Google Searches for the CoA Website

For more than a decade, the state of the art for searching the LoARs has been “go to Morsulus.org and run a Google search.”

We can improve on that by using Google’s “Programmable Search Engine” tool, which lets you customize some search engine parameters and then embed a widget on your own page. (This system is already in use for the name-articles search on Morsulus.org, but not the LoAR search.)

This isn’t the final answer to searching the LoARs — in the long run we can improve on this with a custom-coded tool that understands the structure of our letters — but it’s something that can be deployed with little effort, and I think it is an advance over what we have today.

I’ve set up examples of this kind of search, along with similar tools for the old precedents (1979–2011) and for common name sources from the no-photocopy list, and am forwarding them to relevant heralds of the College for possible future inclusion on the heraldry.sca.org website.

LoAR Search

Here’s an example of the LoAR search embedded on one of my prototype sites:
coa-navigation.digitalherald.org/loar-search/

And here’s a sample search result:
coa-navigation.digitalherald.org/loar-search/#gsc.q=mathghamhain

The results are shown inline on the page and match the College’s visual style. I’ve also set up this search to sort chronologically by default, as you almost always care more about results from recent years than you do about those from many decades ago.

Precedent Search

The precedents search works the same way, but searches a different directory; here is my sample search page:
coa-navigation.digitalherald.org/precedent-search

And here’s a sample search result:
coa-navigation.digitalherald.org/precedent-search/#gsc.q=mathghamhain

Common Name Sources

Lastly, the “common name source” search matches all or part of ten websites that appear on the no-photocopy list:

• heraldry.sca.org/names/*
• heraldry.sca.org/kwhss/*
• www.s-gabriel.org/names/*
• www.panix.com/~gabriel/public-bin/*
• dmnes.org/*
• medievalscotland.org/*
• www.ellipsis.cx/~liana/names/*
• www.yarntheory.net/ursulageorges/names
• heatherrosejones.com/names/*
• st-walburga.aspiringluddite.com/*
• alysprojects.blogspot.com/*

(This is inspired by the search set up by Elsbeth Anne Roth, but includes a couple of sources that have been added to the no-photocopy-list in recent years.)

Here’s my sample search page:
coa-navigation.digitalherald.org/common-name-sources/

And a sample search result:
coa-navigation.digitalherald.org/common-name-sources/#gsc.q=mathghamhain