A high percentage of posts on our forum revolve around numbers. However, it seems that the search does not pick up any numbers at all (even when using Search with Google), which is causing many problems for myself and our members, as we cannot search for a number or string of numbers. Is there anything we or you can do to the search so that it will pick up numbers? (For example if we search '608327' it would find all posts with that block of numbers in it)

Any advice is greatly appreciated, it's rather limiting the functionality of the forum.

Thanks.

Hello,

I think the problem with that is it is such a weird sequence the search engine problem can't sequencial order, it can only pick up keywords, however, I believe if you enable hashtags, you can make the numbers a hashtag, then by clicking on the hashtag, it will show you every post with that hashtag.


So if you wanted see all the posts with a particular sequence of numbers, all you have to do is make sure you put the hashtag symbol (#)before the numbers and will show it in the results.


An example could be #608327

See?


-Brandon

The search engine on your forum only searches for keywords in the topic titles.  If you use the hashtag system then you can search the forum by tags which will search in topics, too.  There is a option for tags when you press the search button.

Are the numbers in the topic titles?

Thanks both. Would a hashtag have to be before every number, or when I search, would I just put a hashtag before the string of numbers and it would pick it up. The numbers on our forum relate to train numbers, and each number corresponds to a unique vehicle within that train, a typical example would be:

66075
460208 460992 950590 460865 460615 460697 460603 460579 460941 460419 460921 460988 460459 460797 460773 460738 460476 460005 460559 460129 460176 460261 460262 460295 460597 460622 460137 460025 460272 460425 460345 460643

If hashtags have to be included before the numbers, the next challenge is getting members to post like it!

You have to add the hashtag symbol to a word to make a hashtag.  Do you have it activated on your forum?

I don't think we do, how do I check? So in order for all of the above numbers to be searchable, a hashtag would have to be placed before each one?

Yes

https://help.forumotion.com/t137316-new-option-hashtags-on-your-forum

Thanks - will see how the members will react to it! 

Yeah, just tell your members, that if they don't post the numbers with hashtags, it might impede the ability to effectively search for the topics. You could also edit posts that don't have the hashtag symbol on it and add it.


-Brandon