While doing a search on google for a FT thread, I found

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/archive/index.php/

Which is an archive file by forum. If you click on the forum you want, you will find posts going back to '99. I was looking for a relatively recent post, so I jumped to the last few pages then did a find for the words in the title of the thread. I went through 3 pages but I found the specific thread.

Not as convenient as FT search but it works.

The best way to perform a search right now is to use google.

search term site:flyertalk.com

So if I wanted info on the admirals club I would type this:

admirals club site:flyertalk.com

Thanks jkfb1 and flipside. I was hoping someone would post a way to get around the dead search function.

And if you're looking for a post in a specific forum, use these search terms on Google:

For example, to search the US Airways forum only for the word "upgrades":
site:flyertalk.com "Airline Programs US Airways Dividend Miles" upgrades

Or to search MilesBuzz for the word "credit card":
site:flyertalk.com "Miles&Points MilesBuzz" "credit card"

You need to type the words "Airline Programs," "Miles&Points" or "Travel&Dining" respectively, followed by the program name, to narrow your results down to a specific forum. Google includes the drop-down menu at the bottom of the screen that lists ALL forums as text on every FT page, so if you just type "US Airways Dividend Miles" or "MilesBuzz" you'll get pretty much every page on FT.

Since there's already an announcement at the top of this (and every other) forum titled "Search Downtime and Google Search Alternative Help," wouldn't it make more sense to incorporate the helpful suggestions into that announcement (and thus make them available across all forums) rather than having this separate "MilesBuzz" sticky? (It isn't really a MilesBuzz-specific topic anyhow.) @:-)

I agree that this Sticky should be for all forums. For example, in another forum someone posted the FT Archive link. Searching with this link is much more specific than Google because you can browse thread titles in just one forum.

Another way to find something.... ask a moderator for help. They have the ability to use search during the downtime strictly to help members.

John at Flyertalk has added this thread as a link in the announcement at the each forum.

No, this thread only exists in the MilesBuzz forum, and not on any others, as far as I can tell.

Well, you're right; it's not there now. The day you posted the suggestion, the announcement contained links to (I believe) 3 FT threads with search suggestions. John added a link to the above search suggestion in the announcement so that there were 4 links listed. Now the announcement is changed so that none of those links are included.

Is the search feature ever going to return?

The utility and value, per se, of flyertalk is severely diminished without a search function.

Google doesn't cut it for very specific, narrow searches and takes far too long to isolate an answer IMO.

I find I go here less and less because I can't review subjects long-ago discussed.

Can anyone update the status ?

TIA

Does anyone know how I can search for my prior posts - or are they listed somewhere? I wanted to update a thread I started in early March or late Feb but I don't know how to find it - thx.

Seeing as how the FT Search feature was re-enabled some 11 days ago (if not more), this sticky probably isn't really needed any longer.