Date:         Tue, 2 Dec 2008 21:34:18 -0500
Reply-To:     pickle vanagon <greenvanagon@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         pickle vanagon <greenvanagon@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Re: google search and the archives
Comments: To: Richard A Jones <jones@colorado.edu>
In-Reply-To:  <49347CE1.8040900@colorado.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

At the risk of repeating myself, I'm inserting below the response to this
observation which I posted earler.
short summary: it works for some keywords for this message but not for
others.

And for some messages, it doesn't work for any keywords at all.
-Wes

-------BEGIN INSERT-----
Tom,
I admit, I didn't test out that example as much as I should have.  But
notice something interesting: if you try searching with
"site:gerry.vanagon.com acura head gasket" you get nothing with you method,
even though all of those terms appear in the message.   Why does it find it
with overheating but not head gasket?  That is truly a mystery to me.  Maybe
it has something to do with the fact that "acura" and "overheating" are both
terms that actually appear in the subject of the message.

Because of the way the site command works, searching with site:
gerry.vanagon.com doesn't find anything more than you get with site:
vanagon.com.  The second one searches for anything whose domain ENDS with
vanagon.com  That includes gerry.vanagon.com.

Here's one that I really think your method won't find even if you search for
terms in the subject:
http://gerry.vanagon.com/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A2=ind0705d&L=vanagon&F=&S=&P=5436
(for example, try site:gerry.vanagon.com Black oxide finish).

The important thing is, the google search doesn't actually work for all the
messages.  And its important to realize this, because it means that the
archives are a better source of information than google makes them out to
be.

-Wes
----------END INSERT------



On Mon, Dec 1, 2008 at 7:10 PM, Richard A Jones <jones@colorado.edu> wrote:

> What am I missing?  This thread started with the
> observation that searching the archives just doesn't
> work.
>
> It works for me; I must be doing something wrong.
> I searched, from
> http://gerry.vanagon.com/cgi-bin/wa.exe?S1=vanagon
> for "acura overheating" from January 2001 to
> January 2007.  In a few seconds under 4 minutes,
> it returned the three relevant messages from
> November 2006.
>
> I tried again with Jan 2006 to Jan 2007, as if I
> knew what I was looking for, and it took 45 seconds.
>
> I usually search in several-year intervals, like the
> first.  Is 4 minutes "not working?"  I'm retired, so
> I have 4 minutes....
>
> Richard
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> +    To unsubscribe from the Vanagon List send an e-mail to
> +    listserv@gerry.vanagon.com with SIGNOFF VANAGON
> +    in the body of the message.
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>

------------------------------------------------------------
+    To unsubscribe from the Vanagon List send an e-mail to
+    listserv@gerry.vanagon.com with SIGNOFF VANAGON
+    in the body of the message.
------------------------------------------------------------