Written by josthohad the 9 Dec 12 at 11:41.

Autolaunch the dash, when typing without any application to receive the input. I.E. on a fresh startup or if you have no open windows.
This will make the system feel more responsive, and it will speed up, the search/launch process.

among others

Autolaunch the dash, when typing without any application to receive the input. I.E. on a fresh startup or if you have no open windows. This will make the system feel more responsive, and it will speed up, the search/launch process. among others

Written by Teuccis the 21 Apr 12 at 17:36.

Applications could be tagged. Example tags for Firefox: "fire", "fox", "internet". Separating "fire" and "fox" would help in fast, intuitive searching whereas "internet" helps those who want to search by typing in a category.

Applications could be tagged. Example tags for Firefox: "fire", "fox", "internet". Separating "fire" and "fox" would help in fast, intuitive searching whereas "internet" helps those who want to search by typing in a category.

Written by PaddyLandau the 22 Apr 12 at 14:21.

"sys" > System Monitor, System Settings, etc.
"mon" > System Monitor, Monitors, Log File Viewer, etc.

So, if entering both terms, "sys mon" acts as the intersection of "sys" AND "mon", i.e. System Monitor.

This will not solve "fi fox", but I don't think it should, because "fox" returns no results.

"sys" > System Monitor, System Settings, etc. "mon" > System Monitor, Monitors, Log File Viewer, etc. So, if entering both terms, "sys mon" acts as the intersection of "sys" AND "mon", i.e. System Monitor. This will not solve "fi fox", but I don't think it should, because "fox" returns no results.

Written by seiryu89 the 25 Apr 12 at 10:49.

*Still refining the solution, discussion in the comments*

Example:
fi fox:
grammar rule will be *fi*fox*. The result of it will be FIreFOX and firefox will be found.

sys mon:
grammar rule will be *sys*mon*. The result of it will be SYStem MONitor, and system monitor will be found.

With this solution there's not need to have a database neither write tags of the applications or maintain something. Only one simple grammar rule and a simple parser (which is already implemented in some programming languages) for it.

*Still refining the solution, discussion in the comments* Example: fi fox: grammar rule will be *fi*fox*. The result of it will be FIreFOX and firefox will be found. sys mon: grammar rule will be *sys*mon*. The result of it will be SYStem MONitor, and system monitor will be found. With this solution there's not need to have a database neither write tags of the applications or maintain something. Only one simple grammar rule and a simple parser (which is already implemented in some programming languages) for it.

Written by josthohad the 10 May 12 at 11:24.

(Written by PaddyLandau)

"
"sys" > System Monitor, System Settings, etc.
"mon" > System Monitor, Monitors, Log File Viewer, etc.

So, if entering both terms, "sys mon" acts as the intersection of "sys" AND "mon", i.e. System Monitor.

This will not solve "fi fox", but I don't think it should, because "fox" returns no results.
"

... in addition to this a simpel search of certain sequences will solve "fi fox".
in case no or only a few resaults apperer the dash should return things containing all or some of the sequences in the name of the app.

(Written by PaddyLandau) " "sys" > System Monitor, System Settings, etc. "mon" > System Monitor, Monitors, Log File Viewer, etc. So, if entering both terms, "sys mon" acts as the intersection of "sys" AND "mon", i.e. System Monitor. This will not solve "fi fox", but I don't think it should, because "fox" returns no results. " ... in addition to this a simpel search of certain sequences will solve "fi fox". in case no or only a few resaults apperer the dash should return things containing all or some of the sequences in the name of the app.

Written by ivantomica the 14 May 12 at 23:11.

Applications should have description, for example they could use whole description from Ubuntu Software Center, but in Dash that would be hidden, yet it would help in searching apps cause every keyword specified in Ubuntu Software Center would be valid when searching in Dash. That would also help a lot with recommendation in "Available for download" section.

Example:

PuTTY Terminal Emulator
-This is an X terminal emulator on the popular Windows SSH client, PuTTY. It supports xterm escape sequences, plus some Linux console sequences for colour palette configuration and some DECterm sequences for title bar control...


And when you are in dash searching by "SSH client" result would be PuTTY Terminal Emulator. That could be very useful when you are searching for apps and you don't know exact name or so.

Applications should have description, for example they could use whole description from Ubuntu Software Center, but in Dash that would be hidden, yet it would help in searching apps cause every keyword specified in Ubuntu Software Center would be valid when searching in Dash. That would also help a lot with recommendation in "Available for download" section. Example: PuTTY Terminal Emulator -This is an X terminal emulator on the popular Windows SSH client, PuTTY. It supports xterm escape sequences, plus some Linux console sequences for colour palette configuration and some DECterm sequences for title bar control... And when you are in dash searching by "SSH client" result would be PuTTY Terminal Emulator. That could be very useful when you are searching for apps and you don't know exact name or so.

Written by turbolad the 17 May 12 at 15:20.

Searching for a program will not reveal the different categories belonging to the program.

Example: a user will search for "wine" because they wish to open the Wine category "Browse C: Drive". At the moment, searching for "wine" will ONLY show the categories that have the word "wine" in the name i.e. "Configure Wine", "Uninstall Wine Software" and "Winetricks". But not the "Configure C: Drive" category of Wine, which the user may be searching for.

If all categories of a program are grouped neat and tidy after searching, users are more likely to find exactly which program they want. Consider how GNOME keeps things tidy by grouping programs in the top-left, such as Wine and all of its categories. Why not do something similar in Dash to enhance search results?

Searching for a program will not reveal the different categories belonging to the program. Example: a user will search for "wine" because they wish to open the Wine category "Browse C: Drive". At the moment, searching for "wine" will ONLY show the categories that have the word "wine" in the name i.e. "Configure Wine", "Uninstall Wine Software" and "Winetricks". But not the "Configure C: Drive" category of Wine, which the user may be searching for. If all categories of a program are grouped neat and tidy after searching, users are more likely to find exactly which program they want. Consider how GNOME keeps things tidy by grouping programs in the top-left, such as Wine and all of its categories. Why not do something similar in Dash to enhance search results?

Written by PaddyLandau the 18 May 12 at 14:54.

When searching, also include categories that match the search.

For example, typing "game" does not list all the games installed on the system; "games" returns even fewer results.

To me, that seems terribly counter-intuitive.

When searching, also include categories that match the search. For example, typing "game" does not list all the games installed on the system; "games" returns even fewer results. To me, that seems terribly counter-intuitive.

Written by tijmz the 2 Aug 12 at 22:59.

The job of tagging applications, categorizing them and providing good descriptions is up to the developers. They have an incentive to do so, as this will not only make their users happy, but will also render their work more easy to find in the software center.

Then, the search algorithms in the Software Center and Unity could order query results based on the distance between the keyword and the (filtered*) content of title, tags and description. There are various string metrics that can be used to calculate the distance (e.g. Levenshtein distance).

* filtered, because some non-descriptive or generic terms should be ignored (e.g. and, or, fantastic, program, Linux). One may even go as far as to only include statistically unlikely terms (but that approach would definitely need a test drive and may not work for every user).

The job of tagging applications, categorizing them and providing good descriptions is up to the developers. They have an incentive to do so, as this will not only make their users happy, but will also render their work more easy to find in the software center. Then, the search algorithms in the Software Center and Unity could order query results based on the distance between the keyword and the (filtered*) content of title, tags and description. There are various string metrics that can be used to calculate the distance (e.g. Levenshtein distance). * filtered, because some non-descriptive or generic terms should be ignored (e.g. and, or, fantastic, program, Linux). One may even go as far as to only include statistically unlikely terms (but that approach would definitely need a test drive and may not work for every user).

Written by eocarragain the 25 Aug 12 at 14:17.

As pointed out in Solution #5, #7, #8 a lot of metadata necessary to improve application searching in the dash is already available in the Software Center. Rather than re-inventing the wheel, I propose tighter integration between application search in the dash and the Software Center search, along with some enhancements to the Software Center.

Ready for use:
-- For "authoritative"/official desciptions of the application, the Software Center offers descriptions from the developers/canonical (as mentioned in solution #8)
-- For public user-generated descriptions/metadata, the Software Center offers a Reviews feature which could be indexed (with lower weighting)
-- Software Center also offers categories (Games, Office, Graphics, etc.)
-- Software Center also offers ratings which could influence the ordering of results in Dash searches if a user happens to have installed two programs which have the same relevance ranking in other respects

Needs development:
-- Software Center doesn't allow local/custom tagging. If a user wants to apply local/private tags to software they have installed, they should be able to do this in Software Center->Installed. These would then be indexed in the Dash
-- Software Center could allow public tagging in addition to reviews (this would go some way to overcoming cheesehead's concerns about the overhead of setting-up and maintaining a new public database since Software Center is already monitored)

As pointed out in Solution #5, #7, #8 a lot of metadata necessary to improve application searching in the dash is already available in the Software Center. Rather than re-inventing the wheel, I propose tighter integration between application search in the dash and the Software Center search, along with some enhancements to the Software Center. Ready for use: -- For "authoritative"/official desciptions of the application, the Software Center offers descriptions from the developers/canonical (as mentioned in solution #8) -- For public user-generated descriptions/metadata, the Software Center offers a Reviews feature which could be indexed (with lower weighting) -- Software Center also offers categories (Games, Office, Graphics, etc.) -- Software Center also offers ratings which could influence the ordering of results in Dash searches if a user happens to have installed two programs which have the same relevance ranking in other respects Needs development: -- Software Center doesn't allow local/custom tagging. If a user wants to apply local/private tags to software they have installed, they should be able to do this in Software Center->Installed. These would then be indexed in the Dash -- Software Center could allow public tagging in addition to reviews (this would go some way to overcoming cheesehead's concerns about the overhead of setting-up and maintaining a new public database since Software Center is already monitored) -- Software Center indexing needs to be improved. For example, browsing the Software Center by category, and searching for those category names doesn't currently yield the same results - the "MyCalculator" app appears under the "Office" category browse but not in the resultset when I search for "Office". -- Indexing/relevance ranking in Software Center should be aligned with Dash application search to provide a seamless/consistent Unity experience for software search (incremental search improvements may also encompass some of the suggestions in solutions #2, #3, #4 and #8)