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Just a thought on this forum outlook

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Just a thought on this forum outlook
Hi all, Just an idea unsure if it has been mentioned before. But when you do a search on these forums the results are really returned in any form of order.

I have visited a few forums in my time and on some of their search listings, you can click the headers so that for example, the results are displayed by username in alpha order, or by most posts to least posts, or in date order.

For example I seach the word mod in all forums, it returns 6254 results.

With my idea if I click on post time, the results are sorted from old to new or vice versa. Old posts are very soon updated and mods revamped. I have in the past installed a mod and then found out, in a later thread that a new code was made and works better. I know that you already have an option to limit your search by date etc but I think this feature would be a benefit.

If I click on username the list is sorted alpha by usernames. This would be a good feature as there are some good staff/moderators out there that provide good answers and to be honest I think I would use their solutions to problems before trying out anyone elses. Saying that a solution is a solution no matter who it comes from.

Number of posts and views also would be a good feature to show in search results. It would save going to any unanswered or unsupported threads. I have found many posts posted by a user then answered by the user again asking the same question etc or complaining about why no one has answered the post. (mmm doesn't make sense but I know what I mean).

Also on the forum, could you not implement a rating system or a whats cool sort of thing. Where threads that are very popular can be linked to straight away and rated if possible. I know again this is sort of civered by your resource section. But there are a lot of mod writers out there, and if they can see what is very popular and what is always on peoples minds, then there maybe an incentive for a writer to make a script and if possible make some pennies out of it.

One last thing, Why have an 'Who's online' facility if you can make yourself invisible. I can understand from the staff/vets/mods point of view that they must get pestered non stop with pm's etc but you can turn them off. I also know that you can search the user database and see if there invisible, so why have this feature if you know there they but invisible.

Sorry its just a boring old Scotsman having a moan. I think I will grab my coat and leave and stand out in the rain.

Stuart
TTFN

Last edited by:

stu2000: Sep 2, 2002, 11:12 AM
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Re: [stu2000] Just a thought on this forum outlook In reply to
Its a nice idea.....and just FYI results are returned in relevance order.
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Re: [stu2000] Just a thought on this forum outlook In reply to
Hi,

As Paul mentioned, the results are returned by relevance (best matches first). We are looking at improving this by also adding sort by date. You can currently filter results by Username (by entering in a staff members username into the search form). We'll look at adding search by group as this would be useful too (search for a post by any staff member).

Thanks for the feedback!

Cheers,

Alex
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Gossamer Threads Inc.