Searching question

[SteveR]

Greetings to all you computer gurus.

I've been trying to figure out how to search for the phrase '3/4" scale' - I use single quotes here only to emphasize the inch symbol. phpBB doesn't seem to like any combination of numbers and symbols like / or " and numbers. I get messages like this:

Searched query: +4" scale
ignored: 3

or

"The following words in your search query were ignored because they are too common words: 3*4.
You must specify at least one word to search for. Each word must consist of at least 4 characters and must not contain more than 84 characters excluding wildcards."

I did some poking around the various phpBB sites https://area51.phpbb.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=26250 and http://www.phpbbdoctor.com/blog/2007/02 ... xpression/ . My conclusion is that an expression like '3/4" scale" is too full of numbers and special characters to qualify as anything other than the word "scale". This would also apply to any of the other scales that are used in the live steam hobby.

Should we start using additional descriptors like "three-quarter-inch-scale", "one-inch-scale" in posts to enable searching? Any way to do a "global search and replace" on the back end?

Thanks,
Steve

[GlennW]

You can use Google to search a website.

Here are the results:

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=c ... 4%22+scale

[dorin]

Thanks Glenn,
I have been trying different things on this as well..with no luck.
-Mike

[GlennW]

You're welcome, Mike!

[Steggy]

You can use Google to search a website.

Here are the results:

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=c ... 4%22+scale

Better search engines than Google exist, and do not track your whereabouts on-line. I use the Ixquick search engine and see a lot less crud and advertising.

We see more than a few PCs in our shop in which Windows has been messed up by long-term use of Google, especially when the Google toolbar is installed into Internet Exploder (which is also bad software to use). Goggle is also a propagator of malware through its Chrome browser. Buyer beware!

[GlennW]

Thanks!

Looks to function the same as Google, but with only ten hits, which is far fewer than Google.

But I'm far from computer literate, so it may be operator error!

[Steggy]

Thanks!

Looks to function the same as Google, but with only ten hits, which is far fewer than Google.

But I'm far from computer literate, so it may be operator error!

The number of hits is often lower because of better filtering. Also, searches on Google are heavily influenced by paid advertising. A site paying for advertising and/or ranking on Google may come up as a hit even though it is only tangentially related to your search expression.

Speaking of search expressions, enclosing an expression in double quotes, i.e., "<search expression>", will produce more precision results. Quoting causes the search engine to treat the entire search expression as a single "term" (word), rather than as several terms. Hence "Union Pacific 844" will produce a more precise search, rather than Union Pacific 844. In the latter case, the search engine sees three terms: Union, Pacific and 844. In the former case, the search engine sees one term: Union Pacific 844. Try it so you can the difference.

Don't forget that searches are case-insensitive. If you search for Union Pacific 844 (no quotes), for example, any page with the word union in the HTML body or meta fields will likely be a hit. You might end up with organized labor and/or plumbing websites as hits.