Better search algorithms, AI

Fiduciary

I am often mystified by how imprecise search results are. If I'm looking for a specific name I don't need pages of names, some of which aren't even close. And if I'm looking for a marriage record, why do decades old census records pop up?

Áine Ní Donnghaile

How are you forming your search query? If you are looking for a marriage, have you isolated your search to the marriage category?

Julia Szent-Györgyi

As Áine says, simply putting in a search term for a marriage doesn't restrict the search to just marriages: census and death records can also have marriage information, so they'll show up, too. Also, while results that match more of your search terms will generally be listed before results that match fewer search terms, this doesn't mean that those less-close matches will not be listed. If there are no close matches, then the loose matches will be at the top of the list.

Now, granted, the algorithms' definitions of a "close" versus "loose" match can be ... um. (For example: which would you consider a closer match to Toldalagi: "Oldal" or "Tordalagi"? Well, the Find algorithm goes with the first one.)

If you're really looking for a precise, specific name, though, you can make use of the Exact checkboxes, and/or you can use wildcards -- contrary to intuitive expectation, they often narrow things down, because they prevent the "huh?" matches like Oldal for Toldalagi.