Thomas Steichen ([email protected]) commented on the StataCorp Statalist
archive search engine:
> This comment about making the archive searchable reminded me
> of a minor frustration with that search tool. That is, it is
> very difficult to find a particular message with the available
> search tool (even if you know the message is there), mainly
> because of the limited search options available. It appears every
> search is of the nature: find messages that contain KEY1 or KEY2
> or .... That is, adding keys gets you more message hits, not
> fewer. I only say it "appears" that every search is of this
> nature mainly because the search tool has no documentation.
> Perhaps there are ways to modify the search... but I have not
> found the technique.
If Thomas is talking about the search box available at the top
of http://www.stata.com/statalist/archive/ then adding more
keys should NOT get more message hits. Rather, adding
keys should restrict the search. For example, a search for
linux
returns 479 results. A search for
memory
returns 1381 results. However, a search for
linux memory
returns only 83 results. It returns only results containing
both the words "linux" and "memory".
> And a further thought for StataCorp: I would find some help
> documentation about the search tool, itself, to be very useful.
> Could some be added to the Archive search page?
Yes, we should do this. We should also provide a link to the
advanced search page at
http://www.stata.com/search/advsearch.html
which provides much more control over the way results are matched.
This page is fairly self-explanatory, but it also needs documentation
which we should and will add.
Joe McCrary ([email protected]) mentioned using Google to
find results in the Statalist archives. Isabel Canette ([email protected])
points out that it is possible to use Google's "site:" restriction
to restrict results to just those within the StataCorp Statalist
archives. For example
site:www.stata.com +Bonferroni +regression
Or, even more restrictively
site:www.stata.com/statalist/archive +Bonferroni +regression
One downside to using Google is that it may not have indexed every
post in the Statalist archives, while the search engine on www.stata.com
is sure to include all messages.
Alan
([email protected])
*
* For searches and help try:
* http://www.stata.com/support/faqs/res/findit.html
* http://www.stata.com/support/statalist/faq
* http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/
