And a datapoint: so far today, the board has been extremely fast. However, Monday’ll be the big test for me as I’ve had the most problems on Mondays around lunchtime.
Fenris
It’s going to depend on how vBulletin is designed. I assume it’s putting the posts into a database of some sort. The speed of the searches would then be largely dependent on:
- Whether or not those fields are indexed
- How the search program applies the existing indices
- How much data there is to search through
If the database is structured as I’d expect, the title is in a separate table from the posts. In that case, a search for words in the thread title would only have to go through an index of about 70,000 records, as opposed to an index of 1.4 million posts. (Or however many there really are after clean-ups.) I think this would be no worse than allowing full searches for the past ninety days (as you’re bound to have more than 70,000 posts in three months time). Single word searches should be faster than multiple word searches.
The reason you have noted a speed increase may not just be directly because of the lack of searches. Good databases sometimes have a memory buffer that the most recently used records are stored in. This helps prevent extra disk access for records that being accessed frequently at the present time. If access to older records is cut off, obviously there are fewer possible records to hit, and the most active ones are more likely to stay in memory.
Not to mention that the occasional dump and load might actually help you more depending on the database and the way the searches work.
vBulletin isn’t exactly my area of expertise, but you need some serious analysis to figure out where you’re being hit the hardest.
Well apparently, squeaky brakes weren’t discussed in the last 90 days in GQ, so I’m SOL.
Searching more than 90 days is essential in GQ. 
That’s only since the end of March…
I’m not so sure that limiting forums in the search is really a good idea either.
Usually, in the morning, I would do a quick search on my name to see if I was mentioned in any threads since the day before. Now, however, I’d have to do eigth different searches. That’s got to be far more database intensive than allowing all the forums in a single query (where there is no WHERE clause defining which forum to look in). In addition, I’m sure I’m not the only poster who searches for their name at least once a day. This may just end up causing far more queries to be executed against the database.
Zev Steinhardt
Same here, except I do an author search on my name to see if there was any activity on threads that interested me. I was rather surprised when I got a ‘no matching’ message, when I KNEW that I had done a post four hours earlier… “shouldn’t that have shown up?” I thought. Then I noticed the revision to the search parameters. Oh well… So I did the rather time consuming multi-board search as well… perturbed me enough to come to this board (which I RARELY do), and saw that it had been covered. How about a notice on each board (you know, in the announcement thread at the top of the board) or a notce on the search page?
I hate to be a spoilsport here, but it might be a good idea to discourage folks from searching on their name in all fora. Search is the single biggest load on the server. If you start your SDMB experience every day by doing an unnecessary search, that’s going to hurt performance.
Searching all fora individually might be a little harder on the user, but it shouldn’t be for the server. Searches on an unsorted database are linear time, which means that seaching a, then searching b, then searching c will use up just as much computer time as searching a, b, and c all together. Besides, when was the last time that you had no idea which of the eight fora a thread was in?
Coincidence.
In the last few weeks the boards have been undergoing a sort of flip-flop, as it were. What used to be the fastest times to log on and peruse the boards, the evening hours, have now become the slowest time to check in. Conversely, what used to be the slow times, the afternoon hours, have now become the fastest times.
I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve noticed it for about three weeks now.
It seems to me that people have simply switched the times when they check the board.
In response to the O.P.-
I guess I don’t understand. Isn’t this the same thing as erasing all threads that are over 90 days?
Personally, I like Tuba’s idea – I’ll just have to toughen up and take it when I can’t search for something more than 90 days old. It’s a sacrifice that I’m willing to make. But I may be one of the few.
I also prefer the “Read-Only Archive” (ROA) for older threads, but won’t maintaining such an archive be a tremendous load of extra work for the mods/admins? It seems that each day, all threads 91 days old will have to be added to the ROA. Is that feasible?
[raising hand] Uh…O Grand High Moderator … if I may? … I too am one of those who does a Search on my name, usually AFTER looking at New Posts (otherwise New Posts only shows me the last few minutes, but that’s another Thread…) and, I often have no idea what fora I posted in, because - as I said - I tend to access threads thru New Posts, thus the forum is often irrelevant.
And CNoteChris brings up a good point, if we can’t search threads more than 90 days old, are they there?
Another vote for archiving the old posts as read only, and preferably having different search capabilities for current and archived posts.
One busy site I know archives at the end of each month - this stikes me as far less time intensive for the mods/admins than archiving on a daily basis.
Maybe it’s because I know precious little about this topic, or the fact that it’s hotter than hell outside and it’s beginning to affect my brain, but how would putting threads older than 90 days in an archive speed things up?
You’d still need to utilize the search function in the archive to find the thread you’re after, right? And unless there’s a new server on the horizon, wouldn’t we still be performing our searches using the current servers capabilities?
Not that I’m against this idea, mind you, but it seems to me there’d still the same amount of threads both before and after the archiving that little would be accomplished.
I don’t mean to be a killjoy, I just don’t see the advantage.
We’re not archiving EVERYTHING, just the oldies but goodies that people need to reference. This also includes the not-so-goodies folks are tired of discussing; we need to teach people to go there first instead of just posting, say, the “gry” question to the board.
The techs tell me that “search all” is the most intensive thing the server does, they have observed over and over again how that ties up the server and how traffic clogs up behind it. They’re recommended to us restricting or removing search for months now and we truly resisted it. We asked people to use it sparingly . . . to be selective . . . to think a little . . . the techs say that the great majority of the searches made were all-inclusive “Search All” functions.
I’m still geting online . . . and making posts . . .and it’s not the middle of the freaking night, so I tell you, I think it really makes a difference. For those that would rather trade performance for the ability to resurrect anything at any time, I dunno what to tell you.
We’re looking at the search function to see how much we can custom tailor it, this story’s not over.
your humble TubaDiva
Administrator
As I posted to you in my response just a few minutes ago before seeing this post:
If cluttered posts contribute toward clogging the system - and I’m not saying they are - then incorporating this idea: features.homestead.com (if it’s possible for vBulletin to do so) might help to discourage facetious clutterers, by allowing OP’s to tag them conspicuously.
along the principles of a dunce cap 
Well, I don’t mind the separate search by Forum (although it can be a pain), but the loss of a search on anything older than 90 days means that my current practice of linking to old threads when a topic is repeated, to avoid re-posting my long-winded replies, is out the window.
I don’t know how badly vB is designed, but I would think that searches on blocks of dates (still aggravating, but at least the posts can be found) would avoid the hours-long searches while not treating the whole MB as if it had a 13 week memory. If we can’t search back beyond 90 days, we may as well just delete those posts, anyway. That will certainly save on server space.
I personally like to search all forums, since I’ve self-appointed myself to doing some quality control when people make erroneous remarks about China.
But, hey, it’s a free site. Do whatçha gotta do.
I really think most folks will be able to suck it up and live with only threads less than 90 days old.
I have started to get really tired of reading “It’s been done before here” and “haven’t we already hashed this one out?” etc. Why should the new folks be snubbed like that? Why should they be prohibited from learning (we’re stamping out ignorance, remember?) just because someone has already asked a similar question months or even years before? Sometimes dopers pull rank on these newbies when this happens, seeming to say “I was already a 'doper when that question was answered, nyah-nyah-nyah!”
Maybe dumping the majority of the old threads, and archiving the others will stimulate new discussion on old subjects. Sure, there are some gems I’d hate to see go, but most of it is coal(Hi Una! ) not diamonds. And would it really be so unbearable to have to actually type out an answer? If you know that there has already been a thread about a question, then surely you can remember some details of the answer? And if you don’t, FINE, let someone else who does know answer instead. There’s nothing wrong with letting the new kids have a turn now and then.
Personally, if Tuba posted an announcement tomorrow that I could only view the boards in size 4 Arial font, yellow letters on electric blue background, while listening to a midi of ‘Some Enchanted Evening’ and wearing swim fins, I’d be the first person in line at the scuba store in the morning.
Do what you need to Tuba, in the end its the board and the dopers that are most valuable. Not all the bells and whistles.
Hey I want Jally’s new feature! In the Pit! Yeah hey that would be so cool!
I’m easy to see the search function go. It’s nicer with it but if the choice is between search or a board as slow as pig poo, I’m all for speed
As TubaDiva said earlier, we wouldn’t be archiving ALL of the threads, just the stuff that gets asked over and over. For instance, just off the top of my head, I’d say that about 99.44% of the Pit and MPSIMS threads do NOT need to be archived. And probably fewer than 10% of the GQ threads need to be immortalized. When I was weeding out ATMB threads (which I’ve temporarily stopped doing) I found that I needed to keep very few threads indeed. Most were just about specific problems, which could be deleted as soon as the problem was taken care of.
Anthracite, we’re discussing your idea in the mods’ email loop. Just because we don’t discuss it out in the open doesn’t mean that we’re not looking at it.
Jally, I think that most people do not want that feature. What’s more, I’m fairly sure that it would be very difficult if not impossible to implement*. But feel free to start a poll in IMHO, if you want.
Lynn
The Sicilian Cecilian
I am not a tech, and am not speaking for the techs here*.
**But I know that the Reader techs do NOT make hacks to the vBulletin software, if it’s not a vBulletin feature, we’re NOT gonna get it.
Would people PLEASE refrain from posting about “I don’t know how vBulletin works, but can’t you just…” or “I assume vBulletin can do this, I don’t know…”? Unless you have vBulletin or know how it works, stop making guesses as to what the issues are. It just adds more noise to the debate.
If you want to find out what vBulletin is and how it works, then download vBulletin Lite, install it, work with it, and find out. It seems that every day or so someone either has an idea about “how vBulletin might work” or “can’t you just simply link vBulletin to an ActiveX applet that uses a client-server model to dynamically index posts by the Wigwam Least Squares method…and no, I have no idea how to do it or actual code to post, I’m just the Idea Guy…”
Yes, vBulletin will allow you to search blocks of dates, if you apply some hacks that others have done to their Boards. I’m sure the people on the Jelsoft vBulletin forum can tell the SD tech people how to do it.
Lynn, I didn’t say it hadn’t been looked at, I simply said that not being able to search by any date would sink it, or at least severely limit it to 1 year back. Unless…you modify and copy the “search.php” file and put it in a special directory that only certain people have access to, so some can search by any date to build an index…hint hint…
Sigh, and my first bumping into the hard wall of reality.
When I follow a GD thread, I really follow them. I remember them, and if some time later, there’s new developments, I think there are benefits to calling up the old thread and posting the update.
So, today, as I’m scanning news sources, I see an update to the Arsenic in drinking water debate. I think to myself ‘self, why that’s an important issue, let’s bring it back up’. I do the search ‘arsenic’ in GD set the perameters on the way-back machine to the maximum 90 days. and nope. it’s not there. So, I went back to the forum itself and set their way back machine for 100 days (I was hoping), and was able to locate the little hummer.
This is not meant as a criticism. I understand that those little hamsters are running their little hearts out on the server engines. Just sad.