[WikiEN-l] full-text searching since the Vector switch in en.wikipedia

[Ray Saintonge]

Amir E. Aharoni wrote:
> On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 17:40, Steve Summit <scs at eskimo.com> wrote:
>   
>> Carcharoth wrote:
>>     
>>> not "search" functionality, but seeing as Google's default is
>>> "search" not "go", I suspect more people are used to getting a list
>>> of search results and clicking the top one than might be realised.
>>>       
>> Indeed.  If there's to be one box, clearly it should be "Search",
>> not "Go".  (And the search results page already has a "Wikipedia has
>> an article on %s" link right at the top, if there's an exact match.
>> So, retconned, "Go" is/was kinda like the Google "I'm feeling lucky"
>> button.)
>>     
> ... Yes, it makes a lot of sense that there would be such a button in
> Wikipedia, because quite a lot of the people who type "obama" probably
> just want the article about the president (but someone should research
> how many exactly). Forcing them to see a list of results and have them
> click on the first one wastes some time.
>
> But it also makes sense to be able to run a full-text search as easily
> as possible.
>
>   
I rarely "feel lucky" with Google.

The search function should also make clear what Boolean options are 
available.

The importance of beta systems can be misleading.  Most of us who are 
not techno-geeks feel clueless about what is being done there, and are 
satisfied with a system that is familiar and works without any 
surprises.  Even editing ".js" files is beyond us.

The Classic skin was the standard when I first joined, and I'm happy to 
stick with it.

Ec