Search Through User's Activity?

December 4, 2009 2:18 PM

Would it be possible to have a search box on Activity subpages -- in other words, a search function that limits itself to a single user's comments or posts?

I think this'd be a useful tool because, as one example, a lot of people may remember threads by virtue of author and comments -- "oh, this thread I half-remember, that was where Joe said 'flippy'" -- and being able to comment search would be useful to allow users to themselves coax partial memories out themselves without MeTa or admin assistance. I do see how it could be abused for stalkerish purposes, but we've not let that get in the way of implementing other existing conveniences such as per-user RSS post feeds, Google Earth KMZ links in profiles, and so on.

posted by MikeHarris to Feature Requests at 2:18 PM (14 comments total)

Every user's profile page already has a search box that you can use to search only on their contributions. Is there a nuance I'm missing?
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:21 PM on December 4, 2009

We have this already. Click on any profile page and look for the "search activity" box in the upper-right.
posted by pb (staff) at 2:21 PM on December 4, 2009

It's kind of random that you can search other people's favorites, to be honest.
posted by smackfu at 2:21 PM on December 4, 2009

Also, I couldn't find this when I was looking either. I guess I expected it on this page.
posted by smackfu at 2:22 PM on December 4, 2009

Upper-right search box. Yay. I also sometimes do a google search for "posted by $USERNAME" along with whatever I'm tr to remember.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:28 PM on December 4, 2009

*stalks everyone*
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:39 PM on December 4, 2009

I prefer WCityMike's pony requests.
posted by gman at 2:43 PM on December 4, 2009 [1 favorite]

Gman = funny. I literally laughed out loud.
posted by josher71 at 4:04 PM on December 4, 2009

"oh, this thread I half-remember, that was where Joe said 'flippy'"

I know that was just an example, but just for the hell of it I checked for instances of "flippy" across Metafilter:

There is one post with "flippy."

There are 22 comments with "flippy" and one of them was posted by CrazyUncleJoe. Ta Da!
posted by amyms at 6:59 PM on December 4, 2009

Does "straddly-flippy" really qualify as an instance of "flippy", though?
posted by setanor at 7:04 PM on December 4, 2009

Does "straddly-flippy" really qualify as an instance of "flippy", though?

Of course it does. Don't be a party pooper, setanor!
posted by amyms at 7:09 PM on December 4, 2009

I am a bit embarrassed by this; somehow, I missed that.

To transmute the pony, I'd suggest that said search box be also available on the pages at:

http://www.metafilter.com/activity/[user id]/[posts/comments]/[mefi,ask,meta,projects]/
posted by MikeHarris at 9:03 PM on December 4, 2009

That's where I didn't see the search box and where I think I thought it would be, if it existed -- since the very material it searches is displayed on those pages.
posted by MikeHarris at 9:15 PM on December 4, 2009

We'll be reworking and relinking search over the next few months I hope and we'll try to make it more visible from wherever it is.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:48 AM on December 5, 2009