You know I love this place, but the 3-character minimum on the search function is driving me crazy!! For example, I had heard of an amazing little handicapable dragon named LG whose owner is a member here - so I tried to find the thread by searching for "LG" but it wouldn't let me. Finally found it here eventually viewtopic.php?f=3&t=82921. I've also been extremely frustrated when I can't search for something in relation to vitamin "D3", or like one time I was looking for something that had to do with a "T8" fixture.
Is there some way I can get around this through the advanced search options? Is the 3-character minimum really even necessary to implement at all?
There are a few problems with having less than that.
1) The site would have to index (making it searchable) every 2 character word. As it is, 3 characters is a lot of extra processing it does each time a post is made.
2) 2 characters are very likely to have false positive matches.
In general, the need for two character search terms is small, and the cost is large. I think the original default for the forum software was 4 or 5 characters. I could TRY is, but it will not apply to any past posts. That would end up causing the site to do a TON of processing to index 2-letter words historically. I'm just concerned about the load this may cause. The character limit is a "performance" setting in the software.
There are a few problems with having less than that.
1) The site would have to index (making it searchable) every 2 character word. As it is, 3 characters is a lot of extra processing it does each time a post is made.
2) 2 characters are very likely to have false positive matches.
In general, the need for two character search terms is small, and the cost is large. I think the original default for the forum software was 4 or 5 characters. I could TRY is, but it will not apply to any past posts. That would end up causing the site to do a TON of processing to index 2-letter words historically. I'm just concerned about the load this may cause. The character limit is a "performance" setting in the software.