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Forum search engine ignoring short words
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tightsocks
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Jan 11, 2012, 06:50 PM
 
Is it possible to adjust the search engine so that it doesn't ignore short search terms?

A lot of tech related stuff has short abbreviations but the search engine makes it rather impossible to search for them...
Examples:
iOS, USB, UPS, RAM, DVD, etc...
     
turtle777
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Jan 11, 2012, 07:17 PM
 
Yes, that would be nice. This limitation has existed like forever.
AFAIR, it's a vBulletin limitation that can't be fixed w/o huge programming effort.

-t
     
besson3c
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Jan 11, 2012, 07:46 PM
 
Originally Posted by turtle777 View Post
Yes, that would be nice. This limitation has existed like forever.
AFAIR, it's a vBulletin limitation that can't be fixed w/o huge programming effort.

-t

It can be fixed to return those results easily, whether results are filtered in a way to make the results listings useful is another story.

In the meantime, I suggest Google searches for:

site:forums.macnn.com [your search]
     
reader50
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Jan 11, 2012, 08:52 PM
 
The native vB Search has a min-word-length pref, set to 3 char. But it's load-intensive, so we use the mysql fulltext search function instead. Which seems to be hardcoded to 4 char. If you know of a pref to change that, let me know. I might be able to change it, or get it changed.
     
besson3c
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Jan 11, 2012, 09:06 PM
 
I don't know of a GUI pref, I know very little about vBulletin, but I was just saying that because there is nothing that would prohibit direct MySQL queries as such:

select * from table where whateverfield like '%ios%'

select * from table where whateverfield like '%a%'

If you're using fulltext though, that makes sense. The above searches would be crazy expensive.
     
reader50
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Jan 11, 2012, 09:30 PM
 
It wouldn't be on the vB side, we're using whatever mysql fulltext gives us. If you know a mysql config entry or command to make fulltext search indexing support 3-chr, I'd be game to try and get that changed.
     
brassplayersrock²
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Jan 11, 2012, 11:54 PM
 
     
besson3c
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Jan 12, 2012, 12:05 AM
 
     
   
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