on December 13, 2004
Nice to call the new users lazy than want to easily fix a basic usability problem with the site.
I can't be sure you're talking to me, but I gotta say - who called new users lazy? Neither quonsar nor I said a damn thing about new users. SpaceCadet's been here longer than I have.
And again, when it comes to reading and posting on MeFi, everybody can do as much or as little work as they want. But if you choose "little" and it winds up making you look like an ass, that's your problem, not Matt's.
Sure the Search should work as well as possible. But if you think that's gonna stop the problem of people re-posting 2-day-old FPPs because they can't be bothered to find that out, well, dream on.
posted by soyjoy at 9:58 AM on December 13, 2004
I can't be sure you're talking to me, but I gotta say - who called new users lazy? Neither quonsar nor I said a damn thing about new users. SpaceCadet's been here longer than I have.
And again, when it comes to reading and posting on MeFi, everybody can do as much or as little work as they want. But if you choose "little" and it winds up making you look like an ass, that's your problem, not Matt's.
Sure the Search should work as well as possible. But if you think that's gonna stop the problem of people re-posting 2-day-old FPPs because they can't be bothered to find that out, well, dream on.
posted by soyjoy at 9:58 AM on December 13, 2004
Quonsar, I also labour under the assumption that I would be happier if you got a life. Why don't you give it a shot and I'll let you know.
posted by xammerboy at 10:00 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by xammerboy at 10:00 AM on December 13, 2004
I had given up on the MeFi search long ago and exclusively used Google to search the site as it is much quicker and more flexible. I have had to go back to using both after a really embarrassing double (well quadruple actually) post where the original had not yet been picked up by Google.
posted by caddis at 10:02 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by caddis at 10:02 AM on December 13, 2004
True, space cadet has been here a while, nor is he lazy, nor is he stupid, nor did he understand how the search worked.
posted by xammerboy at 10:04 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by xammerboy at 10:04 AM on December 13, 2004
Elsewhere, somebody said (of the point of the threads): if you type in "sex" or "porn", it doesn't continue auto-completing .
It does for "fella", but for "mastu" it's broken. (What is "mastubation" anyway?)
posted by davy at 10:22 AM on December 13, 2004
It does for "fella", but for "mastu" it's broken. (What is "mastubation" anyway?)
posted by davy at 10:22 AM on December 13, 2004
Quonsar, I labour under the observation that you're a prick who spends all day inserting snarks into threads.
Looking up Quonsar briefly gets, among other things, this:
"member since: May 13, 2000
quonsar has posted 93 links and 6196 comments to MetaFilter
and 13 threads and 2789 comments to MetaTalk
and no questions and 224 answers to Ask MetaFilter"
[Emphasis mine, of course.]
Dig that ratio of links to comments, and for 4.5 years now too. Somebody who's so sure what makes a good FPP should be able to come up with more of them himself, eh? ("Those who can, do....")
So yeah Xammerboy, it does look like Quonsar lives to snark.
posted by davy at 10:40 AM on December 13, 2004
Looking up Quonsar briefly gets, among other things, this:
"member since: May 13, 2000
quonsar has posted 93 links and 6196 comments to MetaFilter
and 13 threads and 2789 comments to MetaTalk
and no questions and 224 answers to Ask MetaFilter"
[Emphasis mine, of course.]
Dig that ratio of links to comments, and for 4.5 years now too. Somebody who's so sure what makes a good FPP should be able to come up with more of them himself, eh? ("Those who can, do....")
So yeah Xammerboy, it does look like Quonsar lives to snark.
posted by davy at 10:40 AM on December 13, 2004
Somebody who's so sure what makes a good FPP should be able to come up with more of them himself, eh?
See, that right there is a bad way of looking at things. You seem to be saying that people are obligated to go out and try to find things to post to MeFi. That's why we get people with these horribly over-linked posts that are basically just an excuse to post something.
By contrast, if you're surfing along for a few months or a few years, and you happen upon the perfect site for posting to MeFi, well then, by all means post it, and for goodness sake don't feel like you need to go google up a lot of other links to support it. If it's good enough to post, then it's good enough to post -- no other links required. In fact, the more links there are, the less likely the post is going to be any good (at least from where I'm sitting -- others would take issue with that).
So in short, more people should post fewer threads/links. It's not a race, and quality is way more valuable than quantity.
Now, I don't know if Quonsar's links have been quality links. I never pay attention to who posts what, but generally speaking few links would indicate to me that the user is better not worse.
posted by willnot at 11:05 AM on December 13, 2004
See, that right there is a bad way of looking at things. You seem to be saying that people are obligated to go out and try to find things to post to MeFi. That's why we get people with these horribly over-linked posts that are basically just an excuse to post something.
By contrast, if you're surfing along for a few months or a few years, and you happen upon the perfect site for posting to MeFi, well then, by all means post it, and for goodness sake don't feel like you need to go google up a lot of other links to support it. If it's good enough to post, then it's good enough to post -- no other links required. In fact, the more links there are, the less likely the post is going to be any good (at least from where I'm sitting -- others would take issue with that).
So in short, more people should post fewer threads/links. It's not a race, and quality is way more valuable than quantity.
Now, I don't know if Quonsar's links have been quality links. I never pay attention to who posts what, but generally speaking few links would indicate to me that the user is better not worse.
posted by willnot at 11:05 AM on December 13, 2004
I couldn't decide if davy was trying to be sarcastic or not... but I did notice this:
slightly off topic, but successful search is less about knowing syntax arcanities or incorporating auto-complete and more about choosing a sensible search term. even with the seriously broken mefi brute force search, i find double posts, mostly on the first result, after people claim "golly, i searched!". mefi will almost never match a URL correctly, but it does produce good results on sensible one-keyword searches.
What a useless bunch of snark, eh?
posted by soyjoy at 11:07 AM on December 13, 2004
slightly off topic, but successful search is less about knowing syntax arcanities or incorporating auto-complete and more about choosing a sensible search term. even with the seriously broken mefi brute force search, i find double posts, mostly on the first result, after people claim "golly, i searched!". mefi will almost never match a URL correctly, but it does produce good results on sensible one-keyword searches.
What a useless bunch of snark, eh?
posted by soyjoy at 11:07 AM on December 13, 2004
davy, q's comment to link ratio is about 67, yours is 53. I see little difference here.
posted by caddis at 11:16 AM on December 13, 2004
posted by caddis at 11:16 AM on December 13, 2004
In fairness, that ration may actually defend quonsar. Part of a good fpp is that it is not something that is forced or something one has to do on a regular basis, right? The fact that quonsar demostrates discretion is part of making good fpp's. And frankly, I don't like quonsar much either, but comment to link ration is not necessarily a good measure of how good someone's fpp's are.
posted by Doohickie at 12:01 PM on December 13, 2004
posted by Doohickie at 12:01 PM on December 13, 2004
"but successful search is less about knowing syntax arcanities or incorporating auto-complete and more about choosing a sensible search term"
Soyjoy, I didn't say that's all Quonsar does. He just gave me a terse but informative and non-insulting answer to a not-exceptionally-brilliant AskMe question. Still, snarking is clearly his forte'.
davy, q's comment to link ratio is about 67, yours is 53. I see little difference here.
caddis, the difference is that I haven't spent 4.5 years telling other people how bad/stupid/illegal their posts are.
posted by davy at 12:43 PM on December 13, 2004
Soyjoy, I didn't say that's all Quonsar does. He just gave me a terse but informative and non-insulting answer to a not-exceptionally-brilliant AskMe question. Still, snarking is clearly his forte'.
davy, q's comment to link ratio is about 67, yours is 53. I see little difference here.
caddis, the difference is that I haven't spent 4.5 years telling other people how bad/stupid/illegal their posts are.
posted by davy at 12:43 PM on December 13, 2004
Quonsar snarks big. Film at 11.
Jeez people, when will you stop stating the obvious? And DooHickie, please call out Q in a thread soon. He loves it when people do that.
Note: I'm a HUGE fan of the argument above. The best metafilter members know when to post 'em and know when to fold 'em. So fuck off about posting-to-commenting ratios. It's a red-herring.
posted by zpousman at 1:19 PM on December 13, 2004
Jeez people, when will you stop stating the obvious? And DooHickie, please call out Q in a thread soon. He loves it when people do that.
Note: I'm a HUGE fan of the argument above. The best metafilter members know when to post 'em and know when to fold 'em. So fuck off about posting-to-commenting ratios. It's a red-herring.
posted by zpousman at 1:19 PM on December 13, 2004
I was not aware that the MeFi search worked this way. That explains a couple of things (and a repost I made). Thanks for that info. I think having a mention of it on the search page would be a great idea.
posted by Captaintripps at 1:58 PM on December 13, 2004
posted by Captaintripps at 1:58 PM on December 13, 2004
On looking at this again, I went to high school with zpousman. Who else am I going to know here?
posted by Captaintripps at 2:08 PM on December 13, 2004
posted by Captaintripps at 2:08 PM on December 13, 2004
Some users will expect the Metafilter feature to work like most search engines
why would they? metafilter is not a search engine. in what conceivable manner does a hand-coded hobby blog pieced together by a non-programmer appear to be similar to the largest, most sophisticated search engine on the net? oh yeah, they both have those little text boxes! and a pushbutton! they must operate identically!
hey look! there's another search engine!
anyway, yes i'm a prick, but mostly for effect. my snark up above was intended to make you think. i have a client who is an attorney, and he can't make the distinction between his browser's URL textbox, google's textbox, and his yahoo mail login textbox. but he's clueless. i expect more from mefites.
posted by quonsar at 2:17 PM on December 13, 2004
why would they? metafilter is not a search engine. in what conceivable manner does a hand-coded hobby blog pieced together by a non-programmer appear to be similar to the largest, most sophisticated search engine on the net? oh yeah, they both have those little text boxes! and a pushbutton! they must operate identically!
hey look! there's another search engine!
anyway, yes i'm a prick, but mostly for effect. my snark up above was intended to make you think. i have a client who is an attorney, and he can't make the distinction between his browser's URL textbox, google's textbox, and his yahoo mail login textbox. but he's clueless. i expect more from mefites.
posted by quonsar at 2:17 PM on December 13, 2004
why would they? metafilter is not a search engine. in what conceivable manner does a hand-coded hobby blog pieced together by a non-programmer appear to be similar to the largest, most sophisticated search engine on the net? oh yeah, they both have those little text boxes! and a pushbutton! they must operate identically!
quonsar, asking for a search that simply delimits phrases by a space (i.e. treats words separately) isn't a very difficult thing to do. It can be done in a few lines of code (if anyone disputes this, I build this kind of search tool regularly for my clients). I expected more from you quonsar (I thought you knew stuff like this).
posted by SpaceCadet at 2:41 PM on December 13, 2004
quonsar, asking for a search that simply delimits phrases by a space (i.e. treats words separately) isn't a very difficult thing to do. It can be done in a few lines of code (if anyone disputes this, I build this kind of search tool regularly for my clients). I expected more from you quonsar (I thought you knew stuff like this).
posted by SpaceCadet at 2:41 PM on December 13, 2004
I was not aware that the MeFi search worked this way. That explains a couple of things (and a repost I made). Thanks for that info. I think having a mention of it on the search page would be a great idea.
Ditto.
posted by Specklet at 2:45 PM on December 13, 2004
Ditto.
posted by Specklet at 2:45 PM on December 13, 2004
quonsar, asking for a search that simply delimits phrases by a space (i.e. treats words separately) isn't a very difficult thing to do
true, but nobody did that in this thread.
I expected more from you quonsar (I thought you knew stuff like this).
what more did you expect? that i fix code i didn't write? i certainly do know stuff like this. i also know, this isn't my project, i didn't write it. i also know how it works. i know this without ever having seen any code. i know this because i am observant, and don't leap to inane conclusions, and occasionally resort to trial and error, which can be superbly educational.
so, now, you've leapt in, pointed out that something could be asked for that hasn't been (what a towering intellect!), and failed to explain how that is relevant to xammerboy mistaking mefi for google. i expected more from you.
posted by quonsar at 3:08 PM on December 13, 2004
And DooHickie, please call out Q in a thread soon. He loves it when people do that.
I can't do it! I just can't do it. First of all, quonsar is such a fixture. Second of all, if nothing else, he's consistent. After a while, he just becomes part of the background noise. You realize pretty quick you don't have to take his attacks seriously, since no one else does.
posted by Doohickie at 3:51 PM on December 13, 2004
I can't do it! I just can't do it. First of all, quonsar is such a fixture. Second of all, if nothing else, he's consistent. After a while, he just becomes part of the background noise. You realize pretty quick you don't have to take his attacks seriously, since no one else does.
posted by Doohickie at 3:51 PM on December 13, 2004
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posted by Ryvar at 5:15 AM on December 13, 2004