Difference between revisions of "Powerbase:Searching"

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(Tory Chairman Frances Maude)
 
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Solomon Hughes profiles the former Thatcherite minister, Conservative
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This article provides a detailed overview of Wikipedia's search feature, and instructions on using external search engines, such as [[#Google|Google]], to find information. For a short introduction to searching Wikipedia, see [[Wikipedia:Look it up|Look it up]].
  
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Party chairman Francis Maude, who is one of the driving forces behind Tory modernisation
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{| style="background-color:transparent; padding:0px;"
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| valign="top" style="width:180px; float:left; border:1px solid #aaa; background-color:#f9f9f9; padding:4px 2px 4px 10px;" |
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<span style="padding-left:50px;">'''Contents:'''</span><br />
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[[#Wikipedia search|1 Wikipedia search]]<br />
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[[#External search engines|2 External search engines]]<br />
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[[#Browser specific help|3 Browser specific help]]<br />
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[[#See also|4 See also]]
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|}
  
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==Spinprofiles search==
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Tony Blair recently told an audience of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp executives that political 'cross-dressing is rampant'. While Tranny Tony  yearns to swap political clothes and put on Thatcher's blue suit,  Conservative Party chairman Francis Maude is in charge of the Tory dressing up box and the driving force behind David Cameron's costume change.
 
  
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Maude's career shows the links between the old Tory reaction and the  new Conservative confection. Maude hands out the new touchy feely Tory costumes now but he was an old-fashioned minister back in the days when the Conservatives were in government.
 
  
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Thatcher gave him a junior foreign office post, where his
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<div style="border:1px solid #ababff; background: #fdfdff; padding: 1em; margin: 1.1em 1em 1em 0em; font-size:105%">
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first big success was organising the forcible repatriation of
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Put your keyword in the searchbox.
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Vietnamese 'boat people' from Hong Kong. In 1989, he got riot police to force the Vietnamese refugees back to the 'red' country they had fled, while the Thatcher government continued to shout about 'freedom' and proclaim its  opposition to totalitarian communism.
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* <font face="MS Sans Serif,Arial">'''Go'''</font> - (or ''Enter'' on keyboard) will take you automatically to the article.
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* <font face="MS Sans Serif,Arial">'''Search'''</font> - will return a list of articles.
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</div>
  
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===Effective searching===
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Here are few good tips and hints for using the Spinprofiles search feature effectively:
  
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As a Treasury minister in John Major's government, Maude was a top privatiser. Major says that in 1991 Maude ran 'a series of head-to-head meetings, or bilaterals, with departmental ministers in which he would challenge them on their plans for privatisation, competition and contracting out'. The electorate kicked Maude out of parliament in 1992, so he took a job as head of privatisation at Morgan Stanley bank, which profited from these same policies.
 
  
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Maude was re-elected in 1997 and rebranded himself  'moderniser'. In  2003 he signed the letter that brought an end to Iain Duncan Smith's leadership of the party. While Duncan Smith was too Neanderthal for Maude, he was happy to be party chairman when the equally right wing  but less stupid Michael Howard led the Tories.
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====Avoid short and common words====
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If your search terms include a common "stop word" (such as "the", "one", "your", "more", "right", "while", "when", "who", "which",
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"such", "every", "about") it may give a large number of non-relevant results. Historically, these words [[Wikipedia:Common words, searching for which is not possible|could not be searched]] at all, but as of February 2006, Wikipedia's [[Lucene]] index does not use "stop words", so any word can be successfully used in search queries. Lucene still doesn't search for numbers.
  
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====Wildcards====
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You can use some limited wildcards if you really want to. See [http://dev.mysql.com/doc/mysql/en/fulltext-boolean.html Boolean fulltext search] for details on their use. However, wildcard searches are slower, so go easy on the poor server.
  
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Maude also launched a think tank, called C-Change, to promote Tory 'modernisation'. It is the sister organisation of Policy Exchange, David Cameron's favourite think-tank, which Maude set up with Archie Norman in 2002.
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====Words with special characters====
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In a '''search''' for a word with a [[diaeresis]], such as Sint Odili&euml;nberg, it depends whether this ë is stored as one character or as "&amp;euml;". In the first case one can simply search for Odilienberg (or Odili&euml;nberg); in the second case it can only be found by searching for Odili, euml and/or nberg.  This is actually a bug that should be fixed -- the entities should be folded into their raw character equivalents so all searches on them are equivalent. See also [[Wikipedia:Special characters]].
  
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====Words in single quotes====
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If a word appears in an article with single quotes, you can only find it if you search for the word with quotes. Since this is rarely desirable, it is better to use double quotes in articles for which this problem does not arise. See the [[wikipedia:manual of style|manual of style]] for more info.
  
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C-Change shows how the Conservative milieu has changed. Dougie Smith, one of the leading lights of Maude's think tank also organised 'fever parties', upmarket orgies for the adventurous yuppie. The revelation caused some embarrassment, but not much: these new generation Tory swingers showed that the Tories have moved on, morally - although not that much.  
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An apostrophe is identical to a single quote, therefore the name Mu'ammar can be found only by searching for exactly that (and not otherwise). A word with ''<nowiki>'</nowiki>s'' is an exception in that it can be found also by searching for the word without the apostrophe and the s.
  
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While Maude stood by sex-party Smith, he recently assured local Tory associations that he would not impose 'mincing metrosexual' candidates on 'gritty northern' seats.
 
  
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==If you cannot find an appropriate page on Wikipedia==
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If there is no appropriate page on Spinprofiles, consider [[Spinprofiles:How to start a page|creating a page]], since [[Spinprofiles:Welcome, newcomers|you]] can edit Wikipedia right now. Or consider adding what you were looking for to the '''[[Spinprofiles:Requested articles|Requested articles]]''' page. Or if you have a question, then see '''[[Spinprofiles:Questions|Where to ask questions]]''', which is a list of departments where our volunteers answer questions, any question you can possibly imagine.
  
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Maude has given up some bigotries, but he has not moved on economically. Rather than moving to the left, he hopes to benefit from Labour's move to the right. Maude praised Blair's politics, saying, 'One of the great achievements of New Labour is to take class out of politics.'
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'''Adapted from Wikipedia'''
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Maude's strategy is to give his party a makeover to remove its
 
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obviously reactionary twitches. Take out the obvious prejudice but leave the basic politics intact. Maude believes Labour's business-friendly approach means the Conservatives cannot be challenged for championing the rich and powerful.
 
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In his keynote speech setting out the Conservative agenda to
 
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parliament, Maude admitted that the public thought Tory plans for privatisation were 'aimed at enriching sinister business interests'. Because the public looked at 'commercial providers' in the NHS with suspicion, the plan to hand over the welfare state to big business 'is unlikely to be achieved by one party working alone'.
 
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However, Maude was pleased to admit that Labour MPs 'such as Alan Milburn and Stephen Byers . are willing to argue publicly' for privatisation. While the old Tories, like Iain Duncan Smith, reacted to Labour's shift rightwards by trying to find even more reactionary policies to distinguish themselves, the modernisers simply welcome Blairism and hope to take over the job when Blair goes.
 
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Maude certainly puts business first. Until earlier this year he was chairman of a PR Firm, called Incepta. Maude was not worried that one of its subsidiaries, Citigate, donated thousands of pounds to the Labour Party: Citigate represented privatisers like Group 4, so Maude's firm needed to pay cash to the governing party to represent its clients.
 
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Business trumps politics.
 
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Maude has helped run Cameron's modernising campaign, like the Tory leader's recent speech claiming he would put 'commercial responsibility before profits', and castigating sweety makers for adding to Britain's obesity crisis. While Cameron takes on the chocolate oranges, Frances Maude is chairman of the Mission Marketing Group. Maude's new company is an ad agency whose clients include Walkers Crisps and Virgin Cola.
 

Revision as of 08:54, 27 September 2006

This article provides a detailed overview of Wikipedia's search feature, and instructions on using external search engines, such as Google, to find information. For a short introduction to searching Wikipedia, see Look it up.

Contents:
1 Wikipedia search
2 External search engines
3 Browser specific help
4 See also

Spinprofiles search

Put your keyword in the searchbox.

  • Go - (or Enter on keyboard) will take you automatically to the article.
  • Search - will return a list of articles.

Effective searching

Here are few good tips and hints for using the Spinprofiles search feature effectively:


Avoid short and common words

If your search terms include a common "stop word" (such as "the", "one", "your", "more", "right", "while", "when", "who", "which", "such", "every", "about") it may give a large number of non-relevant results. Historically, these words could not be searched at all, but as of February 2006, Wikipedia's Lucene index does not use "stop words", so any word can be successfully used in search queries. Lucene still doesn't search for numbers.

Wildcards

You can use some limited wildcards if you really want to. See Boolean fulltext search for details on their use. However, wildcard searches are slower, so go easy on the poor server.

Words with special characters

In a search for a word with a diaeresis, such as Sint Odiliënberg, it depends whether this ë is stored as one character or as "&euml;". In the first case one can simply search for Odilienberg (or Odiliënberg); in the second case it can only be found by searching for Odili, euml and/or nberg. This is actually a bug that should be fixed -- the entities should be folded into their raw character equivalents so all searches on them are equivalent. See also Wikipedia:Special characters.

Words in single quotes

If a word appears in an article with single quotes, you can only find it if you search for the word with quotes. Since this is rarely desirable, it is better to use double quotes in articles for which this problem does not arise. See the manual of style for more info.

An apostrophe is identical to a single quote, therefore the name Mu'ammar can be found only by searching for exactly that (and not otherwise). A word with 's is an exception in that it can be found also by searching for the word without the apostrophe and the s.


If you cannot find an appropriate page on Wikipedia

If there is no appropriate page on Spinprofiles, consider creating a page, since you can edit Wikipedia right now. Or consider adding what you were looking for to the Requested articles page. Or if you have a question, then see Where to ask questions, which is a list of departments where our volunteers answer questions, any question you can possibly imagine.

Adapted from Wikipedia

Retrieved from "https://powerbase.info/index.php?title=Powerbase:Searching&oldid=14710"