MobileRead Forums - View Single Post

nikkie · 10-29-2020, 04:23 PM

Hey folks.

I work at Smashwords and wanted to request some feedback from interested folks about our search engine. It has changed quite a lot over the last 10 years and gone through a number of backend iterations but remains a sore point for some of our users. Unfortunately we aren't the size of Google and so we can't do everything they do, but I would like to make things a bit better for users when possible.

Some background:
We replaced the primary search engine technology around 5 years ago and built a completely new index, but at the time left the frontend as it had been for a long time. It searched the database for exact matches for titles, authors, series, and isbn but deferred the full text to our search engine. The exact matches showed above the full text results, so often when we got complaints it was unclear whether they were referring to the suggested type-specific results (authors, series, titles) or the full text results below. Since then we have changed this and moved more of these searches to directed searches for title, tag, or full search.

At that same time we added an auto-complete feature that could quickly recognize and auto-suggest titles, authors, and series so that those could be searched automatically and for the full title if you know it. When we added auto-complete it didn't quote the title, so at the time it was still possible to get semi-poor results when searching from the autosuggestion, but since then we have changed that so those results should always return good results for anything auto-suggested by the search box.

I'm in the process of re-designing the way our index works as well as a complete re-design of the frontend for search to make it easier to find books, series, and authors. We also have a goal of making filtering by book properties (word count, categories, etc) possible and searches by topic or tag more sortable by useful properties so people can more easily use the search engine for discovery of new books.

I've looked through anonymized search data from our logs and have some idea of what users are trying to find and why but would like to hear directly from interested readers (or authors). If you are using our search engine for something other than finding books to purchase (think of davidfor and his plugin here), feel free to comment as well.

If you have feedback, could you provide info on:

the kinds of things you search for
what works well with the current system
frustrations with the current system

Apologies if this isn't the correct area for this. It's been a while since I was active here so I don't remember all the norms. Feel free to move this to a different area if needed.

Thanks in advance!

10-29-2020, 04:23 PM	#1
nikkie Guru Posts: 614 Karma: 73700 Join Date: Oct 2009 Location: WA, USA Device: Android, Kindle Paperwhite, lots of ancient readers	Smashwords Search Hey folks. I work at Smashwords and wanted to request some feedback from interested folks about our search engine. It has changed quite a lot over the last 10 years and gone through a number of backend iterations but remains a sore point for some of our users. Unfortunately we aren't the size of Google and so we can't do everything they do, but I would like to make things a bit better for users when possible. Some background: We replaced the primary search engine technology around 5 years ago and built a completely new index, but at the time left the frontend as it had been for a long time. It searched the database for exact matches for titles, authors, series, and isbn but deferred the full text to our search engine. The exact matches showed above the full text results, so often when we got complaints it was unclear whether they were referring to the suggested type-specific results (authors, series, titles) or the full text results below. Since then we have changed this and moved more of these searches to directed searches for title, tag, or full search. At that same time we added an auto-complete feature that could quickly recognize and auto-suggest titles, authors, and series so that those could be searched automatically and for the full title if you know it. When we added auto-complete it didn't quote the title, so at the time it was still possible to get semi-poor results when searching from the autosuggestion, but since then we have changed that so those results should always return good results for anything auto-suggested by the search box. I'm in the process of re-designing the way our index works as well as a complete re-design of the frontend for search to make it easier to find books, series, and authors. We also have a goal of making filtering by book properties (word count, categories, etc) possible and searches by topic or tag more sortable by useful properties so people can more easily use the search engine for discovery of new books. I've looked through anonymized search data from our logs and have some idea of what users are trying to find and why but would like to hear directly from interested readers (or authors). If you are using our search engine for something other than finding books to purchase (think of davidfor and his plugin here), feel free to comment as well. If you have feedback, could you provide info on: the kinds of things you search for what works well with the current system frustrations with the current system Apologies if this isn't the correct area for this. It's been a while since I was active here so I don't remember all the norms. Feel free to move this to a different area if needed. Thanks in advance!