36

A better search on Designer News

over 8 years ago from , Product Designer, Author & Maker

I ♥ DN as we all do. But the search is still sucks even after two updates that have been done :(

Mostly I have two major use-cases for search on DN:

*1. Finding the thing that I saw recently on DN. * “Oh, I remember this cool free font that was featured like two weeks ago, that’s exactly what I need for my current project! I’ll try to find it.” In this case I just want to search for “font” and filter the results from newest to oldest.

*2. Finding the best thing in specific area. * My friend who’s project manager asks me to recommend him a basic prototyping tool. I want to go to DN and search for “prototype” + filter according to most upvoted posts cause DN-community understands this field the best and upvotes count most probably reflects how good the product is.

For now both of these options are impossible. I suggest to add a functionality that will allow to filter the results by upvotes / date.

Are you agree?

Quick suggestion:

Image alt

15 comments

  • Kelly SuttonKelly Sutton, over 8 years ago

    Hi folks,

    We're listening and looking at better and better ways to do search. Keep the suggestions coming. :)

    19 points
  • Evan PEvan P, over 8 years ago

    I'd love to just be able to toggle between searching for stories and users. If you try searching for anything that is even remotely common you will have to wade through almost every user profile.

    I'd also love to be directly linked to a reply when I get one, instead of a landing page with the thread... But that is for another time.

    7 points
  • Pablo StanleyPablo Stanley, over 8 years ago

    I have a hard time just finding it on the menu. It's like they want to hide it. Somewhere on the top header nav (next to jobs or your user settings) would make more sense.

    5 points
    • Kwan Man ChengKwan Man Cheng, over 8 years ago

      I agree.

      I'm new to Designer News and find that I have to relearn where the search tool is. I keep assuming it's on the right side of the nav bar but find my name there instead.

      If the search tool is destined to stay on the left side nav, it'd be really helpful to just display a search field instead of a link to the search page.

      1 point
  • Artiom DashinskyArtiom Dashinsky, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )

    Got confused with the Markdown in the post, here is the image:

    Image alt

    3 points
  • Daniel GoldenDaniel Golden, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )

    tbh, I've found the best way to search DN is still via google: site:news.layervault.com search-term-here

    p.s. We're directed to list feature requests in the feature requests thread in the footer, but it's no longer there.

    1 point
  • Hideyuki MatsubaraHideyuki Matsubara, over 8 years ago

    I agree.

    0 points
  • Namit ChadhaNamit Chadha, over 8 years ago

    Perhaps use Algolia like HN? https://www.algolia.com/

    It's got great fuzzy matching and is really fast so you can do search as you type.

    0 points
    • adrian ioadrian io, over 8 years ago

      I was going to suggest this as well, works great on HN, but then looked into it and it's a paid solution. Might be better longterm to improve the home grown solution.

      0 points
    • Ryan LeFevreRyan LeFevre, over 8 years ago

      I've suggested Algolia as well to Kelly. We use it on Watchville and it's awesome.

      0 points
  • Cody IddingsCody Iddings, over 8 years ago

    Can the search page have a toggle "recently viewed"??

    0 points