Find a Cache by the Name?

[+Team Papu]

I have almost six years searched all the caches (also when logging) with the cache name - where is that function now, I cannot find it??

Few years ago it was even better, because you could just write some part of the name, even in the middle of it, and the page was found. After that they downgraded this and I had to know the first word of the name...but now...

At least I cannot get anything out when writing the name in the field: “Geocache Name Contains ...”

 

It cannot be true that you have to move some of the filters and that there would be no possibility to directly find a cache by the name???

 

And no one can remember those GC numbers of different caches, I only remember the names - always! This bug cannot be real - HELP ME!!!

[Moun10Bike]

You mean something like this, which shows all caches in Spain with "challenge" in the name?

 

https://www.geocaching.com/play/search?kw=Challenge&c=186

 

Just avoid entering an origin search point and instead click "Add Filters". Then, add the keyword you want to search on in the "Geocache Name Contains..." field and enter a country or region in the "Search Only In..." field.

[cezanne]

You mean something like this, which shows all caches in Spain with "challenge" in the name?

 

https://www.geocaching.com/play/search?kw=Challenge&c=186

 

Just avoid entering an origin search point and instead click "Add Filters". Then, add the keyword you want to search on in the "Geocache Name Contains..." field and enter a country or region in the "Search Only In..." field.

 

Just out of curiosity (I cannot use the approach above anyway as Groundspeak has blocked all filters for basic members):

Does this mean that a name search is not any longer possible without providing a country?

 

The old search allowed searching for all caches worldwide with a certain name.

[+Team Papu]

Yes, thanks, I got it now...but I still can't believe that I cannot get the result just with the name and without writing/choosing the area - I have to do these two different things for every cache when earlier I got the same result with just ONE WORD in JUST ONE field!!!

 

And what then when I remember the cache name, but not the place...I drove in December through Europe and through 14 different countries in 1,5 weeks and found caches everywhere. Now when I want to log them and if I don't remember which was in which country? Should I start to guess? That is so time consuming and stupid!!!

 

That is so basic function that it should be able to do from that main page in your search and without any filters!!!! CHANGE THAT BACK!!!

[Moun10Bike]

Keyword search was replaced a while back with "cache name starts with..." because of the impact true keyword searching had on the database. With the new search, true keyword search is back, but yes, it must be limited to within a country or region to avoid performance issues.

[cezanne]

Keyword search was replaced a while back with "cache name starts with..." because of the impact true keyword searching had on the database.

 

I have been aware of that. I had however a search in mind where someone enters the complete cache name. Sometimes it is interesting to see

whether a cache name has already been used somewhere in the world.

 

With the new search, true keyword search is back, but yes, it must be limited to within a country or region to avoid performance issues.

 

Thanks for the answer. Another case for project-gc then.

[+Team Papu]

OMG!!! How can I ever find those caches that I found in Europe!!?? You just did that really nasty and difficult for me - and for many others!

I have list of cache names - nothing else, but I don't even know the country for every cache and not to speak of the region inside those countries.

And in Finland we have so many little municipalities side by side that you cannot possibly remember where the borderlines are and in which municipality area you have found the cache - at least I should find it just by writing "Finland"!

Is there anything that you can do to help this - and this searching feature should be available also for those not premium members who want to find "by name" - even the "starts with the word.." function was much better than this.

 

And that is also a problem like Cezanne said above:

If I want to do a new cache in Finland and want to check that there are no other caches with that name???

I really cannot try with all the 317 different municipality names to find the answer - this is really a quality loss for the caches if there will be unintentional name confusions with the caches in the same region!

Edited March 12, 2015 by Team Papu

[+Doctor Owl]

Are you seriously saying that we can't easily search by cache name anymore? What kind of upgrade is this? I tested the proposals and don't remember anything as lame-brained as this in what I tried. I don't know the location of the cache I'm trying to find. It was just the nearest cache to where I happened to be. I know the exact name. I now can't find it and can't log it. Brilliant!

[Keystone]

Are you seriously saying that we can't easily search by cache name anymore? What kind of upgrade is this? I tested the proposals and don't remember anything as lame-brained as this in what I tried. I don't know the location of the cache I'm trying to find. It was just the nearest cache to where I happened to be. I know the exact name. I now can't find it and can't log it. Brilliant!

Do you know the name of a city or town that you were near when you found that cache? Anything within 30 miles? Enter that town name on the main search box. Then click on "Add Filters." Set the search radius to 30 miles. Enter part or all of the cache name in the filter box for "Geocache Name Contains:" You no longer need to remember what words the cache name begins with!

[+niraD]

I just found the only cache in California with a certain obscure name, even though it is more than 160 miles from home. I left the main search field blank, clicked "Add Filters", entered the name in the "Geocache Name Contains ..." field, entered "United States: California" in the "Search Only In..." field, and clicked "Search".

 

The key to the new search seems to be understanding that the main search field specifies a location at the center of your search radius. That is the only thing it does. That is what it does no matter what you enter into that field. If you want to do ANYTHING ELSE, then leave the main search field blank and enter your search criteria in one of the fields that appears when you click "Add Filters".

[+noncentric]

I'm glad to see that we can search for cache names that 'contain' certain words, and I even posted that request in the forums some time ago. However, the fact that such searches are now limited by country (or by state in US/Germany) negates the positive feelings about the change to search functionality. I understand the database impact of string searches. It's unfortunate if indexing can't make the 'contains' functionality work without a geographic limit.

 

One solution might be if the "Search Only In" could have a multi-select. Then someone in Europe could search a few countries during one search, rather than having to execute separate searches for each country.

[+GEO-BREIN]

Find a cache by the name ...

 

For premium members it is still possible, but for basic members it isn't anymore. They are left in the cold.

There are many new features for the Premium members, but there are several (all) features that were still accessible for basic members in the old version that are now disappeared.

 

Actually I'm very interested in what GS is thinking about this. Did they really do this on purpose so that everybody immediately has to buy a premium membership to get the most out of the website? I really don't understand why these few basic member options had to leave or had to be added to a premium membership.

[+Walts Hunting]

Why not use a much more powerful search engine and not bother with GS performance limitations. Put this in Google and you get them all instantly. I haven't tried wildcards in the title search but they would probably work.

 

site:www.geocaching.com go directly to jail

[+NYPaddleCacher]

You mean something like this, which shows all caches in Spain with "challenge" in the name?

 

https://www.geocachi...Challenge&c=186

 

Just avoid entering an origin search point and instead click "Add Filters". Then, add the keyword you want to search on in the "Geocache Name Contains..." field and enter a country or region in the "Search Only In..." field.

 

Just out of curiosity (I cannot use the approach above anyway as Groundspeak has blocked all filters for basic members):

Does this mean that a name search is not any longer possible without providing a country?

 

The old search allowed searching for all caches worldwide with a certain name.

 

I'm going to stay out of the basic members discussion as only Groundspeak can answer why they've crippled the ability to search for basic members.

 

To be more accurate, the old search only allowed you to search for cache names with *started* with a specific string. We haven't been able to search for caches which *contained* a certain name for a few years.

 

I understand that we can't search for all caches, worldwide, with a certain name. What I don't understand is why anyone would want to do that. What purpose does it serve to see caches with "fork" in the title within our local area and from locations all over the world in the same results list?

 

 

[+Walts Hunting]

You mean something like this, which shows all caches in Spain with "challenge" in the name?

 

https://www.geocachi...Challenge&c=186

 

Just avoid entering an origin search point and instead click "Add Filters". Then, add the keyword you want to search on in the "Geocache Name Contains..." field and enter a country or region in the "Search Only In..." field.

 

Just out of curiosity (I cannot use the approach above anyway as Groundspeak has blocked all filters for basic members):

Does this mean that a name search is not any longer possible without providing a country?

 

The old search allowed searching for all caches worldwide with a certain name.

 

I'm going to stay out of the basic members discussion as only Groundspeak can answer why they've crippled the ability to search for basic members.

 

To be more accurate, the old search only allowed you to search for cache names with *started* with a specific string. We haven't been able to search for caches which *contained* a certain name for a few years.

 

I understand that we can't search for all caches, worldwide, with a certain name. What I don't understand is why anyone would want to do that. What purpose does it serve to see caches with "fork" in the title within our local area and from locations all over the world in the same results list?

You can search worldwide for any subset of a name just not on gS. I have used that alternate fir years for tat kind of search.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

You mean something like this, which shows all caches in Spain with "challenge" in the name?

 

https://www.geocachi...Challenge&c=186

 

Just avoid entering an origin search point and instead click "Add Filters". Then, add the keyword you want to search on in the "Geocache Name Contains..." field and enter a country or region in the "Search Only In..." field.

 

Just out of curiosity (I cannot use the approach above anyway as Groundspeak has blocked all filters for basic members):

Does this mean that a name search is not any longer possible without providing a country?

 

The old search allowed searching for all caches worldwide with a certain name.

 

I'm going to stay out of the basic members discussion as only Groundspeak can answer why they've crippled the ability to search for basic members.

 

To be more accurate, the old search only allowed you to search for cache names with *started* with a specific string. We haven't been able to search for caches which *contained* a certain name for a few years.

 

I understand that we can't search for all caches, worldwide, with a certain name. What I don't understand is why anyone would want to do that. What purpose does it serve to see caches with "fork" in the title within our local area and from locations all over the world in the same results list?

You can search worldwide for any subset of a name just not on gS. I have used that alternate fir years for tat kind of search.

 

This, and other active threads discussing the new search interface are, well, about the new search interface. If you wan't to discuss how to use Google, or GSAK, or project-gc, or pocket queries to discover cache listings you can create a separate thread for that.