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I would like to dig up a question I asked months ago in which I know the phrase "WinDbg" appears. Is there a way, using StackOverflow, to perform a full-text search through all of my previous questions (including all answers and comments)?

ADDENDUM updated title to reflect the importance that I am looking to be able to search through the answers to all of my questions, as well as the text of the questions themselves. (The comments to all my questions and their answers would be nice also, but since it's not even possible to search through the answers of my questions - as the answer to this question makes clear - I don't have much hope for the comments.)

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  • Is WinDbg a random example or something you're really looking for? Because user:368896 WinDbg returns nothing (You can use user:me btw)
    – Bart
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 13:49
  • It wasn't a random example - apparently I'm remembering wrong.
    – Dan Nissenbaum
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 13:51

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For questions and answers, just include the magic user:me search keyword. Searching for "WinDbg user:me" should get you want you want.

I don't think it works for comments, though. I don't think comments are even searchable here. You probably need to use a web search for "WinDbg" "Dan Nissenbaum" site:stackoverflow.com (assuming that's the name that would appear with your comment). (A side-effect is that this will also find your Questions and Answers.)

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  • The Google search found this as the first result: stackoverflow.com/questions/6318447/…
    – ale
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 13:55
  • Thanks. It turns out, then, that the phrase "WinDbg" appears in the answer to this question I posted - but WinDbg user:me did not pull it up. Are you certain that answers, as well as questions, are included in the user:me search?
    – Dan Nissenbaum
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 14:07
  • @DanNissenbaum, yes. Do a "user:me" search for some common term, and you'll definitely see both questions and answers in the results.
    – Pops
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 14:28
  • @PopularDemand When I type this into the search box: WinDbg user:me, the following question I posted on SO does NOT appear in the results: stackoverflow.com/questions/6318447/… . Notice that in the accepted answer to this question (not a comment), the text WinDbg appears. Therefore, the result (or, rather, lack thereof) from the search I've indicated seems to contradict that the user:me search command searches through answers, as well as questions.
    – Dan Nissenbaum
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 15:16
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    @DanNissenbaum oh, I see the confusion. You're considering that answer part of the question, which is reasonable from a human categorization perspective. Unfortunately, the system doesn't share your point of view. "user:me" only applies to posts (in this case, questions and answers) written by you. The answer was written by someone else; the fact that you wrote the question to which it's attached doesn't make it close enough for the search system.
    – Pops
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 15:24
  • @DanNissenbaum for more powerful search powers, you could run an SQL query against the latest data dump, but that's harder to do and excludes recent activity. The last time I checked, the dump was months out of date, although one of the devs had promised to improve the update system soon so that it'll never more than a week behind in the future.
    – Pops
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 15:30
  • @PopularDemand Got it - so, it's not possible (really) to use the SO "search" box to search through answers to your own questions.
    – Dan Nissenbaum
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 16:09
  • @DanNissenbaum sadly, that's right. You can search your own posts (user:me migrated:0 windbg) or answers under a given question (inquestion:6318447 windbg) but you can't combine the two (i.e. there's no such thing as inquestion:(user:me migrated:0) windbg).
    – Pops
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 16:22
  • @PopularDemand I have updated the title of my question, and added an addendum, to make clear I was referring to answers to my questions (as well as the questions themselves), in the hope that perhaps this could be implemented at some point. Also implementing a search through comments to all my questions and their answers would be ideal.
    – Dan Nissenbaum
    Commented Nov 30, 2012 at 16:38
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Just type the terms into the search bar, and follow it up with the flags for your posts and questions (or just your posts if you want to include answers as well).

For example, to search for all of your questions where you mention WinDbg, you would use

WinDbg user:me isquestion:1

This will get you a subset of the search results for "WinDbg", namely those results that are questions you wrote.

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