Posted on 12/07/2020 6:46:05 AM PST by A Conservative Future
Hi folks,
I have been reading here for a very long time, but only recently registered an account. Since registering, I have done my best to take the oft-repeated admonishment to search before posting so that I am not one of the dunderheads who posts the same news five times (I am a dunderhead for other reasons). However, I do not seem to understand how the search function works, and I must say, I feel pretty stupid admitting this. For example:
Yesterday, I searched on the name "staten" looking for articles about the bar owner who hit a sheriff's deputy on Staten Island. I got three results, all a year or more old. I tried different permutations of the search options - title, text, etc - and it did not seem to make a difference. I then scrolled down through the latest posts and found a thread about it posted a few hours before.
I plead ignorance. What am I doing wrong? I usually end up having to search the site with Google, which seems silly. Thank you for your help. I have donated to the Freepathon as is appropriate for making Vanity posts with young accounts :)
Already posted.
(Just kidding)
The search function is problematic
You make seek, and you may find,
But I would not bet the farm on it
It’s OK, no one can...
The search function has never worked correctly.
Using that little search box at the top right of the forum home/index page, you have to use the drop down to switch it from searching keywords to searching title. I don’t know why they don’t make “title” the default selection.
Alternatively, you can use the actual search page, https://freerepublic.com/focus/search
That defaults to searching titles, not keywords
I have the same problem. I find that if the word is spelled with one letter off, there are negative results. Such is the FR search engine.
I find that if I search using “Keywords”, it always yields an incomplete listing.
If I enter the keyword(s) I’m looking for and select “Titles”, however, what comes up is a much more complete listing.
Give that a try and see how you fare. AFB-XYZ
Also, sometimes posters take, ahem, liberties with their headlines when they post. That skews the result.
LOL Pollard! You beat my post by just a hair. :-)
Search results for “staten” using the little box at top right of the forum home page BUT using the drop down to make it search the TITLE of threads https://freerepublic.com/focus/search?m=all;o=time;q=quick;s=staten
Search results for “staten” using the dedicated search page https://freerepublic.com/focus/search?s=staten&ok=Search&q=quick&m=any&o=score&SX=5fce41601283631d908faa70763c748e4eb48ec9
Where is the link to the dedicated search page you ask? Well it’s not on the forum home page. Why you ask? Beats me. It’s at the top left of all other pages, like in a thread.
title: staten
'title' lower case only. If I inadvertently capitalize title like this 'Title', it doesn't work.
The asterisk in the search function is a bit confusing. Presumably, it is some sort of ‘wildcard’ indicator, but it’s not clear. Do I need to append it to find any words following a word (eg. “election*” would find “election fraud”)?
Ignore the search function at Free Republic.
Ignore it.
Even veterans who have been here 20 years and more can tell you; it’s complicated and does not always work well.
Do what most of us do: Use Ctrl F. Go to the top of the forums page, hit Ctrl F and enter a specific keyword from the title. For instance Georgia. In a second you will see every recent article that mentions Georgia in your search results. If you don’t see the article you want to post then post it. If you do see the article you were going to post has already been posted, obviously then do not post.
And welcome to free republic.
Indeed it hasn't. Then again, FR's post formatting has always had much to be desired as well.
ff
It is weird. Yesterday I searched words I knew were in a title. No results using one of the words, but I got what I wanted using another. Makes no sense.
Since the search function produces titles by most recent date, I search titles using one significant word of the title only. It usually works. But I first look at the current page and second pages and check the titles.
If an article hasn’t been just recently posted people don’t object to repeats much.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/search
Locate the entry field:
Search Words to be found in article titles.
Change from “Quick” to “Archive”
Change from “match any word” to “match all words”
Change from “order of relevance” to “order by post time”
Enter search criteria: staten
Nobody can. It’s a feature. After 20 years you still can’t edit your comments either. Or just up or down vote.
I’ve been seeing it for 20 years Jim Robinson should’ve been the billionaire. He was doing what Facebook was doing before they were invented.
And we would have had a financially stable, powerful, conservative platform
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