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Toymods Social Secretary
Location:
Sydney
Registered:
July 2002
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FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 03:47
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Well there have been a fair few comments from people lately about how difficult it is to search for topics on these forums.
It's really not difficult at all, it just takes a little patience and some actual thought put into your searching process.
How does the search work??
# It searches for exact matches of whole words in a string.
# If you search for a part of a word, it wont find words which contain that part, eg - search = "eng" wont find "engineering"
# Search Logic: AND - this will search for results where ALL words exist, OR - will search with any of the input words exist. Of course AND is more exculsive and will give fewer results.
# An Observation: If you search using multiple words with AND logic, the search appears to only look for results using that string of words. eg, search = "turbo size" will NOT find the text "what size turbo" or "turbo exhaust size" - only an exact match of those searched words in that order.
Some Tips for Searching:
Searching in title only is the most accurate way. Searching whole text seems to be erroneous, listing the search results in an odd order (and seems to be missing many of the most recent posts!!). I typically only search SUBJECT ONLY.
Select the section you want to search in!!! Why waste time getting extra search results from someone selling a CT26 when you just want to know what version is on an ST185 grp A??
If you remember the thread you are looking for, try to think of a 2-3 word phrase that was used in the title - something unique to that thread or something you can't really mistype. Searching for this is the fastest way, with the least results.
If you can remember a 2-3 word phrase used in the text in that thread, it might be ok... but like i said these results tend to be erroneous.
If you are searching a topic aimlessly (ie, dont know if the thread exists already), then try a variety of search strings on that topic. Just because searching "4age" doesnt get the results you want IT DOES NOT MEAN A THREAD DOESNT EXIST. Try also "4A", "4a-ge", "4a-g" "4ag" "4ages" etc etc, or try searching along the lines of the topic you want - "4age conversion". Of course search topics first, then text body later. Using OR search logic on TOPIC ONLY searches will work well, but using OR logic on the ENTIRE MESSAGE search will give far too many search results.
Remember that the less results you get, the more comprehensive and better targetted your search was. If you didnt get the result you wanted then your target (ie search criteria) was wrong.
Because the search function looks at complete words to match to your search word - if you search for "abc", but the thread you are looking for is "how big abc, in car?" it will not find this result, because "abc," is considered the complete word, with the punctuation mark "," included. This theorectically would be the same for all other punctuation marks, as they are still considered characters and thus without a space they are part of the word. I'm still testing this theory, will advise if i find fault with it.
Google Search Toymods!!
You can actually use google to search a specific website (toymods forums is what we are interested in), just by adding site:forums.toymods.org.au after your search.
Example:
when searching for information about hilux diffs, you would type the following into the google search bar:
hilux diff site:forums.toymods.org.au
and google will return about 7 pages of search results from the Toymods forums!
If you have more searching tips of your own, please add to this thread. I will add some more tips once i have time, and keep this thread well moderated to maintain clarity/accuracy of information contained.
[Updated on: Tue, 01 March 2005 20:58]
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Location:
Kita-Ku, Sapporo, Japan
Registered:
January 2003
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 04:05
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this is going to be a sticky right?
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Location:
VIC, Sth Frankston.
Registered:
July 2003
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 04:07
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i wonder how many people are going to miss this thread completely and still ask 'I searched and didn't find anything on (insert obvious answer here)'.
Good write up though. No doubt its sticky material.
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I supported Toymods
Location:
I renounced punctuation
Registered:
May 2002
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 04:09
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Can we have a "search you dumb mother fucker!" smiley?
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Location:
Perth
Registered:
July 2004
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 04:21
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the comma being included in part of the word..
that really sux.
maybe wildcards?
never thought about having it included in searches...
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Location:
Cabramatta, NSW
Registered:
May 2002
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Toymods Social Secretary
Location:
Sydney
Registered:
July 2002
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 04:26
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yes - its a sticky now.
Please dont post too much garble in here, i dont want to have to moderate/delete posts within this thread all the time... If there are any more hints, tips, ideas, thoughts, theories, suggestions etc for searching then by all means post em.
GT - i think i will just put a link to this thread as a hotkey on my keyboard.....
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Location:
Sydney
Registered:
September 2004
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Tue, 01 March 2005 14:27
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I think you should definately make the FAQ stickies and search button much bigger. For 1st timers it's quite easy to miss them. I'm pretty sure i did 
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Location:
Tassie
Registered:
October 2003
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Wed, 02 March 2005 00:08
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Could i suggest a locking of this thread ???????
And maybe even a tech article for all the simple things ???????
because i'm sure if i searched for something really simple i wouldn't find it.
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Toymods Social Secretary
Location:
Sydney
Registered:
July 2002
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Wed, 02 March 2005 04:18
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mookie - that is the sort of attitude that won't get you very far in the automotive modification world. If the information is there already, why should other people who have already spent the time DOING the actual ground work have to spent their efforts time and time again to tell other people.
If you want to know something, you RESEARCH. And let me tell you, if researching engineering topics was as easy as researching automotive topics - i would probably be an engineer by now.
Give me an example, and i will show you.
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Location:
Adelaide
Registered:
May 2003
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Wed, 02 March 2005 04:26
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Here is an example for you Witz
Anything about sprinters.
Say my current pet hate
sprinter suspension
Heck, ive even built a FAQ for it, so shouldnt be so hard.
If not then go
how to upgrade my diff
for that really old thread on all the different diff conversions
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Location:
Kita-Ku, Sapporo, Japan
Registered:
January 2003
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Thu, 17 March 2005 04:34
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| THE WITZL wrote on Tue, 01 March 2005 14:47 |
Google Search Toymods!!
You can actually use google to search a specific website (toymods forums is what we are interested in), just by adding site:forums.toymods.org.au after your search.
Example:
when searching for information about hilux diffs, you would type the following into the google search bar:
hilux diff site:forums.toymods.org.au
and google will return about 7 pages of search results from the Toymods forums!
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BEST
ADVICE
EVER!!!!!!
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Location:
townsville NQLD
Registered:
February 2004
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Wed, 23 March 2005 10:38
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what is the point of the toymods search if google does it 100% better.
why not just link the "search" button to google with "site:toymods....." already typed in, or is that not able to be done.
THAT IS MUCH MUCH BETTER WAY TO SEARCH
google searches dont have to be presise spelled words that are in PERFECT order.
this is very good to know....all these tips
why dont u send everybody a PM  with all this information included....that may work...that way they are very likely to read it 
just suggestions
brett
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Location:
Brisbane
Registered:
May 2004
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Wed, 20 July 2005 00:59
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Further to this search issue, is there a way that search results can show posts most recently? When I do a search for something (not using subject admittedly) the first page will show posts back from today (usually) to say 2 months ago (As an example)...if I then click to page 2 of my search results, it starts again with a different post made today, and then another sample back a period of time, page 3 the same.
Using the search ascending or descending doesn't seem to fix this.
Any ideas?
M
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Location:
Brisbane
Registered:
May 2004
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Re: FAQ the how to search thread
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Mon, 25 July 2005 01:08
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Any ideas here? Or am I the only person suffering from this?
M
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