August 25, 2009 at 12:56 pm
( (2) Tag Usage, contd...):
2e) Refine Search, working:
Of all of the things week about SSC search, the "refine" is the weakest: it just doesn't work right, so just getting a re-searching capability to work correctly is a minimum for any navigational improvements.
2f) Refine Search, other:
besides adding tags, the other features needs are:
- content/attribute matching (contains "foo%bar" and RegEx searching)
-- note that "attributes" (like title and author) and "content" (post-body) should not be seperated If I search for "Tally Table" and "Jeff Moden" I should NOT get only those post's that have "Jeff Moden" in the body of the text (this is one of the biggies, currently)
- matching from a Forum, list of forums or ForumGroup
- Thread-matching: right now there is virtually nothing for this, but often tmes we need to match on the attributes of the post's thread, rather than just the post itself. So I may want all of my posts in any thread that Jeff Moden also posted too.
- Date Ranges
[font="Times New Roman"]-- RBarryYoung[/font], [font="Times New Roman"] (302)375-0451[/font] blog: MovingSQL.com, Twitter: @RBarryYoung[font="Arial Black"]
Proactive Performance Solutions, Inc. [/font][font="Verdana"] "Performance is our middle name."[/font]
August 25, 2009 at 1:07 pm
( (2) Tag Usage, contd... (OMG, i hate this hospital terminal!) ):
2f) Refine Search (contd...):
...
- By content-type and Thread-content-type: SSC actually has a LOT of different content-types (Threads/Posts, Articles/responses, Blogs/responses, Editorials/response, Scripts/responses, etc.) The only ones that are reasonably findable are the Threads/Posts. We need to be able to sort each out if we want.
2g) Refine Search, Sorting:
We should be able to effectively re-order with out having to start all over again:
- By Post Dates
- By Thread Dates, then Post Dates
- by match Scoring
[font="Times New Roman"]-- RBarryYoung[/font], [font="Times New Roman"] (302)375-0451[/font] blog: MovingSQL.com, Twitter: @RBarryYoung[font="Arial Black"]
Proactive Performance Solutions, Inc. [/font][font="Verdana"] "Performance is our middle name."[/font]
August 25, 2009 at 1:07 pm
SQLBOT (8/25/2009)
... and also an ability for the OP to mark the thread as answered. ...
This is the only part I don't agree with and I think there are many others as well. The OP is usually not the best one to indicate if a particular post is the answer. Plus, if you look at many of the threads you actually find more answers and discussions after the OP has their "answer" and gone off on their merry way while others continue the discussion and usually come up with other alternative (and sometimes better) solutions. If a thread is marked as answered, this may never happen.
August 25, 2009 at 1:13 pm
Lynn Pettis (8/25/2009)
SQLBOT (8/25/2009)
... and also an ability for the OP to mark the thread as answered. ...This is the only part I don't agree with and I think there are many others as well. The OP is usually not the best one to indicate if a particular post is the answer. Plus, if you look at many of the threads you actually find more answers and discussions after the OP has their "answer" and gone off on their merry way while others continue the discussion and usually come up with other alternative (and sometimes better) solutions. If a thread is marked as answered, this may never happen.
Good point, Lynn.
Discussion could continue on a thread marked answered, but chances of the dialog continuing would go down. I would probably pass those by and not continue contributing.
Thanks!
~BOT
Craig Outcalt
August 25, 2009 at 1:16 pm
2h) Search Presentation:
Don't make me change pages to refine my search. That's just awful, ergonomically, and also probably the cause of why refine-search keeps losing the original context.
All refine-search options should be on the Search Results page.
2i) Default Tag Searchs:
A small number of default-search buttons/tabs/whatever: like "all posts in this thread", "most popular searches", etc. Having the right choices for this, but short, tight and consistent, can easily make the whole faciity.
2j) Tag-search subscriptions:
Probably hard to do, but a great feature if it can be done.
[font="Times New Roman"]-- RBarryYoung[/font], [font="Times New Roman"] (302)375-0451[/font] blog: MovingSQL.com, Twitter: @RBarryYoung[font="Arial Black"]
Proactive Performance Solutions, Inc. [/font][font="Verdana"] "Performance is our middle name."[/font]
August 25, 2009 at 1:43 pm
3) Personal Posts Management:
Right now we have the Briefcase, the
Subscriptions list and the "My Posts" search. All are decidedly weak, especially for us heavy-posters.
3a) File Cabinet: what we really need is something like a super-briefcase, but built around the idea of "Personal Tags" that would allow us to add our own tags to any content, which would automatically put it in our new super-briefcase/File Cabinet. This needs to work for *any* content, not just Articles.
3b) "Personal Tags": our personal tags should be available to all of our searches. So if I add a personal tag like "One-of-GGs-Great-Ideas", then I (and only I) can add that tag to my searches. And of course, it would only find the one's that I had tagged like that (and not anyone else's if they had a personal tag of the same name)
3c) "ME" flag: All search options should have a "ME" option, that matches stuff by me. Including Posts by me and Threads that contain posts by me. And this needs to work, no matter how many posts I have. Its OK, to have a "max results" limit, but then we need to be able to "page" into the full resultset. IT's OK, if that last part is a little slow, if it just works, it'd be worth it.
3d) Personal Notes:
ive us some space to make "private posts" or whatever, notes that only we can see. But are available in our searches, file cabinet and control panel. That we can easily keep a list of "stock" answers online.
[font="Times New Roman"]-- RBarryYoung[/font], [font="Times New Roman"] (302)375-0451[/font] blog: MovingSQL.com, Twitter: @RBarryYoung[font="Arial Black"]
Proactive Performance Solutions, Inc. [/font][font="Verdana"] "Performance is our middle name."[/font]
August 25, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Lynn Pettis (8/25/2009)
SQLBOT (8/25/2009)
... and also an ability for the OP to mark the thread as answered. ...This is the only part I don't agree with and I think there are many others as well. The OP is usually not the best one to indicate if a particular post is the answer. Plus, if you look at many of the threads you actually find more answers and discussions after the OP has their "answer" and gone off on their merry way while others continue the discussion and usually come up with other alternative (and sometimes better) solutions. If a thread is marked as answered, this may never happen.
Please dont let users mark answers...if the answers they receive meet their requirements, then by all means encourage them to post to that effect.
But this does not mean that the answer is " definitive"....it "all depends"
...as a newbie to SSC I have probably learnt far more by following the ongoing discussion in a post. It seems to me that many OP's ask a question..receive an answer ...and then disappear, until the next time....with little response other than maybe a "thanks"
But in many instances the continued discussion and debate by SQL pros actually provides a far greater insight into the practical/performance/"elegant" options that are available ...SQL provides many options in creating a solution...some good/some not so good...and its this discussion that enables me to format my own conclusions based on the data in front of me in conjunction with the various solutions provided ...as they say "it all depends"
regards gah
________________________________________________________________
you can lead a user to data....but you cannot make them think
and remember....every day is a school day
August 26, 2009 at 2:07 am
Great feedback so far guys - lots for us to work through there. Keep it coming! 🙂
One thing to consider - a lot of the feedback about site usability concerns the suitability (or lack thereof!) of the forums (or more precisely the software we use for the forums). As a bit of background, the main site (articles, QoD etc) is custom written, but the forums are largely an off-the-shelf package, only very slightly modded to enable it to be slotted into the site. We therefore have far more ability to customise the main site than the forums. If the conclusion (on here and internally) is that we need to change/update the forum software that's certainly something we will look at.
Personally I think it's an unfortunate thing that forum software pretty much hasn't evolved over the last 10 years or so. I think they pretty much got to a certain point and development kind of ceased, whereas a lot of web usability has moved on significantly since then.
Anyway, to re-emphasise, we are currently looking about both the 'main site' and the 'forums' in terms of improving navigation and usability.
Mel
Mel HarbourProject ManagerRed Gate Software
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