Support => Tips and Tricks => Topic started by: hiccup on July 03, 2024, 04:06:01 PM
Title: How to Search the Forum • Options • Tips • Tricks
Post by: hiccup on July 03, 2024, 04:06:01 PM
How to search the forum
As a result of the large amount of information that has been growing over all the years since the establishment of this forum, the chances that a (new) user has a question that has never been answered or discussed before is getting smaller and smaller.
Therefore it is important that when a question arises, the first thing to do is searching the forum for answers, so not to force other members repeating the same sort of answers again and again, and so clogging the forum with multiple variations of similar answers being scattered all-over.
At the moment of writing, there are several ways how one can search the forum (or the Wiki or the web), such as:
- Google / Bing / DuckDuckGo et.al - LLMs - The forum's search bar - The forum's custom search (icon) - MusicBee's Custom Forum Search (https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=426af386625354430#gsc.tab=0)
Here are some observations on these options:
Google
Will be the most familiar option for most. The advice for that one is to prepend your search query with: site:getmusicbee.com/forum/ example (https://www.google.com/search?q=site:getmusicbee.com/forum/ yourquery) In that way, only MusicBee's forum will be searched. Note that there must be a space between .../forum/ and your search query.
LLM's
getting better and better day by day Some may be better in finding linguistic type of answers, some may be better in finding suggestions for code. (such as formulas for virtual tags and regexes) A forum topic on that subject can be found here (https://getmusicbee.com/forum/index.php?topic=40969.0).
MusicBee's forum search bar
There are actually two options there:
1. The 'Search something…' search bar at the top-right. 2. The looking glass icon right beside it at the left.
The latter will allow for refining searches by filtering on topic boards, time periods, forum members, etc.
MusicBee Custom Forum Search
This one is rather new. link (https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=426af386625354430#gsc.tab=0)
It is using the regular Google search engine, but is tweaked for use with MusicBee topics and search queries. Some of the benefits is has over a regular Google search:
- it searches both MusicBee's forum and MusicBee's Wiki, ignoring other 'www noise'. - it uses an internal list of synonyms tweaked for this purpose, resulting in more relevant results - its auto-complete suggestions are restricted to forum and Wiki content, vastly improving their value - it will show highlighted auto-completes for certain search terms (recommendations from staff (1), marked by a ⭐) - it will show highlighted search results at the top for certain search terms (relevant reads, suggested by staff (1)) (1)'staff' is you and I. Help improving on this by replying to this thread with good suggestions for highlighted topics.
It also has some useful options:
Forum vs. Wiki
By default search results will include both. You can narrow the results down to what's on either of them by selecting the appropriate tab.
Dark and Light theme
The default link to the Custom Forum Search (https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=426af386625354430#gsc.tab=0) will lead to a dark-themed version. If you type 'light' in the search box you will see a link to a light-themed version as the top result.
Synonyms
this means that you can for example type:
albumart, and the results will include artwork sync, and the results will include synchronise theatre mode, and the results will include theatermode xmlc, and the results will include bitmapped etc.
note that the order of search results may differ depending on the term you use
There are also some 'shortcut search' abbreviations that are useful when doing a search on some more frequently used, takes-longer-to-type search phrases. (see 'Some tips on using search queries' below)
Highlighted auto-completes
Keep an eye on the auto-completes that show up when you start typing. They will usually offer useful suggestions. Some will be highlighted with a coloured star, indicating it may especially be worth a read.
Highlighted results at the top of the search page
These are links to posts, Wiki articles or other content sources that are deemed highly relevant in regard to the search term used.
Which brings us to:
An Invitation To Help Improving On Highlighted Search Results
These highlighted top results are not automatically generated but manually added. So this is (and will probably remain) a work in progress.
You are invited to contribute by helping improving it by making suggestions for additional highlighted results.
It's best to make suggestions for things that are not already showing up somewhere at the top anyway.
If you have performed a search on something for which you know valuable content exists on the forum, the Wiki, or maybe the web, and it was not on the first search results page: Please make a suggestion for it by simply replying to this thread.
It should: - include the specific search words or terms - one (or more) links to the proposed content - a brief one-sentence description of it (optional) These suggestions are then open to be discussed with other members.
Some tips on using search queries
• exclude words by prepending them with a minus sign
e.g.: sync -android will return results that don't have 'android' in them
• define a time span
e.g.: android after:2023-1-1 will show posts containing 'android' for the last 1 1/2 year (as we speak)
android before:2020 will show posts containing 'android' before 2020
you can also combine the two: android after:2024-1-14 before:2024-1-21
• use OR to add words that are optionally included (note that OR actually functions as AND/OR in this situation)
for example: You are looking for a post sometime last year about pitch/speed/bpm, but you are not sure how it was referred to exactly.
if you e.g. do: pitch speed bpm after:2022 it will only find posts that contain all three words
if you do: pitch OR speed OR bpm after:2022 all posts that contain either of them will be found
note: Instead of [space]OR[space] you can also use a vertical line: pitch|speed|bpm after:2022
• quick shortcut abbreviations
These can be used for including a takes-longer-to-type (more frequently used) search term by only typing its abbreviation.
Title: Re: How to Search the Forum • Options • Tips • Tricks
Post by: hiccup on July 03, 2024, 04:08:35 PM
Some useful search terms
When entering a word or a search term in the search bar, the resulting search page may have a Highlighted Top Result that is considered to be a useful link related to the used search term. Here is a list of a couple of them that may be helpful when using the Custom Forum Search (https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=426af386625354430#gsc.tab=0), or when helping other users that have questions.
----------------------------
search tips opens a link to a forum post that contains some search query tips
light opens a link to a light-themed version of the Custom Forum Search page
get started opens a link to a Wiki section that contains useful information for new users
anatomy opens a link to a Wiki section that contains useful information about MusicBee's panels
custom tag opens a link to a forum post that explains how to setup a custom tag
virtual tag opens a link to a forum page that contains all functions available for virtual tags
skinning opens links to forum posts that contain useful information on modifying and creating skins
regex opens links to forum posts that contain useful information on regular expressions
tag mapping opens forum posts that contain useful information on mapping tags between MusicBee, Mp3tag and Picard
aac opens a link to a forum post that explains what to do in case of playback issues with aac/m4a files
linux opens links to posts and a Wiki article that contain useful information related to MusicBee on (or for) Linux
complicated opens a link to a forum post that contains some suggestions for some good but simpler music players
virus opens a link to a forum post that explains why false virus alerts sometimes get triggered
Title: Re: How to Search the Forum • Options • Tips • Tricks
Post by: Dizza17 on July 04, 2024, 12:59:17 AM
Great guide hiccup! Taught me a thing or two. Cheers
Title: Re: How to Search the Forum • Options • Tips • Tricks
Post by: karbock on July 04, 2024, 04:43:00 PM
Goed gedaan, jochie! ;)
Title: Re: How to Search the Forum • Options • Tips • Tricks
Post by: tjinc on July 04, 2024, 06:04:14 PM
Very nice - the custom forum search tool is excellent.
Title: Re: How to Search the Forum • Options • Tips • Tricks
Post by: hiccup on July 05, 2024, 03:21:03 PM
Thanks for the vriendelijke words!
I've added a couple of 'quick abbreviation shortcuts'. See (the bottom of) post #1
Let me know if there are other 'takes-long-to-type' search terms that you frequently use that could be a candidate for this.