Show context around old Teams messages from search results

Anonymous
2020-09-29T18:45:59+00:00

Looking for help with a particular issue with searching for older messages inside of Teams.

When I search for a certain keyword - say, "hot dog" - I get results that are both old and recent from past conversations. If I look at the recent results I get the full message context that surrounds it - messages coming and going.

If I read older messages, however, I only get the single message result without any surrounding context. This is only marginally helpful, as the context is necessary to add, well, context to the conversation!

Has anyone figured out how to do this? Is it an admin side thing that needs to change?

Microsoft Teams | Microsoft Teams for business | Chats | Search messages and conversations

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  1. Anonymous
    2021-09-14T13:34:12+00:00

    Looking for help with a particular issue with searching for older messages inside of Teams.

    When I search for a certain keyword - say, "hot dog" - I get results that are both old and recent from past conversations. If I look at the recent results I get the full message context that surrounds it - messages coming and going.

    If I read older messages, however, I only get the single message result without any surrounding context. This is only marginally helpful, as the context is necessary to add, well, context to the conversation!

    Has anyone figured out how to do this? Is it an admin side thing that needs to change?

    Unbelievable but true, I solved by using Teams Android app 🤣
    After you find the single message, it also allows you to scroll through the context, like any other banal messaging app 😑

    I hope I have been helpful, as it has been in my case. I had a whole conversation with a colleague who no longer works with us, I was about to commit suicide with the thought of having lost everything

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  2. Anonymous
    2021-09-14T10:11:55+00:00

    I suspect that they have changed the behaviour of the web version of teams as it now works the same way as the installed app. As in search is broken, not showing the chat history around a message.

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  3. Anonymous
    2021-08-31T21:07:57+00:00

    I don't understand how a multibillion dollar company can so consistently generate products that cannot compete with what a couple of developers are making in their garage.  

    This is a bit off topic, but I'm pretty sure that if I was fired and then given an unlimited budget to write any software I want in whatever language I want, I would instantly become a better developer.

    Programming only becomes "work" when your boss tells you what you are supposed to deliver and by when you have to deliver it. Until this happens, programming is an enjoyable art.

    Why else would a genius write something as seminal as the "The 'Art' of Computer Programming" using assembly language for illustrations...?

    BTW: The best programming language ever invented is Haskell (smirk).

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  4. Anonymous
    2021-08-31T20:53:30+00:00

    @Michal Novotny

    I have tried the proposed solution from @jengibson2, but did not help me.

    BUT WHAT WORKS PERFECTLY is when you open the web version of TEAMS https://teams.microsoft.com/ where you can search for keywords and it displays all the history around.

    Not sure I'm following your instructions for the web version exactly, but I still have this problem even with the web version. I'm on presently on Debian 11 with Firefox 78.13.0esr (64-bit) but I don't think that matters.

    Originally, I thought this was a bug with the GNU\Linux client but now I've got a mentor that seems to be telling me he gets the same problem on the dedicated Android and MS Windows clients. My GNU\Linux Teams client version is 1.4.00.13653 (64-bit).

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  5. Anonymous
    2021-08-31T20:34:59+00:00

    When searching for an old message in Teams, we can only click to check the details about this specific chat message, but unfortunately, it is not feasible to show the chat history related to the specific search result. 

    Jennifer is an awesome name. I know a VERY awesome person named Jennifer. Unfortunately, this is a very disappointing response from Microsoft. This behavior in MS Teams notably hampers usability and thereby underscores the usefulness of plain old email.

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