Guide to Using TehMarz' Cave Search

One of the most useful and, without doubt, powerful facilities that we have is the Cave Search that was recently created by Bristolian member TehMarz. Marz has put much of his knowledge of computer programming (and other forms of 1337 haxorz) to good use on HATPC and has made finding caves much easier. To see his articles on coding and related projects visit tehmarz.com

So how does this Cave Search work? Here's a brief breakdown on what it actually shows you... First of all, here's the link to it: Cave Search You can search for either a username or a cave title. If you type in a valid word, you'll get a list of caves in the following format in alphabetical order:

Named link to user page on Neopets + spotlight number (if it has one) with the related link
Cave Title - link to text box - link to map image
Basic description of cave (e.g. 80x80 cave with murky tapped water)
Walkthrough video (if it has one)

If you type in a word as it is, you'll get a partial match with the word in any part of the username or title. If you put an asterisk after the word (e.g. cave*), you'll only get matches with the word at the beginning of the username/title. If you put an asterisk before the word (e.g. *cave), you'll get all the results with the word at the end of the username/title.

What if you only want cave titles? Then you start your search with 'title:' (e.g. title:cave), which excludes any compatible matches with usernames. If you only want usernames, start your search off with 'user:' (e.g. user:cave).

If you want spotlight caves, put a space and then '+spotlight' at the end of your search (e.g. cave +spotlight). A combination of the title/user/* attachments can be used with '+spotlight'. Only the first 150 spotlight caves have been made available so far.

Finally, if you want ANY title or ANY username then simply make your search blank along with any of the attachments mentioned above. So far, I've found that any combination of attachments can be used if you want a really detailed search.

Here are the different ways of searching for 'cave':

1. 'cave' - any username/title results
2. 'cave*' - any username/title results with 'cave' at the beginning
3. '*cave' - any username/title results with 'cave' at the end
4. 'title:cave' - any title results
5. 'user:cave' - any username results
6./7. 'title:cave* or title:*cave' - any title results with 'cave' at the beginning/end
8./9. 'user:cave* or user:*cave' - any username results with 'cave' at the beginning/end
10. 'cave +spotlight' - any username/title results that have a spotlight entry
11. 'title:cave +spotlight' - any title results that have a spotlight entry
12. 'user:cave +spotlight' - any username results that have a spotlight entry
13./14. 'title:cave* +spotlight or title:*cave +spotlight' - any title results with 'cave' at the beginning/end that have a spotlight entry
15./16. 'user:cave* +spotlight or user:*cave +spotlight' - any username results with 'cave' at the beginning/end that have a spotlight entry

There's probably more, but you get the idea.

So once you've found the cave you want, what do you do with it? There are two ways of viewing it: through text or in map form. If you click 'text', you'll get the code for the cave, which you'll then be able to copy into the uploader. If you click 'map', you'll see a brand new feature that no-one thought they'd ever see: an image of the entire map. Here's a map of CSD's brilliant cave 'The Cascades': Cascades Map

There are also links to Neopets user page, spotlight number/page and and video walkthroughs. All in all, this is the most useful cave database ever devised and makes HATPC caves more accessible than they've ever been before. Although it is completed, I believe that the Cave Search will be expanded and updated to incorporate new caves, although I'm not certain about that one. Let's be grateful for the work that Marz has put into this - it's a dead handy tool to use.

EDIT: Marz has kindly pointed out some commands that I missed out. Min and max dimensions are one (e.g. max:80x80 or min:40x40) and water commands (the ones you can use are... water:clear/murky/dark/none/still/rising/tapped). Sorry for not going through all the combinations, but I have a new blog to do...