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> Half of our customers barely know how to operate a computer, and are
> utterly baffled by our product. They just want a big black box with a
> massive "find the file I need" button in the middle. (Because, you know,
> software is telepathic.) And then the *other* half of our customers want
> more and more sophisticated searching capabilities. People have asked
> for stuff like regex searching and a search predicate builder wizard.
You mean your search engine code can't automatically detect when a regex
is entered in the box? :-D
> Wanna take guesses how a person who barely knows what a "file" is will
> react to a "regular expression engine"?
Google has made it very hard for everyone else doing search. People are
used to just bashing in any words (not even spelt correctly) and getting
matching results. If your search engine is any worse than Google people
will complain it doesn't work, therefore people will complain it doesn't
work.
Our PLM system here has that problem. People expect to be able to type
in a name of a person or document or project and get results. No, it's
an old-school search engine where you must type in *exactly* the text
(or use * wildcards) *and* which field you want it to look in. Then
build up an expression with AND and OR and brackets. Typing in "Joe
Bloggs pump drawing" obviously gives no results, you need to type
something very awkward like "'created by'='Bloggs, Joe' AND
type='Drawing' AND name='*pump*'". Unless you are very familiar with the
system you are shafted.
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On 07/08/2015 09:16 AM, scott wrote:
> You mean your search engine code can't automatically detect when a regex
> is entered in the box? :-D
In fact, we've just been wrestling with a bug where if you want to
actually search for text that has an actual star in it, the search
engine mistakes that for a wildcard... Honestly, trying to guess when
the user meant wildcard and then they actually meant star is *highly*
non-trivial.
> Google has made it very hard for everyone else doing search. People are
> used to just bashing in any words (not even spelt correctly) and getting
> matching results. If your search engine is any worse than Google people
> will complain it doesn't work, therefore people will complain it doesn't
> work.
The other fun thing, of course, is that Google has 75% of all the
computer hardware on Earth. They have almost unlimited computational
resources to throw at your search problem. WE DON'T HAVE THAT! :-(
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On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 18:02:29 +0100, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> Honestly, trying to guess when the user meant wildcard and then they
> actually meant star is *highly* non-trivial.
* = wildcard
\* = literal *
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 8/7/2015 6:35 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 18:02:29 +0100, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>
>> Honestly, trying to guess when the user meant wildcard and then they
>> actually meant star is *highly* non-trivial.
>
> * = wildcard
>
> \* = literal *
>
See! Training!
Users need training. :-P
--
Regards
Stephen
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On 07/08/2015 07:39 PM, Stephen wrote:
> On 8/7/2015 6:35 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 18:02:29 +0100, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>>
>>> Honestly, trying to guess when the user meant wildcard and then they
>>> actually meant star is *highly* non-trivial.
>>
>> * = wildcard
>>
>> \* = literal *
Actually our system uses quote marks to disambiguate.
> See! Training!
> Users need training. :-P
Now try searching for a quote mark...
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On 8/7/2015 7:42 PM, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>
> Now try searching for a quote mark...
" -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation_mark
' -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostrophe
That is what I would expect.
--
Regards
Stephen
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On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 19:39:40 +0100, Stephen wrote:
> On 8/7/2015 6:35 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 18:02:29 +0100, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>>
>>> Honestly, trying to guess when the user meant wildcard and then they
>>> actually meant star is *highly* non-trivial.
>>
>> * = wildcard
>>
>> \* = literal *
>>
>>
> See! Training!
> Users need training. :-P
I never said they don't need training. What I said was that if your
software business' bottom line depends on training revenue as part of
that bottom line, you're doing software wrong - and I stand by that
statement. :)
But in this particular instance, a search interface that provided
semantics for finding things based on arbitrary criteria that dealt with
a natural language interface would probably be easier for the users.
Much more difficult to implement, and Google's search capabilities (as
someone in this thread, I think, already pointed out) make anyone else's
search look like a child's attempt.
But actually, the Google search interface itself is an example of how to
do user interaction around search right. It doesn't provide as much
flexibility as other search engines, but it works for the vast majority
of what it's used for, and is simple, elegant, and requires no special
training to understand how to use.
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 19:42:54 +0100, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
> On 07/08/2015 07:39 PM, Stephen wrote:
>> On 8/7/2015 6:35 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> On Fri, 07 Aug 2015 18:02:29 +0100, Orchid Win7 v1 wrote:
>>>
>>>> Honestly, trying to guess when the user meant wildcard and then they
>>>> actually meant star is *highly* non-trivial.
>>>
>>> * = wildcard
>>>
>>> \* = literal *
>
> Actually our system uses quote marks to disambiguate.
Well, there's your problem.
>> See! Training!
>> Users need training. :-P
>
> Now try searching for a quote mark...
\"
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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On 8/8/2015 12:32 AM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> See! Training!
>> >Users need training.:-P
> I never said they don't need training. What I said was that if your
> software business' bottom line depends on training revenue as part of
> that bottom line, you're doing software wrong - and I stand by that
> statement.:)
>
Get me a landing net. I have a bite. :-)
> But in this particular instance, a search interface that provided
> semantics for finding things based on arbitrary criteria that dealt with
> a natural language interface would probably be easier for the users.
> Much more difficult to implement, and Google's search capabilities (as
> someone in this thread, I think, already pointed out) make anyone else's
> search look like a child's attempt.
>
> But actually, the Google search interface itself is an example of how to
> do user interaction around search right. It doesn't provide as much
> flexibility as other search engines, but it works for the vast majority
> of what it's used for, and is simple, elegant, and requires no special
> training to understand how to use.
Yes and it has the best spell checker I've come across.
--
Regards
Stephen
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On Sat, 08 Aug 2015 06:10:49 +0100, Stephen wrote:
> On 8/8/2015 12:32 AM, Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> See! Training!
>>> >Users need training.:-P
>> I never said they don't need training. What I said was that if your
>> software business' bottom line depends on training revenue as part of
>> that bottom line, you're doing software wrong - and I stand by that
>> statement.:)
>>
>>
> Get me a landing net. I have a bite. :-)
:P
>> But in this particular instance, a search interface that provided
>> semantics for finding things based on arbitrary criteria that dealt
>> with a natural language interface would probably be easier for the
>> users. Much more difficult to implement, and Google's search
>> capabilities (as someone in this thread, I think, already pointed out)
>> make anyone else's search look like a child's attempt.
>>
>> But actually, the Google search interface itself is an example of how
>> to do user interaction around search right. It doesn't provide as much
>> flexibility as other search engines, but it works for the vast majority
>> of what it's used for, and is simple, elegant, and requires no special
>> training to understand how to use.
>
> Yes and it has the best spell checker I've come across.
Agreed. :)
Jim
--
"I learned long ago, never to wrestle with a pig. You get dirty, and
besides, the pig likes it." - George Bernard Shaw
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