[Pydotorg-redesign] how to search the site

[Tim Parkin]

>>http://pollenation.net/assets/public/python-google.png
>
>I'd still prefer the 'Google' IN the Search Button, and I would prefer
>the site doc starship newsgroups mailing lists www checkboxes below.
>This would give me a nice wide search window, another plus.  But
>I also want a way to click 'get a more advanced search page'
If we use google we won't get any more advanced features or sub searches
etc. It's a wideley discovered fact that only about 0.5% of people use
the advanced search anyway although for those that do it's a very
important feature. Taking this into account, a basic full search should
be available everywhere and an advanced search should be available on
the results page. These advanced search options are the reason I for one
would like to us a dedicated search like lupy. And no we can't change
the size of the google logo and it looked silly inside the button
unfortunately.

>'External resources' is a bad wording to put on a search box that
>is to be read, let alone used, by newbies.  They have no idea what
>is and what is not external.  And so they feel stupid, as if they
>were supposed to know this already.  This feels worse than not
>'knowing what the starship is' -- because it is open ended.
External resources is not the search box, it's a quick link to outside
resources (trying to get rid of all those external links whilst making
them still quickly available) so it obviously needs making more obvious
that it is at the moment. I'll think on that one.

>I am not opposed to spending space on search boxes, if it is useful
>space that does stuff and makes searching easier.  I like sites that
>look as if the people cared more about the searchers than about their
>prose.  Some sites it's 'yap yap yap, will these people never shut
>up and tell me how to find what I want? Admittedly, it is ads that
>gets this effect out of me the most, but it is always there'
As I said I think it's great to have a search box on every page but just
a simple one with room for two or three words. Anything more advanced
can use the 'advanced search' facility, which they should only be using
if they don't get results from the simple search. My tendency now is to
try to make the basic search as useful as possible (with domain specific
results and offering alternatives) instead of forcing people to try to
use an advanced search, athough the advanced search should still be
available.

Tim