Temporarily disable site-wide search on WordPress.org

[tellyworth]

Recently it has emerged that the global site search results as shown on wordpress.org/search contain paid ads. Currently we have no control over this. Red tape prevents the ads from simply being turned off.

Various long term solutions are being investigated. In the meantime, as a matter of urgency, I propose that we temporarily disable global search on WordPress.org and replace it with subsite-specific searches where local WordPress-managed search is available (e.g. for the plugin and theme directories).

Specifically:

1. Immediately the Google site search code from /search/.
2. Replace the /search/ page with a placeholder page directing users to content searches on various sub-sites (/plugins/search/foo, /themes/seach/foo, https://developer.wordpress.org/search/foo, etc)
3. Tweak and limit search queries on sites like the support forums that currently can't run searches for performance reasons. (Limit queries to the last n posts, only search titles, etc)
4. Remove redirects that currently hijack some search queries to the global page (e.g. /support/?s=foo -> /search/foo).

Note that this is a temporary measure which will be reverted once a better solution has been rolled out. Several different possible long-term solutions are being discussed elsewhere, but they could take some time to implement.

[tellyworth]

Very rough example of a possible placeholder replacement for /search/

[tellyworth]

P.S. that screen mockup was hurriedly made under duress by a designer whose identity I have sworn never to reveal.

[dd32]

In 11025:

Support: Attempt to use bbPress/WordPress search for support forums.

This is kind of ugly and not perfect, this is just to get it out there.

Searches from Plugin/Theme subforums should be limited to that plugin/theme forum.
Searches for support threads (without plugin/themes) should be limited to not-plugin/theme/review forums.
Searches from homepage or where it says 'Documentation' should be limited to HelpHub articles/Pages.

This is temporary, and as a result, the urls are not super pretty, but should suffice for the immediate need.

SEe #5771.

[dd32]

In 11026:

Search: Ensure that all appropriate variables are predefined to cover all cases.

Follow up to [11025].
See #5771.

[dd32]

In 11027:

Search: Allow searching regular bbPress forums, not just plugin/theme variants.

See #5771.

[chanthaboune]

Hey team, thanks for working through a solution for this so quickly! I chatted through the pros/cons a bit with Matt and we've determined that having no search is really not ideal for users coming to the site, even on a temporary basis.

Instead, let's pay for ads to be removed (through Automattic) in the short term while we come up with a replacement. Let me know how I can help!

[tellyworth]

Ads are now removed.

[dd32]

In 11083:

Support Forums: Revert to using the global WordPress.org/search system rather than using bbPress/WordPress search.

Reverts [11025], [11026], [11027].
See #5771.

[dd32]

In 11084:

Support Forums: Include the correct parameters when redirecting to the global search, so that Forum/Doc searches switch to the correct tab.

See #5771.