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How so? Granted it didn't search the entire site, but then it was never stated to be a site search, it was only for searching names and titles. The only complaint I ever had about it was that it only displayed the first 50 matches. However I wouldn't consider that reason enough to just chuck it and replace it with something completely different.
The search technique used was an exact match, so misspelling the name in any way would 'break' results. Most users would use the browse feature and just use the first letter of the last name. Granted a small portion still used the search, it wasn't really a "search." It was a browse for people who knew the name.
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I personally find that site-wide searches are pretty much useless. They return too many results because they're not focused on any one area.
While it might be useless in some situations, that is what the browse is for. However, the new search is a work in progress as stated before. We will be making changes to much of the functionality. You can check back (or subscribe) to the global announcement found here:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=17885 With each new update, we will always post here with information. If you have suggestions on what you think we should do, let us know about it in our suggestion drop box.
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Can you please put the old search back online? I'm not suggesting that you get rid of the new search, just put the old one online as an option. You could even put it on a different page if you want, so that new users won't be confused. The IMDb has a power search page. They also have options to limit the search from the main box to specific categories so that if you're searching for the show "Chuck", you don't have to wade through a giant list of actors with that name. Also note how neatly the search results are presented.
Unfortunately, we won't be setting up 2 different search bars for the website -- that would be redundant and confusing.
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I never said there wasn't a valid reason to search reviews. In fact, I think that's a great idea. What I asked was why you'd want to search everything at the same time. If you're searching for a movie with "door" in the title, why would you want to see 50+ matches from reviews with the word "door" in them? If you're searching for the name Jane, why would you want to see reviews that mention the character name "Jane" or or that compare another actress to the Jane you're looking for?
In your original post, you stated: "Seriously, can anyone think of a valid example, where you would want to search for names, titles and review text all at the same time?" And yes, I agree. These are the kind of tweaks we will have to work on as time goes on. Search is to be intended to search the CNdb website (and has always been).. this includes forum, reviews, movies, and celebrities.
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Relevancy doesn't really apply when you're searching for a specific name or title. For example, let's say that I wanted to look up Pamela Bowman, and I just typed in "Pamela". Not counting the title matches, her name is the 28th one on the list. Pamela Anderson is listed first, but she's not relevant to me because I wasn't searching for her.
Yes it is relevant. If you know that you are searching for Pamela Bowman, you can either a) type her name in the search bar and use the auto-complete or use the browse:
http://www.cndb.com/browse.html?type=actress&target=B A computer program can only do what you tell it to do. If you search for Pamela, it will show you all the relavent matches for "pamela" -- if you search for "Pamela Bowman" it will show you pamela bowman. However, here is were weights come into play. The program may think you did mean something else, so it will weight pamela bowman much higher than anything else, but still show other results with "pamela" and "bowman." This is pretty much how *every* type of search works, including the god-like google.
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Can you please answer one question for me, and please be honest? If you wanted to find an actress named "Pamela" and you couldn't remember her last name, but you'd know if you saw it, which of the following three sets of search results would you rate as the easiest to use?
Use your example, and go to
http://www.google.com . Type in the word "Pamela," that is just a "funny" amount of results ... what you do when you search, is search for something you know is true and go from there. For example, say I knew this Pamela starred in The Hitchhiker... I wouldn't google "Pamela" -- I would google "The Hitchhiker".. then through that I would find out that the Pamela I was looking for was "Pamela Bowman" ..
Now, if I only knew the name "Pamela" ... that's my own memory's fault. I'd have to search until I remembered something that was factual and search worthy.
On a technical side note: we are all about making things easier. And changes are already in the works, much earlier than you post.
All in all, I should voice that: yes we understand a new CNdb is a bit of a shock to some people -- as they thought we just left it out to dry. With the improvements being done, all it will take a little bit of adjustments on both the CNdb Staff
and the CNdb members. Nothing is ever perfect the first time around and everything can always be changed.
In the end, it will allow much more ease-of-use to the CNdb audience. That is the main goal of every update we do.
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