Add Tags to the Forum so that posts can be tagged on category then you can search for the tags instead of the full text. It might yield better search results, but would certainly clean up the search results with each thread only appearing once, rather than for every time the text is included in the reply posts. Allow mods to modify tags.
We kind of already do this. For example, do a search for [Auction] and you’ll find any auction thread where the host used that tag. We could, as players, implement our own set of tags to prefix onto thread titles. Just have to come up with a standard and then work with staff to enforce it. Adding actual tags, likely not possible. Like most other website feature suggestions, I’d assume tags would require a XenForo update or other large amount of work to make it happen, so it’ll likely be a no
Tags are kinda meaningless though. If you enforce them people just fill out gibberish and if you don't you often don't get any. What kind of info are you trying to find anyway? The search option on the forum itself is kinda "meh", it's usually better to use Google or Bing. Set up a search, and use: "site:empireminecraft.com" next to your search query, this will point the search engine to this website only. After that you should be able to use the engine options themselves to make your query more useful.
I was looking for a way for staff to flag a bunch of articles to come up with a single link - like all forum posts about "Lock Signs" etc.
Couldn't players just put 'lock signs' in the title? Not if the thread is about a lot of things, I suppose. But in that case you can use a web search engine, as ShelLuser recommended. The search option is broken anyway (too long, too short or too common), and considering that it apparently cannot be fixed, I doubt additions could be made to it.
If they had put that in the title, it'd be easy and this idea wouldn't be necessary. This was a way to deal with the inadequacies of the forum posters. Anyway, it was declined
Check out this thread I made (suggestion #3): https://empireminecraft.com/threads/suggestions-some-emc-site-suggestions.82381/ It was discussed that no changes to the site could be made at this time, because of the sites' certain software. So, yes, I think this would be AWESOME, but the change cannot be made at this time.
Nice idea, but the current infrastructure does not want to be changed without breaking things. Staff has attempted it before and... let's just say it was not a good time. I agree with some of the posts above, if you remember a few key words in the thread, search for as many as you can remember, and there's a good chance that you will find it.
