[Sigia-l] String search question

[Michael Kay]

The interpretation of the search string is but one factor. Another factor 
that should add a lot of weight is to look at real queries and see what 
results they return. If you assume an exact match, do most queries still 
give results? If you assume an OR type match, are the results still relevant?

In the former case, I have been to e-commerce sites where I search for 
something I know they have and I get no results. That indicates that their 
default is too restrictive. In the latter case, many corporate sites will 
net hundreds of results in all verticals that do me little good because the 
correct result is buried somewhere. (Well-ordered results can sometimes 
compensate for this case putting the more exact matches at the top, but I 
haven't seen this enough.)

Here's my $0.02 on the behavior:
My personal preference is Google-like behavior, results must match all 
parts of search query, but not as an exact string. Allow quote marks and 
boolean for advanced users.

--Mike



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Michael Kay
Information Architecture - User Experience
Author, The Web Wizard's Guide to Flash - http://www.peep.org/wizard/