On Doing Up Folders (Of A Kind) On FA

Copyright Fred Brown, Mar 29/13

FA:  http://www.furaffinity.net/user/fwbrown61

fwbrown61@gmail.com

Look at the way folders are done on your computer. Very powerful, quite seamless, and indispensable, no?
Your OS gives it to you for free, and makes it look easy. But servers ain't hard drives. Copying this kind of arrangement to FA would be a hellish bitchuva job behind the scenes.
So screw that noise, fug it and thehorse it rode in on. Let's zero in on the core objective.

We want folders so we can organize the stuff in our galleries.
Whuffo? So other users can *find* our stuff. Quickly, easily, and without farting around.
There's also an advertising purpose. A folder labeled Girl Wolves On Girl Wolves will get some attention. The one labeled Boy Wolves On Boy Wolves, ditto.
If you're into aardvarks, hey, it'll do the same for that too. :- )

Helpful Fact: Under the hood, FA owns one of the more powerful search engines going. Very useful, the way it's set up. It can be used to simulate folders.
Or rather, Sphinx can provide a function that accomplishes this core folder job: Organize things so users can get at 'em. 
To be honest, this is one of those Doh-stoopid ideas that's almost too simple. Meaning it's likely that little value will be placed on it. So easy? That's it? Pfffft, what's so special about that?
It works. That's what.

One key thing to know: You can plant a search query inside a [ url][ /url] tag.
In it's dead-simplest form, it looks like this:

[ url=/search/fwbrown61] Search for me [ /url]

I put this on my main page, click on it, and Plink! Sphinx goes off and finds anything with my name on it, or in it. Or whatever string I put after the /search/.
Exactly the same as if I used the Search page.
(Note the space to take out in the [ url] and the [ /url])

To make it a little more specific, there's this:

[ url=/search/@lower fwbrown61] Search for all subs posted by me [ /url]

The @lower operator tells Sphinx to skip looking everywhere and just visit the name field on subs.

There's a hitch with @lower. Use it to search for 'Wolf,' and Sphinx will find every username with 'Wolf' in it. To fix this, Sphinx has a sweet trick:

[ url=/search/@lower^fwbrown61$] Search *exactly* for subs posted by me [ /url]

The ^ and the $ are Sphinx's field position operators. Put 'em in, and Sphinx matches the name almost precisely.
(Almost. Gotta look out for some rare hyphenated names. A sweet trick with a caveat.)

Planting links that do searches can go waaay further than this. The FA Writers Directory uses a busload of heavily complex search links. But for the purpose of folders, look at this:

[ url=/search/@lower^fwbrown61$ @keywords Canada] So whazzis do? [ /url]

Throws the keys to the kingdom at us, is whazzis does.
The @keywords operator forces Sphinx to look only and specifically in the submission keywords field. If word 'Canada' is in there, that sub is a match. And up it pops on the results page.

No mystery here. Look at any sub on FA, just below the Submission Information. If the user who created the sub entered some keywords, there they are in a neat little table.
And every word is one of these @keywords search links (less the username). Clicking on one of them tells Sphinx to find all subs that also contain that keyword.
Very powerful. You can be up to your tail in results in seconds, depending on the keyword. But it is a neat way to find things.

It's when we put these two operators together that we get something interesting, To repeat:

[ url=/search/@lower^fwbrown61$ @keywords Canada] So whazzis do? [ /url]

What this does is tell Sphinx to match *only* subs with my name on 'em, AND *only* subs with Canada in the keywords.
Out of the ten million-odd submissions on FA, only a few will come back on the results page: All the stories I wrote about Canada (since I put Canada into the keywords list).
And this link is just sitting there on my main page. Or try this:

[ url=/search/@lower^fwbrown61$ @keywords bunny] All stories 
about bunnies[ /url]

Click this link, and now you have all the stories I've done about bunnies (or have the word 'bunny' in the keyword field.)

One more, just to pound the nail through the board:

[ url=/search/@lower^fwbrown61$ @keywords fantasy] All Fantasy stories [ /url]

This search link, planted on my main page, gives you all the fantasy stories I've done.

This is why I said Doh-simple. Because it is, in three steps:
1) Put specific keywords into your subs. They may be descriptive or they may be codes. You are labeling your subs with a category identifier so Sphinx can find specifically those subs. Call these folder labels? Why not?

2) Write the search query link, in the form shown here. Just to make it clear, use the word folder. Ie.,

[ url=/search/@lower^fwbrown61$ @keywords fantasy] Folder: Fantasy stories[ /url]

3) Drop the search link onto your main page. Or in a separate submission. Or a journal. Your choice; it'll work anywhere.

Then stand back as users click on the links and go straight to the work they want to see or read. More or less as if FA had real folders.
On the other paw, it's a decent question if FA needs 'em now. As useful as this idea is for users, this technique should be just as helpful to manage the contents of a gallery. It's just not as 'visual' an idea as folders on your comp. 
Whaddya think?

Mar 29/13

NOTA BENE:
There's one restriction. When a sub is created, the folder labels you enter are added on the spot to Sphinx's keyword indexes. Meaning you can use this method to find that sub immediately.
So what happens if you go into an existing sub and add or delete folder labels?
Sphinx is good, but it's not magic. That change won't be made to the keyword indexes until a 'housekeeping' cycle is done. All changes like this, by all users, are dealt with in a batch, not one by one on the fly.

Meaning that at the moment, it takes 24 hours for an added or deleted folder label to take effect. Not an issue for new subs, remember. Just for existing ones.
Ergo when you're setting this up, the procedure should be to add all the labels you want to the subs you want, then wait a day. Then put the search query links on your main page. Or wherever. Ta da: You got 'folders' now.

Also, you can use the regular Search page to test if you got your labels right. Type in the @lower and @keywords text and go. Sphinx doesn't care where the search string is coming from.

--- Fin