More intuitive search/advanced search

[Mr Lucky]

This is a tricky suggestion because I no longer find it an issue, it was something a user brought up. It doesn't bother me because I'm used to it I suppose, but the point of usability is things should be intuitive for people who are new to a feature.

So, thinking about it from that POV, ie coming to the search function with no previous knowledge I can see it isn't quite intuitive.

There is a form and two buttons:



Again approaching it naively a user might put in a search word and think that they have the choice of Search or Advanced Search.

There is nothing to indicate that Search works with the form fileld above, yet that Advanced Search is merely a link button that opens up a whole other big multi function form.

I do remember when first using this type of search I did add w rod, then click on Advanced.

I'm not quite sure of the solution, and I know many people will think there is no problem - because they know how it works. But I think it does need to be clearer but without having to write a whole instruction manual.

It would look messy to explain the buttons have complete different functions. Or maybe it's as simple as changing the first button phrase to "Submit the search from" ???

So I apologise that my suggestion is not a straightforward "why not do this?" it's more of a "needs to be more intuitive but I can't yet think of exactly how to solve it yet."

 

[Mr Lucky]

I just noticed that some forums have solution to this, ie there is a search field in the header, but when you click on it to enter a keyword, that is when the Advanced search button appears. Presumably this may be to address the same perceived usability issue.

 

[Old Nick]

Maybe



Or

 

[Mr Lucky]

Yes something along those lines would work better.

Maybe search now or open advanced search

 

[MaximilianKohler]

Relatedly, "show results as threads" is arguably the most important "advanced option", so I think it deserves its own checkbox next to "search titles only".

An alternative is to have an easy option to "show results as threads" on the search results page.

I think people who are new to XF search will find the default search results to be quite overwhelming and undesirable, especially for large forums. I personally had this issue until I happened to check out and experiment with the advanced options.

 

[Old Nick]

Personally I find the basic XenForo search system neither practical, nor intuitive, nor efficient. ES seems to improve it somewhat, but the UIX takes a hit... Really the big downside of XenForo.

 

[BassMan]

I agree. If there's one thing I've disliked about XenForo over the years, it's its search system. I've never liked the results, it always takes me too long to find things, but I've kind of got used to it, frustrating though it is.

It should work more like Google Custom Search or there was one add-on called Threadloom. It worked fine, but it was sending content to the cloud, which of course was not the best. The search results, however, were excellent.

 

[Mr Lucky]

Maybe

View attachment 308929

Or

This is where I am at the moment. The divider seems to work well to show it's a different action and it made sense to change the placeholder to keywords instead of search - there is no separate phrase for that so I needed a slight edit to the template.



Another thing a member pointed out was that the quick search is for relevance, no option for date.

However personally I think it's fine with just relevance. At some stage I'll remove the icon from the submit button, it seems superfluous. As does the word Search at the top.

It doesn't need to be there 4 x

 

[Mr Lucky]

One thing that is a nice improvement with 2.3 is that if you add a keyword, then click on advanced, the word remains in the field. I don't think it did that before.

 

[Digital Doctor]

Xenforo doesn't EVEN log what people are searching for !

How do you know user's needs are being met ?

 

[Digital Doctor]

the word remains in the field.

Ideally the word would remain in the field is you click a different Tab

like search threads.

 

[Digital Doctor]

Google almost always outperforms Xenforo.

Search for XenPorta using native search and then via google.

or whatever you search for in Xenforo .... just use the same search terms in google but add Xenforo at the end.

 

[Paul B]

Google almost always outperforms Xenforo.

You do realise how stupid this statement is?

Google's business is search.
They do a better job than any other company/site on the internet.

We do not write search software - we use third party products, like every other site.

There's a reason why even some very large sites use Google for their search solution.

 

[Wildcat Media]

We use an addon to add Google Search as an option, as long as members realize that results only appear there if Google has spidered them. Since Googlebot seems to crawl the site constantly these days, it's probably becoming a non-issue now.

Google's business is search.
They do a better job than any other company/site on the internet.

My reply to members who complain about search is, "Well, we're not Google, so..."

Or we can take them back to the mysqltext searches we had in vB that ground the forum to a halt.

Yet ES's results even with their shortcomings are still better than what most forums offer, especially since I use the Search Improvements addon which adds a method to search for phrases, and operators to help trim down the results.

 

[🔥Iggy🔥]

Yet ES's results even with their shortcomings are still better than what most forums offer, especially since I use the Search Improvements addon which adds a method to search for phrases, and operators to help trim down the results.

and if anyone can explain how to actually use those, they will be a minor hero ;P
i didnt really notice a basic * search to work even....i mean it doesnt error or anything but the results didnt seem to change at a glance test.
asked xon, he doesnt know.....the three letter search and some things are def game changing but it could be nice to have a guide of "how to actual search, for dummies"

 

[Wildcat Media]

and if anyone can explain how to actually use those, they will be a minor hero ;P
i didnt really notice a basic * search to work even....i mean it doesnt error or anything but the results didnt seem to change at a glance test.
asked xon, he doesnt know.....the three letter search and some things are def game changing but it could be nice to have a guide of "how to actual search, for dummies"

We're launching a forum FAQ with our next upgrade, so that will help. (It covers everything from using forum functions, to the rules, and a guide to using our classified ad area.) I also plan on a template modification that inserts instructions for basic search operators, below the search window. We can't watch them 24/7 but at least we will have the tools if they take a few minutes to learn them.

I had to include two-letter "words" in our searches since we have so many two-letter acronyms. Not ideal but it did help with certain search terms.

 

[🔥Iggy🔥]

We're launching a forum FAQ with our next upgrade, so that will help. (It covers everything from using forum functions, to the rules, and a guide to using our classified ad area.) I also plan on a template modification that inserts instructions for basic search operators, below the search window. We can't watch them 24/7 but at least we will have the tools if they take a few minutes to learn them.

I had to include two-letter "words" in our searches since we have so many two-letter acronyms. Not ideal but it did help with certain search terms.

i was wondering how hard on the server 2 letter search would be...def would benefit, i wasnt sure about that tho....yes, the extra search support def needs instruction and where the search is used makes the best sense to put that....people either will assume the support isnt there, or wont know how to use it....not alot of middle ground.