# But I like 3-letter words...
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821
**Category:** About This Message Board
**Created:** [March 18, 2002, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821 "2002-03-18T03:11:12Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@ladydisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ladydisco)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2002, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/1 "2002-03-18T03:11:12Z")
I just tried to do a search on “green tea” here, and got this:
The search term you specified (tea) is under the minimum word length (4) and therefore will not be found. Please make this term longer.
If this term contains a wildcard, please make this term more specific.
Huh? Can you change the minumum to 3 letters? We need 3-letter word searches in case someone wants to do a search on _gasp_ “God” or “law” or something silly like that.
just my 2 cents (Canadian 2 cents, so maybe that’s 1.3 cents)
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### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2002, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/2 "2002-03-18T04:42:54Z")
Sorry. Here’s what the documentation for the board software has to say:
> [@](#):
>
> **Minimum Word Length** The smaller this number is, the larger your search index, and conversely your database is going to be.
Indexing three-letter words would make the database very large I imagine. For example, the software would index the word “the”. I doubt we will change the settings to index three-letter words.
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### Author:  [@Nefarious\_Chipmunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nefarious_Chipmunk)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2002, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/3 "2002-03-18T17:33:32Z")
I don’t know anything about how this stuff works, but would there be any way to exclude sertain 3 letter words, (ex. the, him, her, etc) and still keep some. I think that it is not great to not be able to search for God, or law, or whatever.
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### Author:  [@zev\_steinhardt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zev_steinhardt)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2002, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/4 "2002-03-18T17:39:17Z")
It also seems I can’t search for my own name. ☹
Zev Steinhardt
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### Author:  [@Fatwater\_Fewl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fatwater_Fewl)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2002, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/5 "2002-03-18T19:00:03Z")
Nor can I.
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### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2002, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/6 "2002-03-18T19:07:05Z")
heraldgwena - I don’t know what facilities the software offers as far as indexing customization, we will have to investigate that. But if you would have to list all the three-letter words you don’t want to index, I imagine that would be a pretty huge list and I personally wouldn’t want to bother. If it’s possible to list only a few three-letter words to index, maybe that could be done.
zev\_steinhardt - I feel your pain. Perhaps you could go by Zeverino instead?
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### Author:  [@sirjamesp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sirjamesp)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2002, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/7 "2002-03-20T09:26:58Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by ladydisco \*
> We need 3-letter word searches in case someone wants to do a search on _gasp_ “God” or “law” or something silly like that.
Would it not be easier to search for a different word to find the info you want? If you searched for “God” or “law”, you’d end up with a massive number of hits, which you’d have to narrow down by modifying the search anyway.
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### Author:  [@Hamlet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamlet)
#### Post date: [March 21, 2002, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/8 "2002-03-21T15:40:26Z")
I’d like the search function to go even down to two letters so I can search for the latest on my new favorite diety, OG.
OG SMASH!!!
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### Author:  [@Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helen_s_Eidolon)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/9 "2002-03-22T02:50:13Z")
Yeah, when I wanted to check out the TMI thread the other day, and it didn’t accept TMI I had to put in different search terms…
…like toothpaste. It was disturbing.
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### Author:  [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/10 "2002-03-22T19:35:45Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Arnold Winkelried \*
> \*\*heraldgwena - I don’t know what facilities the software offers as far as indexing customization, we will have to investigate that. But if you would have to list all the three-letter words you don’t want to index, I imagine that would be a pretty huge list and I personally wouldn’t want to bother. If it’s possible to list only a few three-letter words to index, maybe that could be done.
>
> \*\*
Just a thought (I personally don’t care one way or another), but perhaps you can index all the three-letter and two-letter words and then simply nix all the words that have an unusually high number of hits. Say apply some threshhold that any words more common than, say, “God” are wiped from the index, thereby saving you the trouble of actually creating a list?
I have no idea whether the software allows for this, but it’s an idea…
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/11 "2002-03-22T21:13:58Z")
So why was it OK for our previous board search engine to have three-letter word capability, but not this version of the board?
Do I assume it is merely the whim of the board software? It could obviously be changed. At least, I think. Was it done deliberately? Or are we just accepting the “off the rack” version, no questions asked?
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### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/12 "2002-03-22T21:46:19Z")
pulykamell - don’t know.
samclem - I assume jdavis wanted to reduce the size of the index. It’s very simple to change the minimum word length being indexed (but very time-consuming to recreate the index.) To tell you the truth, I never searched for a three-letter word that I can remember with the old board so I’ll have to take your word for it that three-letter words were previously indexed. We can ask jdavis why that value was chosen.
Is it really that much of a hardship to not have those words indexed? I don’t feel that affected by it. I usually remember at least one poster that appeared in a thread and do a search by user name.
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### Author:  [@jdavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jdavis)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/13 "2002-03-22T22:26:40Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Arnold Winkelried \*
> **samclem - I assume jdavis wanted to reduce the size of the index. It’s very simple to change the minimum word length being indexed (but very time-consuming to recreate the index.) To tell you the truth, I never searched for a three-letter word that I can remember with the old board so I’ll have to take your word for it that three-letter words were previously indexed. We can ask jdavis why that value was chosen.**
That value was chosen because that is what the software upgrade defaulted to. The other Administrators can choose different values if they wish. Seeing how the vBulletin search index is already 1.4 GBs in size and it took me 12 days to create it I’m not in much of a mood to change the minimum word length.
The search index is already larger than the total RAM of the server. That does not make for fast searches in the first place. Do we want even slower searches and all the whines and moans of how much slower the board becomes as it is impacted by those even slower searches? I certainly don’t.
Jerry
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/14 "2002-03-22T23:42:53Z")
I came across this the other day; I was looking for a thread about USB; you can use wildcards, so USB\* (which is four characters) is permitted, but if three-letter words aren’t indexed, then it isn’t going to help.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [March 22, 2002, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/15 "2002-03-22T23:44:09Z")
One question though; is it (technically)possible to index the thread titles only for three-letter words? - that would help.
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [March 23, 2002, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/16 "2002-03-23T02:07:58Z")
Jerry is GOD!
**Jerry** Thank you for the reply. You chose the default. And a sensible choice it was, as the server is not up to a more sophisticated application.
**DDG** and I have overnighted a check to the **SDMB** for $20,000 to purchase a new server. Perhaps you have read about it in one of her threads. This should put some joy back into your life.\*
- OK. I lied about the check. She made me do it.😃
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### Author:  [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)
#### Post date: [March 25, 2002, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/17 "2002-03-25T17:17:50Z")
One place this is gonna pinch, is with searches for discussions of US corporations and government agencies, many of which have 3-letter acronyms (CBS, FCC).
Not saying what should or shouldn’t be done, just noting that the inability to do searches on 3-letter terms has the potential to be a non-trivial problem.
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### Author:  [@SmackFu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmackFu)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2002, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/18 "2002-03-26T20:21:19Z")
My search for “ska” was made quite difficult. Just saying.
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### Author:  [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2002, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/19 "2002-03-26T20:37:17Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Hamlet \*
> \*\*I’d like the search function to go even down to two letters so I can search for the latest on my new favorite diety, OG.
>
> OG SMASH!!! \*\*
Hamlet, you’re hilarious! But I’m willing to bet that there isn’t an Og thread out there that doesn’t include the word “Smash”. Just a guess.
Love og Og to you.
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### Author:  [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2002, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821/20 "2002-03-26T23:50:39Z")
We’re still trying to find out if it’s possible to only index certain three-letter words, or index three-letter words only in the post subect.
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/but-i-like-3-letter-words/98821.md?page=2)