Search option

Marple

Hi Mods,

I realize you are in the process of making some changes in the site.  Just to let you know, the 'search' option seems to be a bit wonky.  I can't even describe with accuracy what it's doing as each time I try with the same keyword and forum I get different results many of which do not include the keyword.  I'm not complaining, I simply wanted to let you know.

Thank you for all you do.

Marple

Moderators

Thank you for letting us know, Marple!

You're right that a focus of the work the tech wizards are tackling is with the Search functions on the site. The scheduled maintenance has been shifted to overnight Monday/Tuesday, and we expect you'll see improvement. Please let us know when the site comes back if you continue to see wonky results.

In the meantime, if there's something you want to find, a site-specific search using Google can help. To find an exact phrase or couple of words (let's use Helpful Hints as an example). You'd type exactly this into the search field:

"helpful hints" site:breastcancer.org

The quotes tell it to search for those two words together, but you could separate them if that's what you want to find, and the site:breastcancer.org tells Google to look ONLY on our site.

• The Mods

curveball

If the google search works all that well, why not just add a google search box rather than trying to have the tech wizards replicate something that already exists? I frequent another forum that has one, and it gives a choice between searching the site or the whole web.

Moderators

Good question, curveball. Search works very well in most situations, both for members who use the discussion boards, and the huge number of visitors who use the site to read and research, but don't participate the forums.

Having Google search as an option on the site involves a yearly fee that depends on the volume of search queries. For a small personal or blog site with up to 20,000 searches a year the cost is low - their current pricing shows an annual rate of $100. BCO's annual searches are in the millions, and adding another search option would add a significant cost that would duplicate the function that works so well for most searchers.

• The Mods

curveball

I thought that might be it. Are the other search engines such as yahoo, equally expensive?

Moderators

Sorry for the delayed response. Good thought to look into!  AND we do have it on our list to upgrade - your question encouraged a conversation . We´ll let you know if we think we can make the upgrade.  It would be a good thing to do!

Thanks for your input!

The Mods