Hi,
Can we have a auto-complete feature for our search box, similar to Gmail's?
The Problem:
- It's not easy to remember all the available search operators in the Search Options.
- There's no obvious direct link to go to the Search Options page.
NewbieOne only knows about it after reading the FAQ page.
The Idea:
Example:
- When we
start typingclick in the search box, a dropdown appears with list of operators stated in the Search Options. After we select/type an operator with colon (:
), there should be a hint/list of possible values for that operator. - When we start typing open square bracket (
[
) with a few letters, there should be a list of tags for us to choose from.
Sample mockup:
You can also think of it like Intellisense in Visual Studio / code-completion in some IDEs.
With this feature in place, I think the search functionality will be better than the major general search engines out there, as opposed by this old question.
Note: The idea is not to make you type in your query faster. The idea is to let the (new) users know/remember such operators in a convenient way without the need to go to the Search Options page.
UPDATE: I included more info / idea here in response to Grace Notes's answer.
:
would directly bring up the possible operators