Internet searching question using Google Groups

[Muse]

This one's been bugging me for a while and I've been able to find no remedy. If I do a Google Groups Advanced Search and specify a few words to search on, those words are highlighted very intensely in my returned threads. I figure there must be a way to get rid of that highlighting but I haven't found one. I'm using IE, but I see the same thing with Firefox.

This can be very annoying when a keyword shows up literally dozens of times on your monitor, and it's bright yellow.

There's a highlight button in Google's toolbar, but hitting that button (yes, it's enabled), doesn't remove the highlights for the first key word. In this case, I'm specifying 3 words, all of which have to be in the thread, no special order. If I save the search as a favorite, the highlighting remains. I know there HAS to be a workaround, but haven't found one yet. Thanks for guidance.

Edit, after I found out how to strip out the highlighting by manually editing the URL:

For a comparison that I think illustrates my point:

Highlights enabled

Highlights disabled

 

[mugs]

I looked around on google groups, couldn't find a way to disable it. It has nothing to do with your browser, it's generated as part of the HTML code when the page is rendered. The highlighting button on the google toolbar basically doubles the highlighting in this case, so if you turn highlighting off it will dim it a bit.

It doesn't seem that bright to me, but I'm on an LCD.

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: mugs
I looked around on google groups, couldn't find a way to disable it. It has nothing to do with your browser, it's generated as part of the HTML code when the page is rendered. The highlighting button on the google toolbar basically doubles the highlighting in this case, so if you turn highlighting off it will dim it a bit.

It doesn't seem that bright to me, but I'm on an LCD.

Your experience seems the same as mine. I'm also using an LCD, and a lot of the highlights are bright yellow. When you see 20+ of those on your screen it's enough to give you a headache, and I'm a guy who doesn't get headaches.

Yep, it appears that the highlight generation is an artifact of the URL which is responsible for the HTML generation. I'd think it would have to be an option in Google Groups but I don't see it either - a way to turn off the highlighting. I sent the Google people a message explaining the problem and got an automated response. Presumably, someone will respond early next week. Thanks for your reply.

I may have to abandon Google and start using another search engine. Anybody got any recommendations? Thanks!

 

[Muse]

I am about to hit the send button on the following message to groups-support@google.com:

Hello,

Please see the following thread that I started for a complete description of my problem/question:

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...3&threadid=1479965

Basically, my problem is that I can find no way to turn off key-word highlighting from my search results. I find that looking at a page with up to 20 or more highlighted words (all the same word!) in bright yellow is much more than I can take. I thought there must be some way I can turn this highlighting off. The Google Toolbar Highlight Button, though enabled, does not allow me to turn off the offending highlighting. Please, if you do not support turning off the highlighting consider doing so in the near future. Thanks very much.

<signed, me>

 

[WannaFly]

Kinda of a pain, but this will get rid of the highlighting:

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: WannaFly
Kinda of a pain, but this will get rid of the highlighting:

I dig it. I was trying to figure out how to do something like that. Thanks. I munge URL's all the time and it won't be that much trouble. It's really worth it. Meantime, I hope the Google people will come up with something for me. I can't believe they aren't aware of this as a problem or that they don't have a workaround. I don't know how, but it appears that the Google Groups I'm using is a beta. Maybe they'll work something new into the "final version."

 

[mugs]

Google Groups has been a "beta" product for several years now.

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: mugs
Google Groups has been a "beta" product for several years now.

Why? That's a long time to be in beta. Is it little used? Since Deja News was bought out by Google, AFAIK Google Groups is the only effective way to do in depth newsgroup research. Or are there other effective means?

For a comparison that I think illustrates my point:

Highlights enabled

Highlights disabled

 

[Muse]

Got an answer from Google Groups support:


Thank you for your note. Google Groups Beta doesn't currently offer the
ability to turn off the highlighted words. We appreciate the suggestion
and will keep it in mind as we work to improve Google Groups.

Regards,
The Google Team

My reply:

Thanks for your response. I highly recommend that you check out what it can be like when you cannot turn off highlighting in Google Groups. The particular problem I experienced that motivated me to seek a solution can be seen here:

http://groups-beta.google.com/group...le=Back+to+Search&amp;&amp;d#c33dd142a16c3f3d

or here (same thing): http://tinyurl.com/56evp

This was generated by a search in the alt.home.repair newgroup on the search term "water heater replace" in the "With all the words" field.

If your people can read that without getting a headache, I'd be amazed. I sincerely hope you incorporate a means of turning off highlighting in the search results at some point.

<signed...>

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: WannaFly
Kinda of a pain, but this will get rid of the highlighting:

I wrote a FoxPro function today that I execute from a macro that automatically cuts off the URL where it needs to be cut to remove the highlighting. It's nothing nearly as nice as being able to turn it off in Google Groups options. I have to copy the original URL to my clipboard, run the function and then paste my clipboard contents into the URL editing box and press ENTER. Still, it's a LOT easier than doing it by hand (finding where you need to cut it).

The code looks like this:

PROCEDURE urlstrip
PRIVATE lcTotString, lcTrimString, lnPosition, lnPosition2, lnThread, lcHoldClip
lcTotString=_CLIPTEXT
lnThread=OCCURS('thread/',LOWER(lcTotString)) &amp;&amp; How many times does "thread/" occur in the original URL? We want the last one.
lnPosition=AT('thread/',lcTotString,lnThread)+7 &amp;&amp; Where is the end of the last "thread/" in the original URL?
lnPosition2=AT('/',SUBSTR(lcTotString,lnPosition)) &amp;&amp; How far into the rest of lcTotString is the next '/'?
lcTrimString = SUBSTR(lcTotString,1,lnPosition+lnPosition2-1)
_CLIPTEXT=lcTrimString &amp;&amp; This is probably the most I can hope for with this. I doubt that Foxpro will execute on the mouse cursor being in the browser.
RETURN