If SMF wants to be successful

[Grudge]

Good Morning,
But for me, the biggest issue is the limitation of the Search function.  Search is at the heart of any successful forum.  Not being able to search by username is a serious flaw.

I'm confused as you can search by username? Or do you mean *only* by username?

[Matthew Schenker]

I'm confused as you can search by username? Or do you mean *only* by username?

I mean only by username.

This option is avalable in vBulletin and PHPBB, but not in SMF.  I wonder why, since it just seems so obvious it belongs in "Search."

Matt

[Grudge]

I do see your point and it's something I always thought we should have. I know you can see individual users posts from their profiles but that doesn't help if the poster was a guest, or you can't quite remember their name.

[JayBachatero]

I always wondered the same thing.  Why this wasn't possible to do.  Then again we do have the ability to view posts on the profile section for users.  Not sure if other systems.

[Grudge]

Jay, viewing from profiles only really works if you know the user, and their not a guest.

[JayBachatero]

Well if you're searching by posts by a specific user then you know the user .

Like the others have said.  Just cause you like a mod or something else doesn't mean that it should a default feature.  There are a few mods that I would love to see as features but I know that just cause I like something, doesn't mean that it should be added in.

[Matthew Schenker]

Good Morning,
I love SMF, but this search weakness is a growing problem in my forum.

Let me lay out my arguments, and hopefully I will catch the attention of someone who can improve the search function!

I run a woodworking forum that is expanding really fast.  My members are smart and creative, but they are not high-tech.  When I tell them that they have to search for "information" in one screen, and "usernames" in another, they just don't like it.  And I don't blame them.  When you see a function called "search" you expect to be able to use it to do all your...well...searches!  Non-techies do not automatically know that going to the "Members" screen also provides another, separate search function.

I'll say this as often as it takes: If you make searching difficult to use, members are less likely to use it.  If people have to switch back and forth between "Search" and "Members" to do effective searches, they will avoid using it.

Let's use an analogy.  Imagine if Google forced you go to one screen if you wanted to search for "data" and another screen if you wanted to search just by "name."  Imagine if you entered "John Smith" and Google gave you this error message:
Did you forget to put something to search for?

I think most Google users would say that's nuts!  Well, that's precisely what happens in SMF.

One more thing to inspire SMF developers: PHPBB and vBulletin both allow searches by username alone.

Matt

[Dannii]

Maybe you could consider using a Google Co-op search rather than SMF's. A lot of websites do that now. Though of course you'll only be able to search public boards if you do that.

[Eliana Tamerin]

And only if Google has already crawled your pages, unfortunately.

[metallica48423]

Grudge/Jay:  would you like this logged to the bugtracker as a feature for DE?

[Matthew Schenker]

Grudge/Jay:  would you like this logged to the bugtracker as a feature for DE?

What's "DE"?
Matt

[Gary]

DE is short for "Development Edition" it's the former codename that was given to 2.0 while it was being developed.

[Matthew Schenker]

DE is short for "Development Edition" it's the former codename that was given to 2.0 while it was being developed.

OK, that explains it!   I'd really like to see the Search enhancement become a reality.  We don't want SMF to have such an obvious weakness in comparison to its main competitors, do we?

Let me know if I can help move this forward in any way.  I'm willing to volunteer my time and effort.  It's  important!
Matt

[Kindred]

Matt,

Have you looked at the Sphinx search enhancement?

[Matthew Schenker]

Have you looked at the Sphinx search enhancement?

OK, and where would I find this?  I just searched the mods and could find nothing using "Search" and/or "Sphinx."
Matt

[Kindred]

read through the whole thread, since I think there are updated to the attachments later in the thread...

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=127672.0

[HecKel]

That link is not visible to us

[Matthew Schenker]

I'm lost...

[Kindred]

hmmm.....

let me see why that is in a restricted area...

[青山 素子]

hmmm.....

let me see why that is in a restricted area...

The board is restricted because of the focus. Check the board name. I believe we'll have a public Sphinx plugin for search when 2.0 is released as final.

Note: Sphinx is a great tool, but requires VPS-level access or better. It will not work on shared hosting unless the host provides it themselves.