Gentoo forum search sucks

DownSet · n00b Joined: 21 Jan 2006 Posts: 32 Location: Riverside, CA

When I need to do a search on the forums I usually start with the forum search. If that brings up nothing I try searching on google with "emerge gnome fails site:forums.gentoo.org"
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dE_logics · Advocate Joined: 02 Jan 2009 Posts: 2287 Location: $TERM

tomk · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2011 11:07 am Post subject:

dE_logics · Advocate Joined: 02 Jan 2009 Posts: 2287 Location: $TERM

tomk · Posted: Tue May 24, 2011 1:21 pm Post subject:

Bones McCracker · Veteran Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1611 Location: U.S.A.

I don't know if anything can be done about it, but the search functionality really blows. It doesn't find what it ought to find.
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Hypnos · Posted: Thu Sep 15, 2011 11:13 pm Post subject:

Indeed -- use Google with "site:forums.gentoo.org" .

I'm sure something can be done about it, just as something can be done about the GLSAs, newsletter, official handbook, and wiki.
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Bones McCracker · Veteran Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1611 Location: U.S.A.

Thanks for the tip.
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myceliv · Apprentice Joined: 29 Nov 2007 Posts: 178

You can keyword some date limited searches in your browser, too. For firefox with pentadactyl, e.g. "6 months or newer" and "within last year" searches:
`:open fgo6 openrc udev' would find openrc udev posts within last 6 months

fgo6 http://www.google.com/search?q=%s+site%3Aforums.gentoo.org+-inurl%3Asearch.php&as_qdr=m6

fgo1 http://www.google.com/search?q=%s+site%3Aforums.gentoo.org+-inurl%3Asearch.php&as_qdr=y1

tomk · Posted: Fri Sep 16, 2011 9:47 am Post subject:

Well it doesn't suck so much that I couldn't find this topic

Merged from here.
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butchie55 · n00b Joined: 18 Nov 2014 Posts: 2 Location: France

Searching for the word vivaldi in the forum's search field results in only 12 threads, none of them on the vivaldi browser, while a search in google "gentoo forum vivaldi" find at least 2 of them :
https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-1009844-view-previous.html?sid=f5c776b9d339163d2ed306b5cad17043 and
https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-7702778.html?sid=710670a0cce46d3a2b2b3946779b2639.
This is not a problem of posts lost in hundreds of results. Vivaldi can hardly be considered as a stop word. So why these 2 threads don't show up ?
I understand the forum is powered by phpbb 2.0.23-gentoo-p11.
If it was upgraded to 3.0.11 would it solve this kind of wrong functioning ?

krinn · Watchman Joined: 02 May 2003 Posts: 7470

Yeah, what i don't get:
Todo the phpbb migratation:
- the switch itself (as all changes imply work, tests)
- the gentoo patches migration.
- the databases...

I don't get the gentoo patches migration trouble, i mean if you patches phpbb it is for two reasons: custom function and security.
The security: what was in phpbb 2.x certainly doesn't affect phpbb 3.x, it doesn't mean all are fixes, but certainly a high numbers affecting 2.x doesn't anymore affect newer one.
The custom: i don't know how a "stock" phpbb 3.x is, but i don't really see what custom functionality gentoo has add in 2.x that would really be missing.

I just assume search function is better with newer phpbb, it doesn't mean it is reality, but it is something i feel safe to assume, they couldn't had made it worst, as the current version search function is clearly bad.
The problem is that even if the newer search function is as worst as current phpbb one, nobody is willing to fix it, as nobody have really the balls to look into this old tweaked phpbb2 code use by gentoo. So having a newer phpbb, with the same bork search option, would mean some people get faith back and find courage to put their hands in the code.

Couldn't infra provide a test server to implement a "stock" phpbb latest version for testing?
Does newer phpbb imply a huge amount of work, like migrating old database to newer one isn't doable by a script or something?

Because user database shouldn't be lost, but the forum threads could, having my first post searchable isn't really worth any value, too old questions and answers cannot be use generally to fix a recent issue. And this could be kept in its own url (like an forum-old.gentoo.org of forum-history.gentoo.org...) if people really wishes browse such old datas.
The lost of old threads would also mean, a light, really lighter database weight, something any hardware will appreciate (as i think the gentoo forum threads count is pretty awesome and as push phpbb into something his author himself didn't tests with such huge amount of posts).
The consideration that forum post count is any value for search engine result exist, but it would be kind of weird to keep up the old database just for that. So if database migration couldn't be made, the base should be drop.

So even if threads migration isn't doable, i really think it won't be a big lost (it will a bit, but the benefits of lighter base and newer phpbb should oustand the lost)
With proper message sent to anyone, you could even drop user database, asking everyone to create a new account on the new gentoo forum.

szatox · Advocate Joined: 27 Aug 2013 Posts: 3477

Search found 51 matches. Enjoy!
http://s9.postimg.org/eionpt827/forum_glitch.png

Got this little gem with "show posts since last visit" :lol:

Roman_Gruber · Posted: Fri Aug 28, 2015 1:31 pm Post subject:

Most use google or something else to parse gentoo site.

but the site here really sucks for the search feature since i can remember.
It is even hard to find my own posts, .. lol

krinn · Watchman Joined: 02 May 2003 Posts: 7470

hit profil, find my post
At least, this is not really that hard to find your post : https://forums.gentoo.org/search.php?search_author=tw04l124

szatox · Advocate Joined: 27 Aug 2013 Posts: 3477

I know about google. But it's not integrated with my profile so it can't search based on my flags. This is the part where builtin feature is the only option:
Search my posts
Search new posts
Search unanswered posts
Search posts since last visit
Search visited/not visited

Those things are trivial to do for your own website and almost impossible in general. And the flag-based search being both, trivial and broken made that glitch yesterday so funny

Bones McCracker · Veteran Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1611 Location: U.S.A.

I agree. I think we should stop paying them until they get it right!

Oh, wait...
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desultory · Bodhisattva Joined: 04 Nov 2005 Posts: 9410

Bones McCracker · Veteran Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1611 Location: U.S.A.

I would assume all 51 matches are on page 1. Is it really an important issue that an empty second page was provided?
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szatox · Advocate Joined: 27 Aug 2013 Posts: 3477

It lists 50 results per page. Or maybe it just says it lists 50 per page

No idea what caused it, it survived refreshing a few times and grew to 52 before I marked all as red and left for long enough to let session reset.