Can't search on site for help!

[pjadl]

I'm trying to make the $35 I put on a Raspberry Pi Model B not be a waste of money, but I can't set up my wireless.

Even worse, I tried to do a search for 'wifi help' and it tells me
"The following words in your search query were ignored because they are too common words: wifi help.
You must specify at least one word to search for. Each word must consist of at least 3 characters and must not contain more than 14 characters excluding wildcards."

I have no way of searching it. That seems weird to me that once something becomes too common that you can't search for it.
To make sure I have this right, if a problem is big enough to be a common problem, you stop people from searching for the solution?

Please tell me what do I do to get my wifi working?

[rpdom]

The default search for the forums isn't good with such searches. You're better off using google.

Try a google search on "site:raspberrypi.org wifi help", as that will limit the results to this site. Words other than the very generalised "help" might improve results, "config" or "setup" for example. If you can included the name of the wifi device you are using too, that would increase your chances. Something like "edimax wifi setup", for example, is more likely to get what you want (if you use an edimax wifi thingy).

[pjadl]

I guess I'll have to do that. But why they have a search that is almost completely useless, and no note saying how sucky it is or listing an alternative way to do it, doesn't make sense.

At the very least, the search should inject [site:raspberrypi.org] on to the users search and just send that string to google for them. Rather than saying "You're problem is too popular, please search for something else" (paraphrased, of course)

The way it is setup now has me worried about the type of support I might find on this site.

[rpdom]

These forums (fora?) are mostly populated by Raspi owners like me who are keen and will help as much as they can.

The search function is part of the PHPBB software and not so easily changed.

[DougieLawson]

Use Google
"foo bar barfoo xyzzy site:raspberrypi.org"

The "site:" keyword restricts your search for the rest of the keywords to this website only.

[jamesh]

I guess I'll have to do that. But why they have a search that is almost completely useless, and no note saying how sucky it is or listing an alternative way to do it, doesn't make sense.

At the very least, the search should inject [site:raspberrypi.org] on to the users search and just send that string to google for them. Rather than saying "You're problem is too popular, please search for something else" (paraphrased, of course)

The way it is setup now has me worried about the type of support I might find on this site.

How much support do you think you should be entitled to for a product that costs $35?

As it happens, the breadth of knowledge on this site is huge, and by using the search from the front page you do get redirected via google. It's just the PHP search which is pants. There is a site revamp due soon though, so things may improve.

[DougieLawson]

Please don't ditch phpBB3 it may be horrid and clunky and ugly as sin but it’s like a comfy pair of slippers.

[pjadl]

How much support do you think you should be entitled to for a product that costs $35?

I'm guessing from your comment that I shouldn't get any. Wish I'd known that before putting money towards a Raspberry Pi.

[jamesh]

How much support do you think you should be entitled to for a product that costs $35?

I'm guessing from your comment that I shouldn't get any. Wish I'd known that before putting money towards a Raspberry Pi.

Really? You can get a vast amount of support here. More than ANY OTHER SBC. And not only that but the Raspi is the cheapest SBC.

So, you get the cheapest device with the best support! This is pretty much the reason many people go with the Raspi - the level of support available., With 2M devices sold, that's a lot of community knowledge.

What you don't get with your Pi (or any other SBC as far as I know), is an official support contract. The sort of support you might be entitled too if you have paid for it. The point being, with a device of this price, there simply isn't the money available for dedicated support departments. It's a charitable Foundation run by by very few people, who work very hard, but cannot possibly do everything that is requested or needed. Remember that in any criticism you may have.

Feel free to put money towards another device if that's what you want. I feel you may be just as disappointed in their support, almost certainly more so given their vastly smaller userbase.

EDIT: With regard to getting your Wifi working - if a Google search doesn't bring up anything (it probably will), then a post on the forum with an appropriate title is certain to bring some answers.

So, in simplistic terms, you need to Google for the name of the Wifi adapter you are using and Raspberry Pi, and if that doesnt bring up anything that helps, so far you have given no information that would help us figure out what the problem might be.

So we will need: Wifi adapter name, power supply capacity (sometimes inadequate power can stop Wifi working), software installed (OS etc). Anything about your setup really. Also need to know what error messages you are getting and what the actual symptoms are.

[Heater]

pjadl,

I'm guessing from your comment that I shouldn't get any. Wish I'd known that before putting money towards a Raspberry Pi

You should not be discouraged by jamesh's comment. He does have a rather sturn old school teacher style some times but what he says is the truth.

You certainly should have been aware that the Pi is created by a charitable, non-profit, foundation with limited resources, so commercial style product support is not on the agenda.

On the other hand the support you can get from Pi users on this forum and many other places is thousands of times better than any commercial support you will have ever seen.

You will find that many forums like this have really bad search facilities. That's because search is hard. They also tend to use SQL data bases that are not really built for free text searching.

Google is your friend as others have said.

Searching for information is an art. Common words like "help" are not specific enough to get yo anywhere. For example my instinct is to go to google and search for "raspberry pi wifi setup" or "raspberry pi wifi installation". Straight away I find this:

http://www.raspberryshake.com/raspberry ... ork-setup/
And this:
http://www.howtogeek.com/167425/how-to- ... mand-line/
And many others.

There is so much support for the Pi it's mind boggling.

About that wifi. The first thing we need to know is what hardware is it. What operating system are you using?

I presume it's an anonymous USB WIFI dongle, or perhaps you can tell us the manufacturer.
Can you run the dmesg command, then plug in your WIFI dongle, then run dmesg again. You should see some text added there about the new device that is plugged in.

Can you then run "lsusb" and tell us what output that shows.

Once we have an idea about the hardware we can proceed.

[DougieLawson]

On the other hand the support you can get from Pi users on this forum and many other places is thousands of times better than any commercial support you will have ever seen.

You've clearly never worked with IBM's Software Support Centres anywhere in the World. We are a centre of excellence for all of IBM's diverse software platforms. But we are funded (for mainframes) by the monthly and one-time licence charges.

[jamesh]

You should not be discouraged by jamesh's comment. He does have a rather sturn old school teacher style some times but what he says is the truth.

Although it was actually my late grandmother who was the stern old school teacher (and my even later grandfather was a head teacher). Seriously old school, given she retired in 1970's.