Thread: building a search engine for my website

I am building a website for my husbands new real estate company. He would like his customers to be able to search the website for what they are looking for. I haven't got a clue how to do this can anyone help?

Our domain name is blueskyrealtydr.com but I don't have anything posted for you to view yet. This is my first website so I'm a little slow.

Thanks

Hi, for a dedicated search to a site, you would need to install a program that relates to your product so you can direct visitors at certain lists that you would have in a database.
But you could use free find http://www.freefind.com/ & put good key words & titles to every page on your site so the program will find the pages.

When it comes to searching for pages, i agree that a generic search script (or service) is ok. It wll display a page of results as links to the pages that match the users query.
However, when it comes to property listings, the user expects to see a page with very clear results, as a sumary description of the property, number of bedrooms / baths etc.

Why don't you try OpenRealty, which is a free, autoinstallable through Fantastico, script? it is dedicated to property listings.

Hi you can set-up your own search engine here
It's good with traffic.

Zlatko

hey thanks for the help. I now have three good options to explore. Not sure which I'll go with yet. I started school last week so unfortunately the website is now my second priority.

thanks for your input
Bev

sign up with google, then use their free search engine.

David

Hi all this is my first post in bv, I must say I am very impressed by both the service and products.

I have also been trying to put a search option on my real estate website, I had a look at OpenRealty as suggested by navaldesign, I liked what I saw but I have no idea how to use it. Their forums are hi tech mambo jambo.

Their site says and I quote "Open-Realty® is free web based listing management application. It is intended to be both easy to setup and use."

Well I downloaded it and read their Instillation instructions or tried to I may as well of been reading ancient Greek. I know they intended to make it idiot proof but they did not factor me into the equation. (lol)

I would really like to use this program or a similar one is it compatible with bv any help or advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks

Well, to be honest, all these scripts are compatible with VodaHost servers, but NOT with BlueVoda, as they are stand alone applications. You can find templates on the market, if you want to use something more suitable to your needs, but there is little customization you can do yourself.

Thanks navaldesign I will look into it.

Hi I have tried to intall open realty and have got stuck on the following.

4. Set Permissions (chmod) on the following files. You can set permissions(chmod) using most FTP Clients, Web based File managers, or via a shell account.
A. Set Permissions 777 on the include/common.php file B. Set Permissions 777 on the images/listing_photos directory C. Set Permissions 777 on the images/user_photos directory D. Set Permissions 777 on the images/vtour_photos directory E. Set Permissions 777 on the images/page_upload directory
I read one of navals post on how to do this but CP will not allow these numbers any help.

Cheers Wayne

www.cyprussunproperty.com

??? Why?

CP allowes ANY permissions to be set. Anyway, try using Blue FTP.

Thanks Naval I had a bit of a blond moment found open realty in fantastico loaded from there. Thanks for the help though, now I am trying to play with open realty all I want is the search option and its definitely not as user friendly as BV but its great program thanks for the tip!!!!

Thanks Wayne

www.cyprussunproperty.com