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Old 03-01-2011, 02:01 PM
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Richard K Richard K is offline
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Default Search .. sorting through old posts

Joe Hartson started a thread a few days ago about using some of the basic information already posted on this site and/or adding some basic skills type of posts. I think he was also looking for "what would you like to see" suggestions.

Consequently I tried the seach function on the toolbar. I typed in "flange" ,thinking of bending a flange on the edge of a round air cleaner cover for instance,and pushed the search or go button.

Wow! lots of pages of threads. Many (most) of the thread titles did not give me any clue of how it might apply to my flanging question. One post, a very good post, on building a radiator came up because the post included some item about soldering a radiator tube to the tank flange. Another that came up was a post Kerry made a while back on rounding the door corners on his roadster; a bit closer to what I was expecting to find.

Next I went back to the search function and again entered flange as the search term but changed the "threads" choice to "posts". Hit go and got another long list of posts similar to above. The first on the list was Kerry P's "tool holster". What does this have to do with flanges? a bit down the line of photos, he shows his "flange tool" in one pocket.
http://allmetalshaping.com/showthrea...ghlight=flange
Now there is a simple tool that has to do with basic flange work.

Point being; the "search function" is there and it works. The rsults require some sifting through to find applicable info. The "posts" choice instead of the default "threads" choice, brings up a longer listing but each item is the single post that contains your search term. The "thread" choice brings up the whole thread which I then would need to page through all the posts in that thread.

It is a bit tedious, Yes. However there is a wealth of information tucked away for anyone to use.

Another thing I like to do is browse through the photo albums. takes some time, but is enjoyable and can lead to some discoveries also.
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Old 03-01-2011, 02:32 PM
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Richard, very good post. The search function will get you to a lot of available information that the reader can us. Many of the members don't take the time to read or investigate what is available here. I do like you do and look through the photo albums also. Lots of good stuff there. It takes time to learn metal shaping, I've only been at it for 50 years and I still learn every day from what is posted here. Thanks for starting this thread.
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Old 03-01-2011, 04:08 PM
mark g mark g is offline
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I noticed one thread recently got re-titled to better reflect the content of the thread. I thought that was a good idea, just to make the info more accessible to the search function. It would help to generally consider searchability when titling a new thread.

-Mark
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Old 03-01-2011, 06:45 PM
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RatRockx RatRockx is offline
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Thanks for sharing this. I've been using the search function quite a bit since I became a member. I was sometimes shifting through 8 pages of posts before I found the search-term.
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Old 03-01-2011, 09:25 PM
Dyce Dyce is offline
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If you start on the forum page and select a specific catagory it helps narrow it down. Select "General discussion" for example, and at the top of the page under the toolbar you can select forum tools or search.

This forum is better then most. We have some good houskeepers here
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Old 03-02-2011, 12:10 AM
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Kerry Pinkerton Kerry Pinkerton is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dyce View Post
...This forum is better then most. We have some good houskeepers here
Thanks Jeff. We try. Seriously it helps that we have some clear rules and everyone understands that we're kind of anal about staying on topic.

That said, it's just not possible to index every possible thread and subject so a single search goes right to the subject that someone is looking for. Too much data, too many variables, and too much subjectivity. The real problem is that what is the real nugget to one person isn't to the next. About all we can do is try and keep things in a few concise forums and rename threads if they evolve into something that is different than the original title. Like the 'How do I make this shape' thread that we renamed 'How do I make a reverse'.

The search function is really good but it does have limits. When it points into a big thread because you have to scan the whole thing to find it. The roadster thread is up to nearly 300 posts now....
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