Misplaced Pages

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This article provides a detailed overview of Misplaced Pages's search feature, and instructions on using external search engines, such as Google, to find information. For a short introduction to searching Misplaced Pages, see Look it up.

Misplaced Pages search

Put your keyword in the searchbox.

• Go - (or Enter on keyboard) will take you automatically to the article.
• Search - will return a list of articles (along with additional search options).

Effective searching

Here are some really helpful tips and hints for using the Misplaced Pages search feature effectively:

Avoid short and common words

If your search terms include a common "stop word" (such as "the", "your", "more", "right", "while", "when", "who", "which", "such", "every", "about") it may give a large number of non-relevant results. Historically, these words could not be searched at all, but as of February 2006, Misplaced Pages's Lucene index does not use "stop words", so any word can be successfully used in search queries.

Wildcards

You can use limited wildcards if you really want to. See Boolean fulltext search for details on their use. However, wildcard searches are slower, so go easy on the poor server.

Words with special characters

In a search for a word with a diaeresis, such as Sint Odiliënberg, it depends whether this ë is stored as one character or as "ë". In the first case one can simply search for Odilienberg (or Odiliënberg); in the second case it can only be found by searching for Odili, euml and/or nberg. This is actually a bug that should be fixed -- the entities should be folded into their raw character equivalents so all searches on them are equivalent. See also Misplaced Pages:Special characters.

Words in single quotes

If a word appears in an article with single quotes, you can only find it if you search for the word with quotes. Since this is rarely desirable, it is better to use double quotes in articles for which this problem does not arise. See the manual of style for more info.

An apostrophe is identical to a single quote, therefore the name Mu'ammar can be found only by searching for exactly that (and not otherwise). A word with 's is an exception in that it can be found also by searching for the word without the apostrophe and the s.

Namespaces searched by default

The search only applies to the namespaces selected in the user's preferences. To search the other namespaces check or uncheck the tickboxes in "Search in namespaces" box found at the bottom of a search results page. Depending on the browser, a box may still be checked from a previous search, but without being effective any longer! To make sure, uncheck and recheck it.

Searching the image namespace means searching the image descriptions, i.e. the first parts of the image description pages.

The source text is searched

The source text (what one sees in the edit box, also called wiki text) is searched. This distinction is relevant for piped links, for Misplaced Pages:interlanguage links (to find links to Chinese articles, search for zh, not for Zhongwen), special characters (if ê is coded as ê it is found searching for ecirc), etc.

Delay in updating the search index

For reasons of efficiency and priority, very recent changes are not always immediately taken into account in searches.

Multi-lingual Misplaced Pages search

• You can do a multi-lingual Misplaced Pages search using Google Advanced Search or entering site:.wikipedia.org in the Google search box.

• Lumrix: AJAX driven Misplaced Pages search engine. Supports other languages such as German, Spanish, or French.

• Qwika has indexes for English, German, French, Japanese, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, Greek, Korean, Chinese and Russian where the original content is combined with machine translated content from/to English.

Internal search engines (New)=

Recently, new internal search engines were created. These search engines can search Misplaced Pages articles, meanwhile they are user-friendly and are integrated into Misplaced Pages for a good experience. They aren't as good as external search engines through.

WikEh?

WikEh? is a Wikipedian-friendly search engine that searches the articles you want fast. It also searches images that are on Misplaced Pages too. Users can give it a try by clicking on the link below.

• Search Misplaced Pages with WikEh?

External search engines

Various search engines can provide domain-specific searches, which lets you search Misplaced Pages specifically. Searches are based on the text as shown by the browser, so wiki markup is irrelevant. Depending on your browser, you may also be able to use tools that allow you to search Misplaced Pages using bookmarklets.

In general, external search engines are faster than a Misplaced Pages search. However, because the search engine's cache is based on when the site was indexed, the search may not return newly created pages. Similarly, the search engine's cached version of the page will not be as up-to-date as the link to Misplaced Pages itself. Also, when returning Misplaced Pages articles in a regular search, mirrors and forks of Misplaced Pages content frequently rank higher than the actual Misplaced Pages articles because of search engine optimization techniques.

These issues may be less of a problem when using certain search engines that process Misplaced Pages differently:

• Google tends to include Misplaced Pages as part of its normal search, and it comes up fairly accurately.
• Yahoo! includes Misplaced Pages as part of its content acquisition program and gets a regular datafeed.
• Clusty downloads and processes the database regularly, generating automatic abstracts and image thumbnails and meaningfully parsing redirects, disambiguations, and categories.
• Qwika only indexes wikis, and thus mirrors do not appear in their results.

Wikimedia-Search

• Wikimedia-Search with suggest-function and for all projects.

Clusty

By following the link below, you can use the Clusty search engine to search and cluster Misplaced Pages in English only.

• Search and Cluster English Misplaced Pages with Clusty

If you frequently search via Clusty, consider installing the Clusty Toolbar (beta). Selecting the "Encyclopedia" search source allows you to quickly search the English version of Misplaced Pages. The Clusty Toolbar is available for Windows with Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox (beta).

Futef

FUTEF is a site, currently in beta, limited to Misplaced Pages content. Besides basic keyword and full text search providing a list of relevant articles, it also lists related categories in a sidebar.

• Search Misplaced Pages with Futef

Google

By following the links below, you can use the Google search engine to search Misplaced Pages - either all languages, or English-only. Google indexes all namespaces.

• Search all languages
• Search the English Misplaced Pages only

If you frequently search via Google, consider installing the Google Toolbar. Using the "search this site" button allows you to quickly search the English version of Misplaced Pages. The official Google Toolbar is for Internet Explorer (Windows and Mac) and for Firefox (works on all operating system platforms for which Firefox is available, such as Windows, Linux and Mac OS X).

How to provide a link to a specific Google Search

Misplaced Pages markup allows you to insert links to Google searches by including google: as the prefix for the link. This can be useful on talk pages, and sometimes in External link sections. It is done like this:

].

Which looks like this:

google:Tipster

Note: It is important not to use spaces in the search. To add more parameters to the search, separate them by a plus sign, +. For a phrase search, use a hyphen (minus sign), -, between each word. E.g. to search for "Tip of the day", use Tip-of-the-day.

To provide a link to a Misplaced Pages-specific search, include in the google-link +site:en.wikipedia.org (no spaces before or after), like this:

].

Which looks like this:

google:Tip-of-the-day+site:en.wikipedia.org

To clean up the link so that only the part you want to show is presented, use the pipe, like this:

]

Which makes it look like this:

"Tip of the day"

LuMriX

LuMriX is a dynamic query tool which uses lookahead to predict search terms in a list, similar to Google Suggest.

By following the link below, you can use the LuMriX search engine to search different language versions of Misplaced Pages.

• Search Wikipedias with LuMriX

If you frequently search via LuMriX, consider installing the LuMriX Firefox Search Plugin (works on all operating system platforms for which Firefox is available, such as Windows, Linux and Mac OS X).

Lycos

There is a full-featured advanced search engine at Lycos UK. It is more powerful than Misplaced Pages's search box, and you can limit searches to a specific URL, such as the Misplaced Pages website. Here's how. Click on the provided link above, and then enter your search term. Then scroll down to the domain section and add "wikipedia.org" in the box provided. Then click "Go".

Qwika

Qwika is designed specifically to index wikis. Its main index is Misplaced Pages. It includes:

• all namespaces of Misplaced Pages
• English machine-translated into German, French, Japanese, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, Greek, Korean, Chinese and Russian.
• The above languages machine translated into English.

This can assist editors contributing to non-English Wikipedias by being able to search in their own language across the entire English version and then view the machine-translated version in their language.

• Qwika main page and explanation

Wikiwax

Wikiwax is a dynamic query like LuMriX. It only searches English Misplaced Pages, but shows more list entries.

• WikiWax Index to Misplaced Pages

Yahoo!

By following the links below, you can use the Yahoo! search engine to search Misplaced Pages - either all languages or English-only.

• Search all Wikipedias with Yahoo!
• Search English Wikipedias with Yahoo!

If you frequently search via Yahoo!, consider installing the Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Using the "Search Only the Current Site" button allows you to quickly search the English version of Misplaced Pages. The official Yahoo! Companion Toolbar is only for Windows with Internet Explorer and Mozilla.

Other

Here are more Misplaced Pages:Tools which make searching more convenient.

Browser specific help

Using Mozilla to automatically search

Listed below are ways to search Misplaced Pages with Mozilla-based browsers, including Mozilla Suite, Mozilla Firefox, and Netscape 6 and 7.

Search Misplaced Pages from the sidebar or address bar

Works with: Mozilla Suite, Mozilla Firefox, Netscape 6/7.

Mozilla and Netscape 6 & 7 come with a sidebar that allows a user to search the Misplaced Pages site, and Firefox has a toolbar item to do the same. To install the search plugin that tells Mozilla how to search Misplaced Pages, do the following:

1. Go to one of the following sources of Misplaced Pages search plugins. The Mycroft plugins are sometimes out of date, and plugins from the second source may work better.
   1. Original search plugins from Mycroft
   2. Updated search plugins
2. There are versions for many languages, so pick the language local to your area.
3. If JavaScript is enabled, clicking on the name of the search plugin will automatically install the search plugin.
4. If you can't install the search plugin automatically, the second source above lets you right-click on the plugin and save it to disk, or download a ZIP file containing all available plugins. Save the downloaded .src file in the searchplugins directory where Mozilla is installed and restart the browser to use the new plugin.

To make Misplaced Pages your default search engine in Mozilla, Beonex Communicator, and Netscape 6/7:

1. Go to Edit, Preferences.
2. Expand the Navigator tree and choose Internet Search.
3. Choose Misplaced Pages as your default search engine.

With Misplaced Pages selected as your default engine, searches can be conducted via the search sidebar tab, search box, or the web address bar.

Search Misplaced Pages using a custom keyword

Works with: Mozilla Suite, Mozilla Firefox, Netscape 6/7, Beonex Communicator, Camino.

Misplaced Pages can also be searched via a custom keyword.

1. Create a new bookmark (Bookmarks/Manage Bookmarks/New Bookmark in Firefox)
2. Enter "Misplaced Pages Quicksearch" for the name (without the quotes).
3. Enter one of the following for the location, again without quotes:
   • "http://en.wikipedia.org/Special:Search?search=%s" to search the English Misplaced Pages
   • "http://de.wikipedia.org/Special:Search?search=%s" to search the German Misplaced Pages
   • "http://www.google.com/search?q=site:wikipedia.org+%s" to use Google to search all Wikipedias
4. Enter "w" (without the quotes) for the keyword.
5. Click OK.

To search, go to the web address bar (Ctrl-L), enter "w SEARCH_QUERY" (without the quotes), and press Enter.

Many versions of Firefox include this wikipedia quicksearch by default, but use "wp SEARCH_QUERY</i" instead of the form mentioned above.

Note: This can also be done with Opera and Internet Explorer, see below.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
@="http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?search=%s"
" "="+"
"#"="%23"
"&"="%26"
"?"="%3F"
"+"="%2B"
"="="%3D"

@="http://de.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?search=%s"

@="http://www.google.com/search?q=site:wikipedia.org+%s"

Name: &Misplaced Pages
Keyword: w
Address: http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?search=%s

Name=&Misplaced Pages
URL=http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?search=%s
Query=
Key=w
Is post=0
Has endseparator=0
Encoding=utf-8
Search Type=8