This has probably been asked before, but I would like to request that the search function have the option of selecting "ALL" Forums. If that is not possible, could the listing drop-down selection box have everything in alphabetical order? That would simplify looking for the individual forums to search. Thanks for your consideration.

this always drive me nuts too. If nothing else, can we get the forums listed in alphabetical order? :p

No and No. Just kidding. Not my call.

If I remember this right, It takes forever to get a result back if it is searching through all the topics.

This is why the Admins and Mods are working so hard to keep things (Posts) organized under the right topics.

Now why would we do that. Actually, the search feature was changed to its present set-up for ease of use. Searching all the forums takes forever and not everyone has high speed internet service.

OK, I understand.

What about sorting the forums alphabetically then? If it is just a matter of time and has to be done by hand and then changed on the webserver, I will volunteer my time to give you all back a list that is sorted correctly. Then just re-enter the forums using that list. How about that?

I think this discussed before and it would be difficult to do. At least that was my understanding. The forums are in the order that they were added to the site.

OK, one last thought in the spirit of open discussion.

I would ask that the search all feature be added, because even if it impaired a person with slow download speed, then that person or persons would simply just revert to searching individual forums the old way, you are not removing any feature that they want to use, you are adding a feature that will empower others who can use it. If it was too slow for a person, then they would say, "Gee, I guess I will have to search forums one by one because of my low speed connection." But the person with a high speed connection would say, "Wow, this is great and I am finding the answers I need in no time flat." I don't see the downside, from what you have told me here, to anyone.

Peace.

PM Carlton with what you said. See what he says. I have no control over it.

My understanding is.... that adding the "search all" option slows down the server - therefore slowing down the site operation for EVERYONE - not just people on dial up.

So - one lazy user trying to shave off a few minutes on their search time will - in effect - slow down EVERYONE else - just cause one user was too lazy to search the forums individually. Not efficient in the big picture.

In case you haven't noticed - this board runs significantly faster than anything else out there. There are no avatars, no signature banners, no useless fluff here to slow down the operation.

If you want to re-write the code of the software to place the forums in alphabetical order - please volunteer the hours it would take to code - debug and install. I'm sure the admin would be more than happy to accept your help.

Tip - if you go to the most logical forum that your question might be in - then hit search - the search engine will automatically be set to that forum.

Tip #2 - Help everyone out by starting topics in the most logical forum in the first place - then the mods won't have to shuffle threads around.

I PM'ed Carlton about it and he was pretty decent to deal with, and I realize you are a supporting member - but I feel I need to share some thoughts on your specific comments. Someone, and I think Carlton was going to look into it, needs to review the manual on the software package this board is using, I believe it is UBB Classic, and check into the re-ordering options regarding the forum display in the search options dialog to see if this can be used to change the display to get the topics in alphabetical order.

As far as re-writing code, that is not an option because I do not work for the company that developed the package, so I don't know why that suggestion was put forward, but i did volunteer to alphabatize all the forums on my own time and to return the list to the Admin, but I don't think the software package will accept an outside list into its database.

Also, because a user is on dial-up is not the issue. The issue totally resides on the server side, I agree with that, but dial-up is not going to impact the user's speed regarding searching because the output of the search algorith is just a series of text lines pointing to forums. This is not going to be any slower to download, and is probably going to be faster, that what the user experiences looking through the forums because of inserted pictures.

As far as users being lazy searching all the forums, I would just have to agree to disagree on that way of looking at it. What you term lazy I would perceive as using the available tools to the maximum benefit of the user. It is the 21st century. There is such a thing as data mining. What it refers to is looking for information that could be anywhere, not just where you think it might be. For example, I might be interested in a better set of tires for my 2005 XTerra. According to your instructions, one would look under the forum that talks about tires, and maybe a few others like general and 2005 XTerra. You might find what you are interested in, or you might not. But if the search all function was added. I would search all the forums, and I might find that a person in a regional club just bought some and liked them, even though he/she started off talking about another subject entirely. I would never have found that reference if I hadn't searched all the forums. So much information resides in places that are not obvious at first glance.

Anyways, I'm not trying to be a smart ass, but I am smart, and I appreciate the dialog. I did offer to be the first to contribute $25 to a new server if it is really hampered so badly by the search all feature.