Website search hurts my feelings • Hacker News Board

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#101

Post by billyjmc » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:06 PM UTC

bee_rider wrote: post #12

okasaki wrote: post #9

Vaguely related but Firefox on android history search (well, autocomplete) is awful. n -> suggests nothing ne -> suggests news.ycombinator.com new -> suggests news.ycombinator.com news -> suggests nothing news. -> suggests nothing news.y -> suggests nothing news.yc -> suggests nothing news.yco -> suggests nothing news.ycom -> suggests nothing news.ycomb -> suggests nothing news.ycombi -> suggests nothing news.ycombin…

I do not understand this phenomenon where search boxes will stop presenting the phrase you want, after you’ve typed the next letter in the word. new -> suggests news.ycombinator.com news -> suggests nothing How does this happen? It is bizarre, it is the most frustrating little thing I can think of in computers, at least since USB became flip-able.

Not quite the same, but iOS gives me trouble with its word suggestions. Usually, it’s contractions that make me curse.

‘It’ suggests It, It’s, and Its.

‘Its’ suggests Its and Itself.

Given that the apostrophe requires accessing a different keyboard overlay, and that only two suggestions are presented (leaving one suggestion slot empty), why not just include the contraction “It’s” in the suggestions?

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#102

Post by nox100 » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:12 PM UTC

ano-ther wrote: post #84

Tagging ins tedious. Especially when it’s not you who searches but lots of other people, all with their specific ways of describing what they are looking for. And yes, the results are between amusing, annoying and infuriating. The “alcohol” example finding mostly comes from alcohol free products advertising this feature in their name - no need to name your regular beer or wine “with alcohol”, at least not in the prod…

tagging doesn't work period because people will tag things to try to get their product in front of your eyes and add any tag they think is popular entirely unrelated to their "product".

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#103

Post by gosub100 » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:13 PM UTC

jzb wrote: post #18

My wife prefers to use curbside pickup for groceries, and orders via the Harris Teeter website. It’s a disaster. The site search picks up unrelated items, misses others, and so on. I would complain about the inventory management/substitutions too - but since they also have in store shoppers using the same inventory I guess they can’t always be 100% about what’s on the shelf. You’d think a chain that size could do bet…

we're all looking at these as technical mistakes, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if, during A/B testing, people spend more when search doesn't quite work. For a similar reason as why they put milk in the back of the store. optimizing shoppers' efficiency doesn't optimize their profit.

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#104

Post by theamk » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:18 PM UTC

eusto wrote: post #65

marginalia_nu wrote: post #46

Feels like there's a pretty widespread problem that goes something like this: * PO: We need search! * PM to architect: Google how to implement search! * Architect: googles "best search library 2023 java" Aha! Let's use Elasticsearch! * PM to Team: Alright, I need a search feature next sprint. Architect googled for 5 minutes and says we should use elasticsearch! * Team: Alright, integrating elasticsearch in a sprint s…

It's more about what the company considers core business and what not. Most often they don't see the website as being important enough to the business so they don't invest in it. We have gotten used to almost flawless experiences from amazon shopping. Google search finds (or used to) results sometimes almost like magic, etc. The thing is, that's the core business. These companies invent new technologies and have huge…

> flawless experiences from amazon shopping

what kind of stiff are you buying you call this "flawless"? In my experience the Amazon search is worst there is. Search for "AAA batteries" and it will offer you AA and even N ones. Why on earth would anyone want that?

They even got the basics wrong. The other day I was searching for power bank under $5. Instead, many listings was $10+. How hard is it to get this right?

Because of horrible search quality I actively avoid Amazon when I can.

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#105

Post by DonHopkins » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:18 PM UTC

That's what you get when your AI Powered Search system is implemented by Web3 Experts who just pivoted to AI.

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#106

Post by ruined » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:19 PM UTC

plz-remove-card wrote: post #93

On officedepot.com when searching for a produect I have found no way to filter by "in stock at my chosen store" you have to search, then click through each individual item. The one and only reason I am considering office depot as a place to spend my money is because they're local and I can go get whatever cable or thing I need, right now.

analytics have confirmed that surfacing inventory status is bad for the customer because it reduces conversion

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#107

Post by DonHopkins » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:19 PM UTC

WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #33

gniv wrote: post #26

On the other end of the spectrum, I've been impressed by Netflix search. I would search a name and they do not have that movie, but would suggest a mix of similar movies, movies with the same actors or director. It's pretty clever, I just wish they were more explicit about it, as in showing the reasoning behind choosing a result.

Sweet! Can Netflix search by age rating yet?

You can type age:!well to get movies that didn't age well.

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#108

Post by pixl97 » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:24 PM UTC

ano-ther wrote: post #84

Tagging ins tedious. Especially when it’s not you who searches but lots of other people, all with their specific ways of describing what they are looking for. And yes, the results are between amusing, annoying and infuriating. The “alcohol” example finding mostly comes from alcohol free products advertising this feature in their name - no need to name your regular beer or wine “with alcohol”, at least not in the prod…

Leaving myself a note here for when I'm back behind a computer.

I'm wondering how well something like GPT-4 generates tags with a product description/product image. Be interesting to see its accuracy and comprehensiveness.

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#109

Post by binarymax » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:24 PM UTC

flenserboy wrote: post #44

The point of website search (at least on commerce sites) is not to help the users find what they're searching for, but to put other, possibly related, products in front of their eyes. On most sites drilling down through limiters falls apart after about the third or fourth restriction is chosen, often because the sites seem designed to not give three or four clear choices (which is what the user wants to see), but ten…

It’s both. What you’re referring to is “searchandizing”, and it’s a component of e-commerce for sure. But if you’re not also retrieving what the customer wants you’ll just piss them off and they’ll shop elsewhere.

Re: Website search hurts my feelings

#110

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Dec 26, 2023, 4:25 PM UTC

ruined wrote: post #106

plz-remove-card wrote: post #93

On officedepot.com when searching for a produect I have found no way to filter by "in stock at my chosen store" you have to search, then click through each individual item. The one and only reason I am considering office depot as a place to spend my money is because they're local and I can go get whatever cable or thing I need, right now.

analytics have confirmed that surfacing inventory status is bad for the customer because it reduces conversion

[deleted]