4 FAQ tagged with search


I want help finding an old post or comment. Where should I post this question?

Post it to MetaTalk.
(tags: ) December 13, 2012 - permalink - back to questions

How can I check if something has been posted before, to avoid double posting?

The New Post form will automatically check for you. Just enter the URL and click "Preview."

For better searching, leave off everything but the domain name -- no "http," no "www" and no directory or html suffix information. This makes it more likely the search will catch a double.
You can also plug a URL into the Search box on any page, or search in Google by pasting the URL into Google along with this string: site:www.metafilter.com
(tags: ) January 25, 2013 - permalink - back to questions

How do tags work on MetaFilter?

Tags are a way of adding keywords to your posts as a way of making it easier to find, organize, and filter posts.

Tags can be added/removed, either at the time of posting or later, by the original poster, or the site admins, or mutual contacts of the original poster. There's no automatic tagging, so if you see a post that you think is missing an important tag, let the moderators know.

Tags can only include certain ASCII characters: English letters, numbers, and the following five punctuation marks _ ' \ - ! (underscore, apostrophe, backslash, hyphen, exclamation point). Tags cannot include accented letters or other special characters. Tags are not case sensitive. When tagging a post with a phrase, you can put the words together with no spaces and use CamelCase, for example: HeavyMetal.

Plural tags do not combine with their singular counterparts. There is a "similar tags" function to the regular tag search, to make it easier to catch typos, variant spellings, plurals, etc. See the explanation in Metatalk for details.

To view pages tagged with specific words, either click on a tag or go to a tag URL, for example:
http://ask.metafilter.com/tags/HeavyMetal
http://www.metafilter.com/tags/HeavyMetal

Tags can be combined. To view pages tagged with a specific pair of words, use the plus sign like this:
http://ask.metafilter.com/tags/airport+Tokyo

Tags can be combined with usernames as well. To see "all posts tagged with 'obit' by user 292" use this URL:
http://www.metafilter.com/tags/obit/292

The 150 most popular tags are linked on these pages (MeFi, Ask MeFi). The larger a word appears on that page, the more times it has been used to tag a thread. Notable tags on MeFi include obit and art.

Tags allow rough filtering of posts, using the MyMefi or MyAsk pages -- see here for details. Also, tags also have individual RSS feeds, linked from the tag page.

Note: when a post is removed, the tags for that post are not removed from the index. This can sometimes cause discrepancies between the number of posts that are claimed to exist having a certain tag, and those that actually show up in a list of posts with that tag (example).
(tags: ) March 6, 2006 - permalink - back to questions

Can I search within my favorites?

Yes. Click on the number after "Favorites:" from your profile and you will be taken to a page that includes a search window you can use. Type the word(s) you would like to find into the search window and then click "Search." The first returns will be from your favorited posts, and if you then click on the "Comments" tab on that results page, you'll see search returns for comments.
(tags: ) April 14, 2014 - permalink - back to questions