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Buckaroo · Oct 10, 2004, 05:09 PM

What is going on? I'm trying to search for something, I realize that I made a typo and I need to run the search again. The stupid seach engine tells me that I'm only allowed one every 30 seconds.

I may only search once every month, but I don't need some stupid search engine that tells me sorry you are limited to one search every 30 seconds.

DekuDekuplex · Oct 10, 2004, 05:17 PM

Originally posted by Buckaroo:
What is going on? I'm trying to search for something, I realize that I made a typo and I need to run the search again. The stupid seach engine tells me that I'm only allowed one every 30 seconds.

I may only search once every month, but I don't need some stupid search engine that tells me sorry you are limited to one search every 30 seconds.

Most forums that I have seen so far place some kind of limitation on the frequency of searches in order to avoid overloading the server. For example, I ran into the same kind of situation today on MetroMac Alliance - Forums.

-- DekuDekuplex

Buckaroo · Oct 10, 2004, 05:19 PM

I forgot to mention, I would have searched to see if this topic had ever been posted before, BUT I CAN'T.

Buckaroo · Oct 10, 2004, 05:21 PM

When the search engine produces no results, then maybe there shouldn't be a limit, or maybe limit the searcher to 4 searches and then a 30 second break.

What, are there people out there just doing a ton of searches and not looking through the results? What good is a search engine if I can't use it.

Heck by the time I finally get to search to make sure that there were no previous posts concerning my subject, I'll have forgotten what it was I wanted to post about.

storer · Oct 11, 2004, 03:36 PM

Originally posted by DekuDekuplex:
Most forums that I have seen so far place some kind of limitation on the frequency of searches in order to avoid overloading the server.
-- DekuDekuplex

Yep, thats it.

CharlesS · Oct 12, 2004, 12:53 PM

I agree that this is annoying. Lots of times I have to try a few searches before I come up with a set of keywords that will give me the result I want. It seems like a natural result of using a search engine, unless you are so good at guessing what terms will turn up what you want that you are always able to find it the first time.

dcolton · Oct 12, 2004, 01:57 PM

its 30 lousy seconds. think of it as opportunity time to get a life.

DekuDekuplex · 07:01 PM

Originally posted by CharlesS:
I agree that this is annoying. Lots of times I have to try a few searches before I come up with a set of keywords that will give me the result I want. It seems like a natural result of using a search engine, unless you are so good at guessing what terms will turn up what you want that you are always able to find it the first time.

How efficiently are you searching?

I had a lot of difficulty in choosing keywords, too, until I came across a few tips in the wonderful work How to Build a Digital Library, by Ian H. H. Witten and David Bainbridge.

They explained that words and phrases are used entirely differently in searches, and that in order to perform a search using a phrase, it is usually necessary to enclose the phrase in double-quotes. Further, it helps immensely in narrowing your search to use logical operators, such as AND and OR, and to group parts of your search, if necessary, using parentheses.

For example, if I want to search for, say, a shareware or freeware RPG development engine for the Macintosh, I would enter a search string similar to the following one:

Code:
("shareware" OR "freeware") AND ("development" OR "engine") AND ("RPG" OR "role playing game" OR "role-playing game") AND ("Mac" OR "Macintosh")

(Incidentally, if anybody happens to be interested in an RPG development engine for the Macintosh, there is an excellent demo version of the Coldstone Game Engine 1.0.1 available.)

-- DekuDekuplex

CharlesS · Oct 15, 2004, 06:38 PM

Originally posted by DekuDekuplex:
How efficiently are you searching?

I had a lot of difficulty in choosing keywords, too, until I came across a few tips in the wonderful work How to Build a Digital Library, by Ian H. H. Witten and David Bainbridge.

They explained that words and phrases are used entirely differently in searches, and that in order to perform a search using a phrase, it is usually necessary to enclose the phrase in double-quotes. Further, it helps immensely in narrowing your search to use logical operators, such as AND and OR, and to group parts of your search, if necessary, using parentheses.

For example, if I want to search for, say, a shareware or freeware RPG development engine for the Macintosh, I would enter a search string similar to the following one:

("shareware" OR "freeware") AND ("development" OR "engine") AND ("RPG" OR "role playing game" OR "role-playing game") AND ("Mac" OR "Macintosh")

Yes, I know how to use Boolean searches, thanks. The thing is, that sometimes a search that you thought would turn up a lot of stuff doesn't, and sometimes typing a keyword that you know is in the post still doesn't turn up the thread for some reason. I've had cases where I could look the thread up manually in the forum list, verify for sure that a keyword is there, then do a search for that keyword and get nothing. MacNN's search is just kind of messed up.

(Incidentally, if anybody happens to be interested in an RPG development engine for the Macintosh, there is an excellent demo version of the Coldstone Game Engine 1.0.1 available.)

Which doesn't work with Panther and is not even available to buy anymore.

DekuDekuplex · 07:29 PM

Originally posted by CharlesS:
[comments deleted]

Which doesn't work with Panther and is not even available to buy anymore.

It should work if you use the demo version for Mac OS 9 within the Classic environment.

Even the Mac OS X version in Mac OS X 10.2.6 Jaguar won't save correctly, but the Mac OS 9 version hasn't given me any problems yet.

Also, I know for a fact that even after the demo version expires, you can still get it to work if you delete the associated Classic preferences in the /Macintosh HD/System Folder/Preferences/ folder (not to be confused with the OS X preferences in the /Macintosh HD/System/Preferences/ folder!).

-- DekuDekuplex

awaspaas · Oct 16, 2004, 06:08 PM

Okay I think the stupid thing is that if you hit the back button to get back to your searches, it does the whole fricken search again! Why isn't it cached or anything?? Man that pisses me off to no end!!

CharlesS · Oct 16, 2004, 06:44 PM

Originally posted by DekuDekuplex:
It should work if you use the demo version for Mac OS 9 within the Classic environment.

Even the Mac OS X version in Mac OS X 10.2.6 Jaguar won't save correctly, but the Mac OS 9 version hasn't given me any problems yet.

Also, I know for a fact that even after the demo version expires, you can still get it to work if you delete the associated Classic preferences in the /Macintosh HD/System Folder/Preferences/ folder (not to be confused with the OS X preferences in the /Macintosh HD/System/Preferences/ folder!).

-- DekuDekuplex

Which matters... not at all, since you cannot buy this product anymore. Ambrosia has taken it off the market.

Oh, you can circumvent the copy protection by trashing the prefs twice a month. Whee. Boy, it's so convenient to not only have to run in the Classic layer, but also to have to reset your settings every 15 days. Sorry, but I think there's a reason the developers took it off the market. Apparently they don't think it's so "excellent." Maybe I'll give this one a chance when the developers think it's ready.

What does this have to do with the thread topic, anyway?

Buckaroo · Oct 31, 2004, 02:54 PM

Originally posted by dcolton:
its 30 lousy seconds. think of it as opportunity time to get a life.

Yeah, 30 seconds of my life. It adds up. It takes so much longer to do a search to find what we are looking for, we loose our life.

brapper · Nov 7, 2004, 01:32 AM

the 30 seconds thing doesn't actually mean 30 seconds. That's not to say it doesn't stop you from researching really quickly but, in my experience, it doesn't actually take 30 seconds - seems closer to 10...anyone know what the actual delay is?..
anyway, yeah it's annoying but I can understand it.

veryniceguy2002 · 06:10 PM

Originally posted by Buckaroo:
What is going on? I'm trying to search for something, I realize that I made a typo and I need to run the search again. The stupid seach engine tells me that I'm only allowed one every 30 seconds.

I may only search once every month, but I don't need some stupid search engine that tells me sorry you are limited to one search every 30 seconds.

Yeap. I have the same problem - made a typo in the initial search, and then I have to wait for another 28 seconds before I can search again.

May I suggest to change it so that I can do 2 searchs every 60 seconds instead? It should only marginally increase the load to the server, but it makes it more user friendly.

Randman · Dec 21, 2004, 07:07 AM

Make sure you spell correctly from the get-go. 30 seconds is not a big deal. Most people use tabbed browsing these days anyway, so you can take the time and switch to another tab.

tooki · Jan 14, 2005, 06:10 PM

Originally posted by veryniceguy2002:
Yeap. I have the same problem - made a typo in the initial search, and then I have to wait for another 28 seconds before I can search again.

May I suggest to change it so that I can do 2 searchs every 60 seconds instead? It should only marginally increase the load to the server, but it makes it more user friendly.

Sorry, the forum software only allows us to set a single delay between searches. (I find it annoying, too.)

tooki