umpnum14
.._. _._. :-)
Using the search tool provided can be a little frustrating but with a little understanding of how things work you should be able to find what your looking for in a matter of minutes using the info provided below.
For this example I am going to use the search term "power supply"
In my first example I search for power supply using the forum defaults and the results are less then stunning. I get a page of about 30 topics that when I click on them doesn't seem to get me anywhere closer to what i was looking for. hmm......
How can we get what we want from this mess????????????
We look at what available to us
What are our options and just how do they effect what I see?
I hope to answer that for those who don't really understand.
First go here FC Search Page and look at the options available to you
They are listed below with an explanation of what they are and do.
Enter your search criteria:
-- Keyword Search Search for the keywords we type using Boolean criteria such as AND, OR, NOT
-- Author Search Search for post by that user containing the keyword provided(Keyword not required)
Select where to search
-- Forums Limits Searches to a specific area of the forum (.eg only get results that occur in the Vaporizer Discussion)
---Vaporizer Discussion
---General Vaporizer Discussion
---Ask the Vaporist
---The Vapor Lounge
Default is all Forums
-- Search In Limits Searches to just messages or topics
---Message text and topic subject
---Message Text Only
---Subject Only
Default is both
Select how to view search results
--Sort by Controls how the results are displayed to you, how they are sorted
---Post Time Orders them by most recent or oldest, dependent upon the sort order
---Author Orders them by author alphabetically, dependent upon the sort order
---Subject Orders them by Topic alphabetically, dependent upon the sort order
---Forum Orders them by Forum alphabetically, dependent upon the sort order
--Sort Order
---Ascending View results A-z/0-9 format(Handy for alphebetical searches)
---Descending view results Z-A/9-0 format(Handy for searching for the most recent)
Default is Order by Post Time in descending format thereby displaying the most recent activity on top
--Show results How you see the results
---Topics Displays the results simply as a list of topics containing keyword/keywords
--Post Displays the results as post Allows you to see the contents of the post and where the keyword was found
Default is Topics
For best results change this to Post
Ok now that you got that, back to my example. When I last left you we discovered a default search of the keywords power supply returned a simple page of like 30 topics. Not much help.
First things first. Lets get something we can use actually read, or do further searching using our browser. Now do the same search only change how the results are displayed to posts. Now we get something a little more manageable and, being that the way the search works, the most relevant searches will be on top. But its still a little bloated 5 pages of results.
Lets limit this down to power supply discussed in the Vaporizer discussion since I am looking for info on my particular model. The Extreme
Still too bloated hmmm....
Now to turn to the power of Boolean and sorting
We need to filter out some of that crap that we are getting back. Tell the forum what we want so it can give us just that.
We know we want power supply but when we search that we get 4 pages of junk, so now what. First let's sort what we get by
setting the search page to search in the "Vaporizer Discussion" Forum (We chose this because this Forum is Vaporizer specific, thus allowing us to see by vaporizer which ones have discussed power supply in their threads) Still a little bit unmanageable because now the results still display in a most recent post format. Lets change it so that it sorts by Subject (The Topic) which will allow us to see at a quick glance alphabetically the vaporizers discussing these keywords. Now we see the Vaporizers listed alphabetically. All we have to do now is look and see if the Extreme is listed. What do you know? There it is and the first listing of it is about a power supply failure.
I'll edit the post and add more about how to use Boolean later today.
For this example I am going to use the search term "power supply"
In my first example I search for power supply using the forum defaults and the results are less then stunning. I get a page of about 30 topics that when I click on them doesn't seem to get me anywhere closer to what i was looking for. hmm......
How can we get what we want from this mess????????????
We look at what available to us
What are our options and just how do they effect what I see?
I hope to answer that for those who don't really understand.
First go here FC Search Page and look at the options available to you
They are listed below with an explanation of what they are and do.
Enter your search criteria:
-- Keyword Search Search for the keywords we type using Boolean criteria such as AND, OR, NOT
-- Author Search Search for post by that user containing the keyword provided(Keyword not required)
Select where to search
-- Forums Limits Searches to a specific area of the forum (.eg only get results that occur in the Vaporizer Discussion)
---Vaporizer Discussion
---General Vaporizer Discussion
---Ask the Vaporist
---The Vapor Lounge
Default is all Forums
-- Search In Limits Searches to just messages or topics
---Message text and topic subject
---Message Text Only
---Subject Only
Default is both
Select how to view search results
--Sort by Controls how the results are displayed to you, how they are sorted
---Post Time Orders them by most recent or oldest, dependent upon the sort order
---Author Orders them by author alphabetically, dependent upon the sort order
---Subject Orders them by Topic alphabetically, dependent upon the sort order
---Forum Orders them by Forum alphabetically, dependent upon the sort order
--Sort Order
---Ascending View results A-z/0-9 format(Handy for alphebetical searches)
---Descending view results Z-A/9-0 format(Handy for searching for the most recent)
Default is Order by Post Time in descending format thereby displaying the most recent activity on top
--Show results How you see the results
---Topics Displays the results simply as a list of topics containing keyword/keywords
--Post Displays the results as post Allows you to see the contents of the post and where the keyword was found
Default is Topics
For best results change this to Post
Ok now that you got that, back to my example. When I last left you we discovered a default search of the keywords power supply returned a simple page of like 30 topics. Not much help.
First things first. Lets get something we can use actually read, or do further searching using our browser. Now do the same search only change how the results are displayed to posts. Now we get something a little more manageable and, being that the way the search works, the most relevant searches will be on top. But its still a little bloated 5 pages of results.
Lets limit this down to power supply discussed in the Vaporizer discussion since I am looking for info on my particular model. The Extreme
Still too bloated hmmm....
Now to turn to the power of Boolean and sorting
We need to filter out some of that crap that we are getting back. Tell the forum what we want so it can give us just that.
We know we want power supply but when we search that we get 4 pages of junk, so now what. First let's sort what we get by
setting the search page to search in the "Vaporizer Discussion" Forum (We chose this because this Forum is Vaporizer specific, thus allowing us to see by vaporizer which ones have discussed power supply in their threads) Still a little bit unmanageable because now the results still display in a most recent post format. Lets change it so that it sorts by Subject (The Topic) which will allow us to see at a quick glance alphabetically the vaporizers discussing these keywords. Now we see the Vaporizers listed alphabetically. All we have to do now is look and see if the Extreme is listed. What do you know? There it is and the first listing of it is about a power supply failure.
I'll edit the post and add more about how to use Boolean later today.