Hey, These days searching gives me headache. There is too many information out there. I frequently have to use complicated and cleverly thought query syntax to narrow my searches (same for Google). I always change my query if I have to visit more than the first 20 results (again, same for Google). I never realized that personal information space could be so vast and varied :-/.
So I ask you for suggestions, how to make searches efficient ? Please suggest only tangible methods e.g. no neural network based context-sensitive feedback tracking system to determine what the user had in mind. We will leave dashboard for that :) E.g. frequently I know what kind of things I am looking for - a photo, an email, a contact, an application etc. The query syntax allows you to type "filetype:image" or "type:Contact" or "source:application" to specify the needs. But thinking and typing that elaborate thing will often take enough time to destroy my desire in continuing searching. Could be add interesting query syntax to make it easier ? It has to be short and easy. But it should not deviate from the obvious meaning e.g. if we decide adding "videos" to the query would only query videos then that would destroy searches with the intent of finding the word "video" in the data/metadata. Anything that could be done on the UI side ? A drop box of every possible data type ? My problem with a drop box is if it is naively filled with entries, I have to click on it, scroll through the list and then click again to select the type ... thats 2 clicks and a huge careful scrolling! This will require an ongoing effort, so be creative. Email partially inspired by looking at the deskbar, gnome-do, kbeaglebar etc. On small systems, they work nicely and return you the apps or contacts etc. But they are designed to encourage you to look in the first 5-10 results only. That does not work in a long used system with lots of different data. Note that quicksilver or launcher specific apps do not have this problem since they already search within a narrow search scope. Thanks, - dBera -- ----------------------------------------------------- Debajyoti Bera @ http://dtecht.blogspot.com beagle / KDE fan Mandriva / Inspiron-1100 user _______________________________________________ Dashboard-hackers mailing list Dashboard-hackers@gnome.org http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/dashboard-hackers