Dave's Tip No. 1 -- Using "Site Search" and "Enhanced Search"

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Comparisons of Searching Using the Site Search Button or the Enhanced Button

by Dave Anderson, February 2013

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Overview

At the top right of the every protoball page there is a search box with two buttons: one says "Site Search" and the other says "Enhanced Search". Enter a search term and click one of the buttons to search the site.

Site Search

Site Search gives complete, up-to-date, unformatted results. It's usually a little faster than Enhanced Search.

Use Site Search for the following cases:

  • You want to find information entered that day
  • You want to search this entire site, including, for example, all the Protoball Articles

Enhanced Search

Enhanced search gives nightly-updated, formatted results for most of the site but not all of it: the results come from various categories of information such as Chronology, Pre-pro, and Glossary of Games entries. After running an enhanced search, specific entries can be marked as important; the searches, including which entries were marked important, can be saved and shared with other diggers.

Use Enhanced Search for the following cases:

  • You want to have the result be formatted
  • You want to save and share your search results
  • You want to select out entries from the results and save and share those selections
  • You want to use complex search parameters

Much of the following information can be found in the Enhanced Search page itself.

Enhanced Search Options

Two words or phrases both exist in the entry
Use "and". Example: "Baseball and New Jersey" finds entries that have both the word baseball and New Jersey.
Either one or another word or phrase exists in the entry
Use "or". Example: "NJ or New Jersey" finds entries that have either the word NJ or the word New Jersey.
Nested terms
Use parenthesis. Example: "Baseball and (NJ or New Jersey)" finds entries that have both the word baseball and either the word NJ or the word New Jersey.
Specifying a word or phrase or complex condition does occur
Use "not". Example "Baseball and not Wicket" finds entries where Baseball is mentioned and Wicket is not mentioned.
Wildcards to find parts of a word
Use "%". Example: "Base%" finds entries that have the word Base, Baseball, Bases, and anything else that starts with Base.
Wildcards to for any one character
Use ".". Example: "Base.ball" finds entries that have "base-ball", "base ball", and anything that has "base", then a character, then "ball".
Wildcards to for any one character
Use ".". Example: "Base.ball" finds entries that have "base-ball", "base ball", and anything that has "base", then a character, then "ball".
Wildcards to for the possible existence of character before it
Use "?". Example: "Bases?" finds entries with "base", "bases".
Combining wildcards
Example: "Base.?ball" finds entries with "baseball", "base ball", "base-ball".
Limiting by date
Example: "year > 1840" finds Ballgames that took place after 1840, Chronology milestones that occurred after 1840, and ballgames that were formed after 1840. Note: Including a year search will skip entries that are undated: Field entries, for example.

Saved Searched

You save a search by running a search and clicking on the "Save Search" link on the upper-right of the search results. You can re-run the search by finding your search and clicking on its Run Search link. Find your search by going to the Enhanced Search home page and click on the "My Searches" link.

Selections

Once you have run a search, you can select particular entries you are interested in by clicking on the star at the upper-right of the entry. They become collected in the Selected tab. When you make selections on a saved search, those selections are saved as well.

Sharing a Search

You can save a search by clicking on the Share link on the upper-right of the search results page. A box is displayed containing the search url. Cut and paste this url into an email and sent it to fellow diggers. Selections are shared too.

Using Other Diggers' Searches

You can run other Diggers' searches by using the link the send you through email or you can search for searches through Enhanced Search itself. From the Enhanced Search home page enter in the search criteria: to list all searches use ".*"; to list all searches that belong to specific person, type their name. Before you run the search, click on the Searches box just below the main search box.

-- From Dave Anderson, Protoball.org developer