bjoernvold.com

I have had a lot of questions about search here and I have also found it to be rather limited myself at times.
So I integrated Google search.
It will search this forum only or this site only depending on your choice.

You can use Google to search here by clicking the Advanced search under the searchbox on the top right of this site.

This will greatly improve your chances of success.

Example: if you search for manjaro+arch in the standard searchfield you wil get this:

But if you use our new and shiny Google search:

Then you will get a result like this:

It will present the results Google style but it will only contain results from this board unless you click the entire site option which will give you the results from the entire site (bjoernvold.com).
Now you can search for meaningfull combinations like thin client+ssh or ck without having to use at least 3 letter words (4-letter words are still a problem though but we have filters for that)

The Google search is also implemented in the Subsilver2 layout but there you can search directly in the header - so it is a different Layout.


Test it and let me know what you think (If it sucks, I can remove it).
It is only the first block (in the default layout) that is the Google search so it is easy to compare on the advanced search page.
You simply have one more option - so choice is good right?

Yes but it's still Google search, no matter the customization. I saw it a bit ago running a forum search, before I saw this post, and was very surprised for more than one reason. I did not use it at the time. It's still Google. It's still the biggest sell-out of search results and research, as well as logging, both to advertisers and to the NSA. I will probably use it because I don't care, but this forum officially has always taken a stance against these things, and against privacy invasion. Is there not any other that can be used instead?

Yes you can use the phpbb internal search.
If you use the search field on the top right you will not be using Google - you have to go to the advanced search for that. And even there you can use the phpbb search - only the first block is Google search.
It has not been removed - just stick to the traditional search and you will not be spied upon (but you did complain about the results).

You have been able to search Google and find content here anyway - Google already has that and there is nothing we can do about it as long as this is an visible open forum.

What I have done is to make Google give only results from this forum. The spying pretty much stays the same in both cases.

And Addblock is your friend...

Yeah, *sigh

This is why I asked if there is a different alternate search engine that can be used...

I'll check it out - duckduckgo should be an alternative gimme a minute...

Thank you, really. I worry that we're projecting a hypocritical image, when we have whole threads speaking negatively about Google, yet we use it when it's convenient for us. It presents a conflicting statement of who we are, and what we stand for.

Well I support Google's Android in various fights with MS and Apple so there is no official policy here of hating Google.
Google is using Linux and open source - "we" are all for that. Yet those who are not, are welcome here too - even if they will have to accept some freedom of speech.
Google is very innovative - we like that.

We definitely are against the spying and Google's disrespect of privacy. But you would be more "crocked" if you have an Android phone.

The search results the Google engine delivers are annoyingly good so it improves the search of this site so it is kind of a tradeoff.

I'll try to implement duckduckgo though - the problem is to get it to present the results from this site only.

DDG uses Bing so nobody is perfect...
Edit:
The duckduckgo implementation can easily be implemented but it only presents the traditional ddg search results.
Google is simply a search engine for bjoernvold.com and really gives me the results I need - so overwhelmed by laziness I am giving up on ddg for now.

If you want to use Duckduckgo for searching the site this is the best I can do for you now:
Type this in your duckduckgo search field and add the search word behind it with a space like this:

This will present you with results from this forum only.

Thank you! You da best! That works for ddg.

I do have serious doubts about using Google search - it gives the best results. BUT they are placing adds on our search and they are not paying for it.
I searched for LAMP (server) on this site and without addblock I got a lot of adds for IKEA Lamps
So please use addblock to make the search clean. Google is a damned spy (inspired by your president - no doubt) and we will do what we can to work against it.

I might remove it again too...