# Forum Search Prioritization



## piaconis (Aug 2, 2012)

I'm not familiar with this particular forum engine, but I had a few random thoughts about the search usability...

I do a lot of searches on this site.  Obviously, there is a wealth of information, but with that comes the challenge of digging through the articles to find the post that applies to our situation.  How does the search engine rank our content?  Can we sort to bump the most viewed content to the top?  Does our post feedback system, which appears to be mostly unused, help prioritize it (and should we encourage members to use it if this is the case)?

I work with a lot of documentation  in my IT career, and I've learned that good information can be lost by bad search.  I just wondered if there are ways for us newbies to make better use of search, or if there are opportunities for us to make the more commonly used information in the forums bubble to the top of search.

Just some questions I wanted to throw out there.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I727 using Tapatalk 2


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## s2k9k (Aug 2, 2012)

Have you used the "advanced search"? I know there are a lot more options to filter by and I know you can search by relevance or by recency.


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## piaconis (Aug 2, 2012)

I had tried to use the advanced search once and had some trouble, but it was around the time of one of the recent site updates, so I guess I should try that again.

I just see a lot of posts from new folks who, like me, tried a search, but didn't find the result right away.  The moderators and more experienced users are wonderful about replying with a link, but I just wondered if there was a way to automate that process by having the search engine provide more relevant content.

Again, not complaining, just my process improvement brain thinking out loud.


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## diggingdogfarm (Aug 2, 2012)

The search function sucks!

See this thread.....

*Better way to search the forum.....*
http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/125428/better-way-to-search-the-forum

HTH 

~Martin


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