After deciding last summer not to renew its search deal with Google, Twitter has been making efforts towards its own search capabilities. The micro-blogging site added spelling corrections and related queries alongside its search results back in May, and now it has implemented an additional set of improvements to search.
"[T]hese updates make it even easier to immediately get closer to the things you care about," Twitter engineer Frost Li said in a blog post. The new set of improvements allows users to search just within tweets of people they follow, and adds autocomplete, as well as related search results including similar hashtags and usernames. These improvements are designed to simplify search and help users find what they are looking for even if they are unsure of a certain hashtag or someone's handle.
The updates are already live on Twitter.com, while and related search suggestions, autocomplete, and spelling corrections are also available in Twitter for iPhone and Android. The spelling correction feature will automatically display results for users' intended query even if they misspell a term. Meanwhile, if you search for a topic commonly referred to with multiple terms, the related suggestions tweak will provide relevant suggestions. Another improvement is results with real names and usernames, which means searching for a name will return that person's real name, as well as their Twitter account username. Results from people you follow also come as a useful addition, complementing the "All" or "Top" Tweets for your search. With the new results, users can now see Tweets on a topic from only the people they follow by selecting the "People you follow" view.
The new search tweaks follow a set of enhancements to the Discover tab, email digests, and Tailored Trends, which aim to make Twitter more than just a tweeting and reading venue. On the other hand, while the search improvements were long-overdue, they still need plenty of refinement. Other internal search engines have offered autocomplete and suggestions for years, but Twitter's efforts are commended nonetheless.
