Improve cache search function

[+Sol seaker]

I'd love to see the "search" page improved to be able to search a number of different variables at once.

 

For instance, I was just updating my "Sudoku caches" bookmark list. The list is just for Sudoku caches in WA state. I'd like to be able to search for the word "Sudoku" just in WA state. As it was I had to search through 67 pages of Sudoku caches all over the world to find the 4 or 5 new ones in WA State. A bit frustrating.

 

I find I need this function a lot.

Recently I found a puzzle cache that required you find caches with the word, "Cow" in it. I would like to find cow caches within driving distance of my house, at least just in WA State, without having to search through every cow cache in the world.

 

If there is a way to do this that I have missed, then my apologies. Please let me know how.

 

Thank you,

Sol

[+6NoisyHikers]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This gives you a search result list with cache page links. It doesn't solve everything (like being able to do an advanced search on the site!) but it will save you from searching through 67 pages again!

 

[Me and My Monkey]

I, too, would love to see a REAL advance search page for just the same reason. The Google thing sure beats pouring through pages of nothing. Thanks!!

[+geocat_]

Of course, there is a third-party program that does all this...and more

[+The A-Team]

Of course, there is a third-party program that does all this...and more

If you're referring to GSAK, then no, it can't. There's a big difference between downloading a massive number of caches and filtering, and performing a search that returns only the results you want. One is extremely inefficient and wasteful, while the other is very efficient.

[+Sol seaker]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This gives you a search result list with cache page links. It doesn't solve everything (like being able to do an advanced search on the site!) but it will save you from searching through 67 pages again!

 

 

This is helpful, thank you, but I still get caches from Washington County, Maryland, cow travel bugs and all sorts of other flotsam and jetsam.

It would be nice to have this function upgraded on this site. Thanks.

[+StarBrand]

I have long advocated an expansion of the criteria available in PQs to include thing like keyword searches, include/exclude by username, include/exclude by area and more.

 

I know that improving the speed of PQs is a priority that must be addressed before adding more criteria - but it is still a wish list.

[+Lil Devil]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This is helpful, thank you, but I still get caches from Washington County, Maryland, cow travel bugs and all sorts of other flotsam and jetsam.

Refine that Google search further to:

 

site:geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx cow washington

 

and you'll only get caches. You might still get caches in a Washington county somewhere, but most other flotsam and jetsam is gone.

[+RecipeForDisaster]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This is helpful, thank you, but I still get caches from Washington County, Maryland, cow travel bugs and all sorts of other flotsam and jetsam.

Refine that Google search further to:

 

site:geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx cow washington

 

and you'll only get caches. You might still get caches in a Washington county somewhere, but most other flotsam and jetsam is gone.

I've often wished I could search by any criteria(name, terrain, etc.) AND restrict either zip code or state. Type of cache and other restrictions together would be great, too. Also, wouldn't it be nice to restrict PQ hits by how many DNFs? If I want to take children out and don't want frustration, I'll want to avoid caches with 4 or more consecutive DNFs, for instance.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This is helpful, thank you, but I still get caches from Washington County, Maryland, cow travel bugs and all sorts of other flotsam and jetsam.

Refine that Google search further to:

 

site:geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx cow washington

 

and you'll only get caches. You might still get caches in a Washington county somewhere, but most other flotsam and jetsam is gone.

I've often wished I could search by any criteria(name, terrain, etc.) AND restrict either zip code or state. Type of cache and other restrictions together would be great, too. Also, wouldn't it be nice to restrict PQ hits by how many DNFs? If I want to take children out and don't want frustration, I'll want to avoid caches with 4 or more consecutive DNFs, for instance.

 

This sort of search syntax is available using the Lucene search API. Essentially, every cache listing could be represented as a Lucene "document" which might have fields such as "name", "terrain", "cachetype", "state" etc. Once the index is built a search for something like cow state:Washington terrain:3 would list all caches in the State of Washington with a terrain = 3 with the word "cow" in any of the fields (i.e. in the cache title or the description). It also supports range queries so something like cachetype:unknown difficulty:[3 to 5] would list unknown caches with a difficulty of 3 or higher. Lucene "documents" can be built and indexed from a variety of sources and it's fairly easy to build them using database queries. If you're wondering about if something like this would scale to 2 million caches, we're using Solr (which uses Lucene under the hood) for indexing our university library catalog, which has over 9 million records and has a lot more fields for each record than a cache listing might have.

[+Sol seaker]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This is helpful, thank you, but I still get caches from Washington County, Maryland, cow travel bugs and all sorts of other flotsam and jetsam.

Refine that Google search further to:

 

site:geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx cow washington

 

and you'll only get caches. You might still get caches in a Washington county somewhere, but most other flotsam and jetsam is gone.

I've often wished I could search by any criteria(name, terrain, etc.) AND restrict either zip code or state. Type of cache and other restrictions together would be great, too. Also, wouldn't it be nice to restrict PQ hits by how many DNFs? If I want to take children out and don't want frustration, I'll want to avoid caches with 4 or more consecutive DNFs, for instance.

 

This sort of search syntax is available using the Lucene search API. Essentially, every cache listing could be represented as a Lucene "document" which might have fields such as "name", "terrain", "cachetype", "state" etc. Once the index is built a search for something like cow state:Washington terrain:3 would list all caches in the State of Washington with a terrain = 3 with the word "cow" in any of the fields (i.e. in the cache title or the description). It also supports range queries so something like cachetype:unknown difficulty:[3 to 5] would list unknown caches with a difficulty of 3 or higher. Lucene "documents" can be built and indexed from a variety of sources and it's fairly easy to build them using database queries. If you're wondering about if something like this would scale to 2 million caches, we're using Solr (which uses Lucene under the hood) for indexing our university library catalog, which has over 9 million records and has a lot more fields for each record than a cache listing might have.

 

 

Hi NY Paddle cacher.

thanks so much for your response.

Do you have an English translation for that?

 

Seriously, I"m sure this will be of great help to many people reading this thread. I'm afraid I'm not employed in the computer field, nor do I use anything very high tech in my occupation, so I'd be lucky to remember how to find cow caches on Google really.

I understand a whole lot of cachers are really high tech, so I'm sure this will help them.

There are probably a few of us left that are stone age folk who use a rock for a mouse and keep our computer work to a minimum. For those few of us, it would be great to have a great search engine on geocaching.com where I can find cow caches in WA state without having to go through every cow cache in Germany and Antarctica before I find the one down the street.

Thanks for your input!!

[+NYPaddleCacher]

Until they can sort this out, you can type this into the Google search bar:

 

site: geocaching.com cow washington

 

This is helpful, thank you, but I still get caches from Washington County, Maryland, cow travel bugs and all sorts of other flotsam and jetsam.

Refine that Google search further to:

 

site:geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx cow washington

 

and you'll only get caches. You might still get caches in a Washington county somewhere, but most other flotsam and jetsam is gone.

I've often wished I could search by any criteria(name, terrain, etc.) AND restrict either zip code or state. Type of cache and other restrictions together would be great, too. Also, wouldn't it be nice to restrict PQ hits by how many DNFs? If I want to take children out and don't want frustration, I'll want to avoid caches with 4 or more consecutive DNFs, for instance.

 

This sort of search syntax is available using the Lucene search API. Essentially, every cache listing could be represented as a Lucene "document" which might have fields such as "name", "terrain", "cachetype", "state" etc. Once the index is built a search for something like cow state:Washington terrain:3 would list all caches in the State of Washington with a terrain = 3 with the word "cow" in any of the fields (i.e. in the cache title or the description). It also supports range queries so something like cachetype:unknown difficulty:[3 to 5] would list unknown caches with a difficulty of 3 or higher. Lucene "documents" can be built and indexed from a variety of sources and it's fairly easy to build them using database queries. If you're wondering about if something like this would scale to 2 million caches, we're using Solr (which uses Lucene under the hood) for indexing our university library catalog, which has over 9 million records and has a lot more fields for each record than a cache listing might have.

 

 

Hi NY Paddle cacher.

thanks so much for your response.

Do you have an English translation for that?

 

Okay, forget about the mention of Lucene and Solr. It's just an example of search technology that is quite commonly used the will provide the kind of search experience you want. If I might try to simplify things, think of any cache as a "thing" that has many different attributes (title, description, size, type, difficulty, terrain, etc. All of those attributes, can be included in a search index, and the search syntax allows you filter what your looking for about "things" using any combination of those attributes. If it's done right you don't really have to know complicated search syntax. All of those attributes can be used as filters after an initial search. For example, if you go to a online shopping that sells clothing you might just enter "pants" into a search box. Then it will let you filter by gender (only show mens pants), style, set a price range, color, etc. Eventually you might get a list mens casual pants that cost less than $60 and are available in blue.

The same idea can be applied to a geocache search interface.

 

 

Seriously, I"m sure this will be of great help to many people reading this thread. I'm afraid I'm not employed in the computer field, nor do I use anything very high tech in my occupation, so I'd be lucky to remember how to find cow caches on Google really.

I understand a whole lot of cachers are really high tech, so I'm sure this will help them.

There are probably a few of us left that are stone age folk who use a rock for a mouse and keep our computer work to a minimum. For those few of us, it would be great to have a great search engine on geocaching.com where I can find cow caches in WA state without having to go through every cow cache in Germany and Antarctica before I find the one down the street.

Thanks for your input!!

 

Part of the problem for your cow caches search is that unlike most of the ways to search for caches, a keyword search doesn't include a "center point" (or more accurately, proximity to a center point) to order the results. For most other searches you can specifically indicate a center point (based on an address, zipcode, home location, specific coordinates, etc) but not for a keyword search. It really wouldn't be that difficult to use ones home location (if it has been provided) as a the default center point for a keyword search.

[+duncanhoyle]

Some more advanced search functionality would be really useful. A friend is in to completing challenge caches and wanted to find caches with specified colours in the titles. She doesn't use GSAK or any other offline db and maintaining such a large DB for the whole of Germany, UK and parts of Holland where she regularly caches would be unfeasible. The only solution is to use the same qualifying caches as everyone else. It would be so much easier to be able to search on key words.

 

I recently got interested in challenge caches and thought I'd search for all the mysteries with 'Challenge' in the title in the UK. Looks like I can't and can't create such a PQ.

[+Me&Geppetto]

I'd like to see a filter added for searching by cache size. If I have a trackable I want to search for other size, excluding nanos or micros

[+StarBrand]

I'd like to see a filter added for searching by cache size. If I have a trackable I want to search for other size, excluding nanos or micros

You can always search with Pocket Queries to get size.

[+PEPREO]

I would like to see a search function kinda like on the iOS version where you can select and unselect:

CACHE TYPE,

D+T,

ATTRIBUTES,

SEARCH RADIUS (maybe around coords or cache or town name...)

[+niraD]

I would like to see a search function kinda like on the iOS version where you can select and unselect:

CACHE TYPE,

D+T,

ATTRIBUTES,

SEARCH RADIUS (maybe around coords or cache or town name...)

As a premium member, you have access to pocket queries. You don't even need to run a PQ. You can just "preview" it, which doesn't count against your 5 PQs run per day quota, and which functions pretty much as the kind of advanced search you just described.

 

For more info on PQs, see: http://www.markwell.us/pq.htm

[+Sol seaker]

I'd like to see a filter added for searching by cache size. If I have a trackable I want to search for other size, excluding nanos or micros

You can always search with Pocket Queries to get size.

 

I would like to see a search function kinda like on the iOS version where you can select and unselect:

CACHE TYPE,

D+T,

ATTRIBUTES,

SEARCH RADIUS (maybe around coords or cache or town name...)

As a premium member, you have access to pocket queries. You don't even need to run a PQ. You can just "preview" it, which doesn't count against your 5 PQs run per day quota, and which functions pretty much as the kind of advanced search you just described.

 

For more info on PQs, see: http://www.markwell.us/pq.htm

 

 

Pocket queries are not a good replacement for a decent search engine.

 

A website like Geocaching.com should have a decent search engine. Most websites do, even those that serve far fewer customers.

 

Pocket queries have a whole lot of limitations, starting with my example of searching for "cow" caches, there are a whole lot of limitations that make it not a search engine, it is a pocket query creator; the work you have to go through to create a query and the time it takes vs. just hitting a "search" button; people who are not premium members can't use it, when any member should be able to do a simple search, etc. etc.

 

A decent search is a very basic function of any website.

I can't see any reasonable excuse for not having a decent search function.

[+tumbleweed42]

I would like to be able to search along a route on my iPhone app without having to create and download a pocket query. I know this is a premium only function, but so is the searching for premium only caches that only shows up once you get a premium membership.

[+tumbleweed42]

I would also like to see the "new search from here" function on the iPhone app have the option to retain the original search criteria, esp. to exclude found caches.

[+geodarts]

I would also like to see the "new search from here" function on the iPhone app have the option to retain the original search criteria, esp. to exclude found caches.

 

I often use the Advance Search function on Groundspeak's app since it gives the capability to search by keyword within a specific area, as requested by the OP. The additional "search from here" query does not filter the new search, but it will exclude found caches as long as that is specified in the settings menu.

 

I have made requests similar to the OP because doing a keyword search through the web site is almost useless without a geographical limitation.

[+Oxford Stone]

I'd like to see all of a CO's caches on a map. Unless I'm doing somethnig wrong, having got them as a list, "Map Location" just takes me to a map centred on the cache at the top of the list, and it's of all caches not just the CO's.

[+tumbleweed42]

I would also like to see the "new search from here" function on the iPhone app have the option to retain the original search criteria, esp. to exclude found caches.

 

I often use the Advance Search function on Groundspeak's app since it gives the capability to search by keyword within a specific area, as requested by the OP. The additional "search from here" query does not filter the new search, but it will exclude found caches as long as that is specified in the settings menu.

 

I have made requests similar to the OP because doing a keyword search through the web site is almost useless without a geographical limitation.

 

Thanks for the tip! I had set up my settings before the upgrade and I don't think this was an option before then. This was a big help!

-tumbleweed42

[+PEPREO]

it would be much easyer to add a search function similiar to the one in the iOS-App, just by selcting the required attributes, D/T or cachetype for example...