OMD! Our search feature SUCKS! Try this one out...

[ClarkP]

Hey there!

Thanks so much for all of you that filled out our survey.  It has helped us figure out some stuff.  Adina will post more about the survey results later.

Some stuff you told us about we had been avoiding thinking about.  Like... OUR SEARCH FEATURE REALLY SUCKS.

Ouch.

It had to be said.

We knew search wasn't great, but didn't know it affected you this much.

So I am testing something else:  Scrapping our search completely and just using Google for our own internal search.

But I'd like your opinion on it first.

If you guys like the Google search results better, we will replace the search result that you currently see on DK with results from Google.  You would search in the same places on DK, but just get a different results page.

Try this for me.  Do searches on DK and then do the same searches here:
http://www.google.com/cse/publicurl?cx=009170712849504475131:pu1tn0...

Do you like the results better?  Or do you like the current results from the DK search?

(Note: This link is to our custom search test page.  You WON'T have to go off site to use this... but I wanted to know if you like the search results you get from it better.  Make sense?)

If you like the Google search results better, we will replace the internal DK results with these results.

So let me know what you think.

Thanks!
/Clark

[Carol and Banjo]

OK, just a quick search on ear infection in puppies....brought up much better, more direct results on Google than on DK.  Go Google!!!

Wow, what a difference this will make on those "repeat" questions we've all heard a hundred times!   I'm guilty myself....as I never had much luck with searches.

[Camilla and Darwin]

Much better!

[F, Calla & Luca]

OMD, I forgot to mention that because you get used to even bad things. But just today I looked for two things because Karen wrote the search engine was broken . Major plus you can sort in the Google engine by date. Often I am looking for something recent or around a particular time. But there seem to be many fewer results with Goggle. Ten pages versus 170 some odd. Perhaps the Google search.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Clark, the search function in the groups and the forum isn't working at all, only the main DK search, and I never use that one anyway. 

[ClarkP]

I'm working on it...  :-)

Try the search link I gave above.  It does search the whole site but let me know what you think of the results.

There is no perfect solution to this.  Using the Google results won't give us search results from a specific site area.  But as you noted, our own search has become a steaming turd of non-usefulness.

[Jill, Woody & Maxi]

The Google search worked great for me!

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

The Google search is okay...better than the main DK search but not as good as the ones in the groups and the forum when they are working. One problem I had with the Google search is that it doesn't show you dates, you have to click on each listing to see if it's from 2 weeks ago or 2 years ago. 

[ClarkP]

Try the "Sort by Date" link at the top right of the Google search results page.  Does that help?

The two options are to sort by Relevance or by Date.  Relevance is the default.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Ah, thank you. I would not have noticed that little "sort by" thingy, lol. Much better, and i was able to find a FG discussion I had tried to find earlier today. 

[F, Calla & Luca]

But you can sort by relevance or date which at least gives you a better functionality I think.

[F, Calla & Luca]

Does this search photos. Mostly the long lists of photos on the main search engine got in the way.

[ClarkP]

It does not appear to search photos.  Either that or it deems them less relevant.

I'm still learning exactly what it does.  :-)