New: Full Text search

[russellw]

Good afternoon
We have implemented full text natural language searching on AFF.

In simple terms this means:

1. Searches can now be performed on any word (or phrase) of more than two characters except for a list of default words that are excluded such as "if" "so" "to etc.

2. Searches can now be performed using Boolean search functions - thus:

A search for P5 would return all results for P5 Model LTD/Landau but -

A search for P5 + Coupe (or P5 AND Coupe) would only return those results where both search terms were present.

You could also use P5 - Coupe (or P5 NOT Coupe) to exclude the results for Coupes.

3. Wild card operators (*) can be used in both plain and Boolean searches.

e.g: a search for P* would return P5 and P6 models - be careful using wild cards on such short phrases as you are likely to have a slow search and a lot of irrelevant results. Better to use something like P* AND LTD

4. A phrase that is enclosed within double quote (") characters matches only rows that contain the phrase literally, as it was typed.

e.g: a search for "1975 P5 LTD" would only return a result for that exact phrase.

5. Results are still capped at 500 while we gauge the server load from this search function.

6. Please Note: some searches may take a little longer than they have in the past but this will improve with each search as the indices are refined.

Questions and comments can be posted in the thread HERE

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Some further examples form the manual:

• apple banana
  Find rows that contain at least one of the two words
  
  
• +apple juice
  Find rows that contain both words
  
  
• +apple macintosh
  Find rows that contain the word “apple”, but rank rows higher if they also contain “macintosh”
  
  
• +apple -macintosh
  Find rows that contain the word “apple” but not “macintosh"
  
  
• apple*
  Find rows that contain words such as “apple”, “apples”, “applesauce”, or “applet”
  
  
• "some words"
  Find rows that contain the exact phrase “some words” (for example, rows that contain “some words of wisdom” but not “some noise words”)