2.1 Hacks #9-19
Without
the ability to search, eBay would be close to worthless. Think about
it: at any given time, there are close to 20 million items for sale
on eBay, and that number keeps growing. If you were only able to flip
through them like pages in a magazine (a magazine a quarter of a mile
thick, mind you), you'd never find anything.Searching on eBay is an art, often requiring you to think a little
creatively. Sometimes you have to get into the minds of other users
to predict how they might describe the item you're
looking for; other times you just have to be devious.Now, basic searching on eBay is a piece of cake. Just type a word
into eBay's search box and press Enter, or type more
than one word to narrow your search. By default, all searches simply
cover auction titles, but you can include auction descriptions as
well by clicking the "Search titles and
descriptions" checkbox.The hacks in this chapter take it several steps further, covering the
advanced search syntax, showing you how to carefully control the
scope of your searches, and including several ways to find things
that would otherwise elude you. After all, the best deals (and the
best finds) are usually the items that most people
don't see.