Search tutorial for HoL

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on May 9, 2018 at 12:15

'Search (or G power - L col Ho Pg)' (embarrassed titter). That was me trying to give directions in a very limited space - it took me a while to work out what it meant and I wrote it!

It's directing you to the left-hand column of the home page - the G power was my (pretty crap)  way of saying search HoL using the power of Google.

So, cryptics aside, my default mode of search is to use a site-specific search for HoL on Google. You can do that using the box in the left hand column of the home page. I find it generally pretty effective. I sometimes use the native search function as well, but always as a fallback.

If I know precisely what I want I might go to a post or a photo and use one of the tags (but you have to be on a post to access the tags - no tag cloud or even listing comes with this software).The tagging feature is not the best aspect of this software.

It is case specific. So a tag for 'Kebab'  won't link to a tag for 'kebab' (users are asked to use lower case only, but it's tough to get out of the habit of using initial capitals!).

Tagging on HoL is also feature specific. So a tag for 'salisbury' in the events or pictures won't link to one in the forum.

It also depends on people tagging posts - which few people do. Sometimes, I might tag a set of things so I can find them easily or an issue is one of ongoing interest - but don't count on it!. I also tag the trades and services posts when I get a chance, but it seems that people like brand new recommendations and don't always look at the existing ones anyway. 

If you want to peruse forum posts with a broader sweep, you can always look at post categories. If you click on the word Forum in the black bar under the HoL banner, you'll go to the forum listings page. There you can use the using the right hand drop down box (top right) to sort posts by category or discussion. If sorted by discussion then another box appears and offers some additional options.

Historical pictures are grouped into albums by area and in some cases also tagged.

I hope that helps a bit.

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on May 9, 2018 at 12:21

Cryptic directions now changed. Hope it's better! Once you use it, you can see the syntax employed in the search box on Google. It can be used on any site on the web.Here's the syntax:

search term/s + 'site:' + url

e.g.

salisbury site:http://www.harringayonline.com

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Permalink Reply by Hugh on May 9, 2018 at 12:27

.....and having written all that, I find that there is a 'how to' in our 'How to on HoL' section - link in the grey strip at the bottom of any page

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Permalink Reply by adamvietnam on May 9, 2018 at 12:53

Nice one - thanks Hugh

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