We need exact search / exact string matching on the portal

1. Ideas & Brainstorming
1

right now, searching for an atom returns everything that loosely matches it

that works for discovery
but breaks down when you’re trying to find something specific

for example, if you search for something like “apple”, you don’t just get the exact atom. you get:

  • Apple Pie

  • Applebee’s

  • Pineapple

and then somewhere in that list… the actual Apple

right now, search behaves like a partial match system

it looks for anything that contains the term, not just exact matches

which is useful when you’re exploring
but not when you already know what you’re looking for

it matters because atoms are supposed to be precise, unique identifiers

so when search isn’t precise:

  • it slows you down

  • increases the chance of picking the wrong atom

  • and makes duplicates more likely because people can’t find what already exists

there’s no way to say:

“only show me the exact match”

a simple fix could be:

  • quoted search → “apple”

  • or a toggle for exact match

so users can switch between:

  • broad search (discovery)

  • exact search (precision)

the bigger issue

this isn’t just a UX detail, it’s a mismatch between how atoms are defined and how they’re retrieved

atoms are meant to be clear and unambiguous
but search introduces ambiguity at the moment it matters most

search right now is great for finding related things

but sometimes you don’t want related

you just want the exact thing and move on

1 Like
2

Hi @pixie thanks for writing this up. You’re completely right, and this is something we’ve been talking about internally too.

Search is doing a decent job on the discovery side, but it’s not good enough when you already know exactly what you’re looking for. That makes it harder to find the right atom quickly and definitely increases the chances of duplicates.

We’re actively working on an updated backend that should help a lot here. It’ll give us a much better foundation for search quality overall, and for how atoms and triples get constructed and retrieved.

Really appreciate you calling this out so clearly. This is exactly the kind of thing we need to improve.