Ins and out of DNN Search

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Ins and out of DNN Search

Posted on Thu Feb 22, 2007 by Tom Kraak
In: DotNetNuke, Web Design & Usability, DNN Tips & Tricks | 6 Comments

As you may have noticed, we added DNN search today. So I thought this is a good opportunity to shed some light on DNN’s search capabilities as this is a must-have on any modern website. But in preparation for this post I came across a phenomenal resource on DNN search.

From the basics to the more advanced, from DNN search enhancements to DNN search operators, this series of tutorials touches on everything you ever wanted to know about DNN search.

I was especially interested in how to add search reporting to your DNN site. Knowing what your visitors are looking for is a great way to optimize your site. You may for instance give prime visibility to a favorite article by placing a teaser on your home page or add a link to your navigation to cut down on clicks to reach popular content on your site.

Unfortunately, I can't even give proper credit to the author since he does not seem to sign his work. Let’s call him "ecktwo" according to the sites logo. Well done ecktwo and keep up the good work!

Comments

Monday, May 21, 2007 at 11:20 PM Jeremy says:

I found this alternative to using DNN Search which has worked out really well for me:
http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/support/tutorial_dnn.html

I was rather frustrated with some of the limitations of DNN Search, and ive found that the overall results weren't very relevant. I've used Zoom on other websites in the past, and found out recently that it worked for DNN sites as well... quite well in fact! it gave me exact phrase matching, highlighting, spelling suggestions, and they do statistic reports as well with pie charts and all. it's become a bit of a not-so-secret weapon of mine.

Tuesday, May 22, 2007 at 7:32 AM Tom Kraak says:

Excellent tip Jeremy! Thanks for sharing. I'll have to give this a try myself.

Monday, October 06, 2008 at 11:53 AM Bryan Beswick says:

This sounds like a great resource. Unfortunately, these links appear to be broken now. Would you, by chance, still have that information around somewhere else that you could share?

Monday, October 06, 2008 at 8:13 PM Tom Kraak says:

Bryan - what exactly are you trying to do?

Monday, October 06, 2008 at 8:32 PM Bryan Beswick says:

When I click on the links to the resources you mention, I get a message that "Internet Explorer can not display the webpage." I just verified and got the same issue - it appears that the www.innovatasites.com site is down. I'm just looking for more information about the basics and advanced and search operators of the built-in DNN search. I will be upgrading/replacing the search engine in a few months but wanted to know what was possible with what is built-in.

Monday, October 06, 2008 at 8:39 PM Tom Kraak says:

There is really nothing much to configure ... only the 4 options you see on Host > Search Admin.