Howdy all,

As everyone is so fond of telling everyone else to go and use the search function, maybe we can make the search function more "functional"?

I recently purchased a 2002 SE/SC, and found myself here.

I frequent alot of car boards, and like most of the others boards I'm on, the search function is great when looking for info about a problem you are having. Chances are that If you've had a problem, it's likely that someone else has had the same problem, and has started a thread about it.

The PROBLEM that I have with XOC's search function, is 2-fold.

Firstly: It would be nice to be able to search all the categories at once. I know that this would likely find alot of results, and take longer, but at least you wouldn't have to try to guess where your answers might be. That's been an issue for me, between the warranty section, and problems and annoyances section.

Secondly: Using the search function, I found that what returned was alot of dead links. As in, I look for info about the supercharger, and I'm returned with several hits. When I click on the link, with easily 75% of them, I am told that the link no longer exists. That's pretty frustrating when I'm having issues with my SC. I know that someone a while ago started a thread about their problem, but it has since been deleted, so I have no idea what was said in the thread, if their was a solution etc.

My suggestion, would be to either not delete posts (space issue though), or remove the title of the thread from the search DB.

It's really annoying to get a bunch of hits on a topic that you are looking for, but they all turn out to be useless.

Anyone else had this problem at all?

I use the search engine alot, because it's there, and I like to get as much info about the vehicle I'm driving.

Thanks!

I think what we ask is that you search first, if you don't have any luck with it, then go ahead and start a new thread.

It would be a bit of a pain to delete the topic names from the DB, and I don't see that happening. I am not sure if this software (vbulletin) can search all forums at once, or it has been turned off for a reason.

I think that the categories are specific enough, and our moderators do a good enough job that searching in the correct area should find you plenty of results.

We try to keep topics in the relevant fourms so that when a search is done it take less computing power for the server.

As for the dead links. From time to time I go in and rebuild the search index to omit deleted threads.

I understand your concerns about computing power, however I would also like to be able to search in all the forums at the same time.

I don't think the performance hit would be that noticeable because if we are able to search all forums at once, we won't do repeated search in several forums.

For most things I search on, I have to search 4 to 5 forums. For example if I want information on brakes, some can be find in "Genaral", in "Problems and Annoyances", in "Backyard Mechanics", in "Parts and Accessories" and in "Tires, Wheels and Brakes". So in this example, I am doing 5 queries instead of one so that is still using computing power. I realize that 5 small queries might require less computing power than 1 large query, but it still more than 1 small query.

Thanks,
56kz2slow