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Alternate way to search the forum: via Google's site search feature


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Sometimes the limited ability of the forum's Search feature can be frustrating. I've just learned that Google.com can be used to search just one web site. You may find this useful here and for other sites you visit.

 

Go to http://google.com and type in the following:

 

site:greenleafdollhouses.com/forum   [no www, no //, no spaces]

 

then follow it with a space and the term you want to search 

 

I tested it with a couple of searches

 

site:greenleafdollhouses.com/forum glue returned 3390 instances where glue is mentioned in a message

 

site:greenleafdollhouses.com/forum glue "White Orchid"  narrowed it down to 908 instances of glue specific to the White Orchid

 

With a judicious choice of terms, a topic can be searched with great specificity. Using quotation marks ensure that the term is search as is and not variations. For instance, using the term "Gorilla glue" returned 140 instances where that particular type of glue is mentioned.

 

site:greenleafdollhouses.com/forum "Gorilla glue" swelling  Returned just two posts that discuss the swelling properties of Gorilla glue

 

To use this method to search other websites, use the format above. It is not necessary to use the / symbol if you want to search an entire website but useful if you want to search just a part of it.

 

 

 

 

 

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Great tip Kathie, I've pinned this topic! I can agree sometimes the search feature is frustrating.

 

A few important notes about the forum-based searching:

  • Since we have so many posts, it will only return results posted within the last 365 days/1 year.
  • Multiple keywords entered are combined with 'AND'. So if you search "red fox" - it is interpreted as red AND fox, and will ONLY return results that contain both of those words.
  • Unable to handle words that are shorter than 4 characters (too many false matches) and a limitation of the server software.

 

So, google is sometimes a better option when looking for much older content or need to tweak your search a bit better.

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