Hi! When trying to help new users (or myself) I often Google the keywords.
But, Google seems to prefer old archive versions over current.
This can get unwanted result.
Is there a way to fix this?
eg: manual beaming dorico - Google Search
You should be able to search effectively within the help pages themselves, which you can go to directly from Dorico’s Help menu.
Google gives higher priority to links with more hits, which older versions have by virtue of being older.
Sure, searching within document itself is better when
a) You know where it is
b) You only want answers from the manual.
That’s not always the case.
You will get better results if you search e.g. “manual beaming dorico 5”. That little 5 makes a world of difference to the results.
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This is a long-standing issue reported oodles of times the last five years. This issue lies solely with Google, and the older manuals have more page hits, hence the algorithm favors those, and then it’s a self-reinforcing cycle, unfortunately. FWIW, if you access the help pages directly from within Dorico, it will ping you to the proper version.
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I’m sure @Lillie_Harris would be interested to know what you’re typing into Google that’s not bringing results when you type it into the Help Page’s search.
There seems to be an easy fix:
This is quite interesting to me, truth be told. That said, I’m not sure the team would agree that de-indexing the older help manuals is actually helpful. There will still be users who need access to those older pages.
Those legacy help-pages are also found under main help I believe.
How many benefit from those old help-manuals are Google indexed vs. how many are led astray?
When I navigate to [www.steinberg.help] the very first thing that pops up on the homepage under the popular tab is a link to the current manual.
If you don’t notice that and then deliberately filter for Dorico Pro, 5.1 is the top of the list of options.
And if you using Dorico, and click the Dorico help button from within the program itself, it takes you directly to the current manual.
So, what exactly is Steinberg doing wrong here? Is it really that hard to find the correct manual if you put in even the smallest modicum of effort?
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I leave a browser tab with the online manual (these days, v. 5.1) loaded at all times in Safari (also making use of S’s Profiles feature to keep things organized), right next to the tab for this forum. That way I know a search bar is always just a click or two (and some typing) away. I find it far more accurate, useful, and efficient than wading through “prioritized” Google results.
Somewhere there is a very good tip by @dspreadbury , cannot find the thread right now, but in Firefox at least it goes this way:
- go to Steinberg
- select: Dorico
- select: 5.1
- now Right-CLick in the search field “Search our manuals”
- select “Add keyword for this Search”
- now add the keyword you wish to use in the “Keyword” field
- I use “dh” (dorico help) here, but you can use what you want
If you now open a browser tab, and type: dh something
it will take you right away to the Dorico 5.1 manual pages, no Google involved 
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For Safari users:
@JeroenH (and Daniel’s) handy workflow tip above inspired me to think about Safari’s equivalent. Pretty simple:
- Make, say the Introduction page of your preferred manual one of your top 9 Safari Favorite pages. (Steinberg)
- OPT + CMD + [1–9] (wherever you place it) is by design the keyboard shortcut
Now maybe I’ll learn to start closing some of these tabs open everywhere…
Some of you seem to not understand the issue.
The issue is: Google lists old archived manuals over current. This gives especially new users outdated info.
Yes, for experienced users all of you above suggestions are fine. But that’s sort of another discussion.
Why use eg. Google: Well, then the search-result include videos and blog-info and what not.
Why do you think we don’t understand the issue? Just because you haven’t received the answer you want? If you insist you don’t want to try any of the good suggestions already given, but are only interested in controlling Google results – we cannot!
The focused and extremely well-organized user manual has lots of video links too. Lillie is working every day to ensure that likely search terms yield relevant documentation.
Does @iaincd’s suggestion above not do the trick for you?
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Yes, sort of. It fixes the problem mentioned.
But, it filters out relevant answers that does’n contain “5” so it would defeat the purpose.
I don’t understand you here Mark.
In web-design and SEO “controlling” Googles search results is very much what it’s about. I just point out that things are not optimized well in this case.
And, I’ve suggested an easy fix.