> I have reworked the search page that is shown if you can't find
> something a bit and included the google search
> But this is only for the meantime until we get Lucene. Lucene is what
> wikipedia uses and it imho has the right combination of the features of
> the MySQL search and Google.
That is a good start. Is there a way that we can move that higher up or make it more prominent somehow? Also, can we do the same even if we get a list of results? Even when Mediawiki finds pages, they are often very limited or poorly ranked. I like where you are going though, as it combines the strengths of the default search with that of the Google Search.
As for Lucene, just remember that patience is a virtue ; ) Don't worry, I plan on getting it installed and tested on stage as soon as the server gets an upgrade. There are a few technical hurdles to overcome, but I'm confident we can make it work.
> BTW can you please use another pagename for google search engine?
> Portal: does not really fit with our namespace policy. Can you please
> use Mediawiki: or Special:?
My first thought was to use Special namespace, but that would have to be programmed in the wiki software. Portal seemed to make the most sense after that, but I didn't think to use the MediaWiki namespace. Therefore, it is now under both Portal:GoogleSearch and MediaWiki:GoogleSearch. Let me know when you have made the change in the search results page, and I'll nuke Portal:GoogleSearch.
-Matt