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When looking at new questions, I want to filter out questions that are tagged for subjects I don't know enough of or am not interested in.

When I'm searching for information, I don't really care about filtering out these tags as answers which may be filtered out may still be relevant and provide an answer.

For instance, someone may ask about a tool to help them perform screen scrapes for java apps. They may be developing in C++, and so tag their question with this. An acceptable answer may include the Java Access Bridge, which can be used from any .NET application via p/invoke. While I filter out C++ questions, when searching for ways to scrape Java apps this workable answer would be excluded from the search results.

Currently, I'll search for an answer and I'll see lots of results pop up and then immediately disappear, being filtered out. The only way to stop this is to reload and stop page execution before the filter runs. Its a hit or miss situation.

My suggestion would be to provide a "Filter search results" checkbox on the screen or let me set this from within my preferences.

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  • +1 - I find I do the same, I tend to filter out Java, C++, MySQL because they're not my core areas of expertise, but I have got .NET/Java interop experience I can impart. But because the Java tag is ignored I miss these interesting cross overs.
    – Kev
    Feb 3, 2010 at 16:19

2 Answers 2

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A good solution would be to extend this suggestion to any page that shows a listing of posts. The idea being to place the Hide Ignored Tags check box within close proximity of the filtered content so it can be quickly toggled on/off.

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  • I find the current behaviour really annoying. Search results will ghost answers that are in my ignored tag list, rather than hide them completely. It's almost like the search is saying 'These are not the results you are looking for'.
    – Phil Lello
    Apr 26, 2011 at 20:13
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It would definitely be useful to have the "only show interesting tags" checkbox on any search/question list page, rather than just the user preferences, so it can be turned on and off more readily. I don't hide uninteresting tags simply because there are too many circumstances where I may wish to see them, or even see questions that have both "interesting" and "uninteresting" tags.

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