TheSamba.com :: View topic

Thu Oct 20, 2011 2:51 pm

The last few days, all of my searches in the forums have come up empty. I was trying to find my own "Where do we go from here" thread in the Type 3 forums and it came up with zero results- even though this is most certainly in the title. I finally found the thread when I searched for myself as "author"... even though the search seemed to return EVERY thread I've ever posted in- not just the ones I was author of.

Just now, I tried to search for "salt and pepper" in the same forum, and got the "nothing matches your request"... again.

Am I suddenly stupid and doing it wrong, or what's up? Hard to "use the search" when you get an overwhelming amount of hits for every query (which is what USED to happen), let alone NO results for EVERY topic search.

Wazzupwiddat? :lol: :?

Thu Oct 20, 2011 10:29 pm

"Where do we go from here"
I'm assuming that is the thread title?
Those words are super common words and probably not indexed at all.

I searched on Salt and Pepper in the Type 3 Forum and got 50 results:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/search.php?search..._chars=200

Searching on author name finds all posts you made, not just a thread you started. Thus, this could be tons of results.

I can provide better feedback if you go do a search, then cut and paste the URL line from your browser into a post, like I did above. I can probably tell from that what the issue was.

If you don't like the Forums search, you can always use the Google search of the site, sometimes that works better. Click on Search from the Home menu above.

Fri Oct 21, 2011 1:19 am

Yes, that was the same search I made and I got the standard "no topics or posts met your criteria" that I've been getting on every search. But now, I'm getting the same results you are by doing the exact same "salt and pepper" search in the Type 3 forum that I did earlier. I tried it several times without success then. Maybe it was a glitch? If it happens again I'll post here with the search I'm running.

Incidentally, a friend of mine out here said he was suddenly getting the same thing while searching for Bay Bus parts in the Classifieds. He was searching for things like hubcaps, mirrors, and kick panels.

Could it be an issue with Comcast?

Fri Oct 21, 2011 8:49 am

I can't explain it without knowing exactly what you are searching on.

The same with your friend.

People do often email me saying they get no results from Classifieds searches and 100% of the time it is user error. For instance, entering things that are too exact in the form, such as "1974-77 Westfalia curtains" which won't find anything unless someone used those exact words. Searching on "curtain" is better. Less is more there.

It's possible Comcast is doing some sort of caching but I don't feel like that would apply to searches. This could cause you to see pages on the site that are not the most current. I know AOL used to or still does this.

Fri Oct 21, 2011 1:41 pm

OK, it just did it again:

I searched "where do we go" and got the "no results met search criteria" screen again with this:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/search.php?search...ults=posts

looking for this thread with those exact words in the title:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=465205&highlight=type

But the "salt and pepper" search IS working today:
http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/search.php?search_keywords=salt+and+pepper&search_forum=6

It's GOT to be a glitch!

Fri Oct 21, 2011 10:31 pm

Searching on "where do we go" breakdown:

Where is a "common" word so it cannot be searched on.

do, we, and go cannot be searched on because words under 3 letters are not indexed.

Thus, no results are found. This is correct for this search.

Fri Oct 21, 2011 11:19 pm

EverettB wrote: Searching on "where do we go" breakdown:

Where is a "common" word so it cannot be searched on.

do, we, and go cannot be searched on because words under 3 letters are not indexed.

Thus, no results are found. This is correct for this search.

Oh. OK, I get it. That makes sense. Thanks!