# Searching for strings with @ returns 0 results

**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/searching-for-strings-with-returns-0-results/64427
**Category:** Feature
**Created:** [June 13, 2017, 1:33pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/searching-for-strings-with-returns-0-results/64427 "2017-06-13T13:33:36Z")
**Posts on this page:** 3
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![Sujan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/sujan/32/70979_2.png) [@Sujan](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Sujan)
#### Post date: [June 13, 2017, 1:33pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/searching-for-strings-with-returns-0-results/64427/1 "2017-06-13T13:33:37Z")

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Example:

> **[Search results for '"@ionic-native"' - Ionic Forum](https://forum.ionicframework.com/search?q=%22%40ionic-native%22)**
>
> Forum for Ionic Framework, Capacitor, and everything cross-platform mobile app development related

vs.

> **[Search results for '"ionic-native"' - Ionic Forum](https://forum.ionicframework.com/search?q=%22ionic-native%22)**
>
> Forum for Ionic Framework, Capacitor, and everything cross-platform mobile app development related

For programming related content it would be nice if this worked as e.g. npm adopted @ in package names.

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### Author: ![cpradio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/cpradio/32/4970_2.png) [@cpradio](https://meta.discourse.org/u/cpradio)
#### Post date: [June 13, 2017, 2:22pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/searching-for-strings-with-returns-0-results/64427/2 "2017-06-13T14:22:01Z")

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The reason this likely fails, is due to the `@` being at the beginning of the word, thus it matches the username selector and is trying to find a user with that username and any topics/posts associated to that unknown user.

I guess if it fails to find a username, it could treat it as a regular string and not a filter… (seems like a feature request)

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<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![Sujan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/sujan/32/70979_2.png) [@Sujan](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Sujan)
#### Post date: [June 14, 2017, 5:40pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/searching-for-strings-with-returns-0-results/64427/3 "2017-06-14T17:40:19Z")

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I think you are right, searching for “ionic-hello-world@” finds strings with @:

> **[Search results for 'ionic-hello-world@' - Ionic Forum](https://forum.ionicframework.com/search?q=ionic-hello-world%40)**
>
> Forum for Ionic Framework, Capacitor, and everything cross-platform mobile app development related