[Accepted] Adding search for specific forums and threads

[loveacrossborders]

I spent a few days looking at most of the bulletin boards available. After searching and reading I finally settled on using SMF. I think there's a lot of potential here. It offers lots of flexability laid out in a simple way.

I have a small suggestion of a feature to add to SMF. I think that the ability to search within a specific forum and also within a specific thread is a powerful option. I use it a lot when I search on forums using VBulletin or IPB.

Say for example if you do a search on something, lets say "cheese". So a list of results comes up. You click on one to discover that the thread is actually 39 pages long. So how is one suppose to find the specific post when someone mentions about "cheese"?

This would be a good feature to add. Thanks for reading .

Shaun
http://www.loveacrossborders.com

[Peter Duggan]

While searching specific topics has been discussed before and I can't remember what came of that, there are already two ways of searching specific boards:

1. Check only the board(s) you want on the search screen.
2. Use the simple search box while browsing the board that interests you:

However, what has been done.... well, go to the Feature Requests board.  Make sure you're using the default theme.  Now, in the box above (the search box, not the button) type something.  Hit search.

Only the board you are viewing (Feature Requests) will be searched.

[Grudge]

I also believe that topic searching is quite possibly going to be implemented in SMF 1.1

[[Unknown]]

Well, it's already possible in 1.1, assuming we don't remove it and actually get the UI done for it. (I still need to commit...)

-[Unknown]

[klumy]

this would be great, if we see this feature in SMF 1.1

[jl]

I like to suggest that the search be defaulted to the narrowest scope, with option to expand it using the current check list, instead of defaulting it to global.  Reason?  When you have say 6-figure active users, all doing searching frequently, the resource demand can be high.  In most cases, the desired scope is not global.  Therefore defaulting it to the narrowest (say thread) with option to expand it via check list will save resources and improve speed of response.

I've done searches on phpBB and it can be slow with many users and multiple search words.  Most of the time, I don't really want global search as a default, only threads under a certain topic or within a certain sub-forum or forum.  Therefore starting with the narrowest scope as default with expandable options, rather than global as default, can help a lot with active forums with large member population.

While searching specific topics has been discussed before and I can't remember what came of that, there are already two ways of searching specific boards:

1. Check only the board(s) you want on the search screen.
2. Use the simple search box while browsing the board that interests you:

However, what has been done.... well, go to the Feature Requests board.  Make sure you're using the default theme.  Now, in the box above (the search box, not the button) type something.  Hit search.

Only the board you are viewing (Feature Requests) will be searched.

[[Unknown]]

People only end up searching more times if you limit it too strongly by default.

When you say the "narrowest scope" by default, what in the world do you mean?  How can you detect which boards or topic to search?  I've already said that searching from a board automatically limits the search to that board.

-[Unknown]