Arora... Ferrets... Searching... WHAT?

So we have been integrating this cool search technology called acts_as_ferret into Arora.  It is a way of searching through the database VERY fast and VERY accurately.  Here is a pretty graph comparing ferret to the other well known searching technologies (reference):

So it's fast and accurate?  Is that good?  YES!  You would be surprised the number of web application (and applications in general) that have horrible search engines.  Using a technology that indexes the database rather than just using an SQL full text search (or even worse LIKE statements) creates great applications.  Customers are more prone to use a search than to try and navigate through categories.  Think about google, there is a reason they are most peoples homepage.

 Scott also took the searching to the next level for Arora...  If the search is a direct hit, such as a course number or title perhaps, it goes straight to the details for that class.  No point in sifting through some results when we know where you want to go, right?