If you have little or no experience with Google, read on. Otherwise, skip ahead to Going Directly to the 1st Result.

If your browser isn’t pointing to Google, visit Google’s home page by entering one of the following web addresses into your browser:

• http://www.google.com/ (the full web address for Google)
• www.google.com (a common abbreviation for Google’s web address)
• google.com (for lazy typists)
• google (works on some browsers for the laziest of typists)

When we refer to a web address in this tutorial, we omit the “http://”prefix. For a description of web addresses, see “Anatomy of a Web Address”.

You may also have a bookmark or favorites entry for Google or a Google button on your browser window. No matter how you do it, you should see the Google home page with a search box:

What is a query? It’s a request for information from a search engine. A query consists of one or more words, numbers, or phrases that you hope you will find in the search results listings. In Google Guide, I sometimes call a query search terms.

To enter a query, type descriptive words into Google’s search box. You can use either the search box on Google’s home page (shown above) or the search box that always appears at the top of a Google results page (shown in the next screen shot). And for now, you can also use the search box we’ve provided. For practice, point to this box, click in it, and type the words [ california driving ]:

Now press the ENTER key or click on the Google Search button to view your search results. A new window will open with the Google results page for a search on the words “california”and “driving.” The results include links to pages that match your query as well as relevant snippets (excerpts) with your search terms in boldface.

When you’re finished with the results, close that window. This tutorial window, with the original search box, should still be here. Feel free to change what’s in the search box and run other searches.

The results page is full of information and links, most of which relate to your query. Results Google considers to be most relevant to your query are shown first. To the right of Google’s search results appear sponsored links, which are paid advertisements.

The first line in each result is the page title. The title will be underlined, i.e., it’s a link to the web page. You can click on the title to view that page. (The URL of the page is shown in green at the start of a line, near the end of the result.) Under the title are often excerpts, called snippets. Snippets include one or more of your query words shown in boldface. In our example, click on the link California Driving — A Survival Guide to view the corresponding California Driving Guide web page.

Your results for a search on “california driving” may be different from this screen shot because Google constantly searches the Web for new pages and adjusts its results algorithms.

tags (keywords): queries, search box

Click on the I’m Feeling Lucky button on Google’s home page to go directly to the first result for your query. Instead of showing you a list of pages, Google sends you immediately to the result that may be most relevant to your query. For example, if you enter the query [ california driving ] (without the square brackets) and click the I’m Feeling Lucky button, Google may send you to the home page of Hamish Reid’s wonderful California Driving Guide. (You may see another page if Google’s first result has changed by the time you read this tutorial.) When you run a Google search from Google Guide, the search result page opens in a new window. You can come back to this Google Guide page by closing that new window.

This example isn’t just a picture of what a search box and the I’m Feeling Lucky button look like. In this example and in others like it throughout this tutorial, you can edit what’s in the search box and run different searches.

The I’m Feeling Lucky button can save you the time it takes to review your results and then click on the first one. Use it when you’re confident the page you want is the best fit for your query, which is usually the case when you’re seeking very popular pages. For example, it’s a safe bet that an “I’m Feeling Lucky” search for “Paul McCartney” (one of The Beatles) will send you to his home page www.paulmccartney.com.

Note: I’m Feeling Lucky doesn’t consider the various sponsored links on the first results page, which are paid advertisements, when deciding where to take you. In other words, the I’m Feeling Lucky button will send you to what Google considers the most relevant result that is not a paid advertisement.

Next, in Selecting Search Terms, we’ll look at how to select search terms.

Exercises

These problems give you experience with entering a query. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page.

1. Point your browser to Google’s home page by visiting www.google.com. Find Google tutorials by typing [ google tutorial ] (without the square brackets) into Google’s search box and then clicking the “Google Search” button. Click on the link for Google Guide.
2. After completing the previous exercise, click the back button on your browser twice to return to Google’s home page and then search again for [ google tutorial ] (without the square brackets). Click on the I’m Feeling Lucky button.
3. What is the difference between the results of the previous two exercises?
4. Point your browser to Boogle’s home page by visiting www.boogle.com. In addition to offering the same search capabilities as Google, Boogle includes an interesting quote.
5. Find recipes for chocolate souffle by typing [ chocolate souffle recipes ] (without the square brackets) into Boogle’s search box and then clicking the “Google Search” button.
6. After completing the previous exercise, go back to the Boogle home page. (If you still have the same window open, use its back button to go back. Otherwise, click on www.boogle.com.) Then search again for [ chocolate souffle recipes ] (without the square brackets). Click on the I’m Feeling Lucky button.

tags (keywords): driving directions, lucky, results, search box

The search terms you enter and the order in which you enter them affect both the order and pages that appear in your search results. In the examples below, click on the similar ways of specifying various searches and note how the results differ.

For simplicity sake, this tutorial uses square brackets to denote Google’s search box. For example, to search for a cheap hotel in Mykonos, I’ll put the words “cheap,” “hotel,” and “Mykonos” in square brackets, [ cheap hotel Mykonos ], to indicate you should type those three words in Google’s search box. You should not type the brackets, although Google will ignore them if you do type them.

Furthermore, in the examples that follow, each set of search terms is linked to the results of a Google search on those terms. So clicking on [ cheap Mykonos hotel ] returns the Google results page for a search on those three words.

1. Use Likely Words

• [ salary negotiation tips ]
• [ sciatica ]
• [ window treatments ]

Avoid using a question as a query. For example, the query, [ Does Australia have Target ], instructs Google to find pages containing all the terms. Such a query won’t necessarily find pages answering your question. A better query might be [ Australia Target store ].

• USE [ Australia Target store ]
• NOT [ Does Australia have Target ]

When Google detects very common words such as where, do, I, for, and a, known as stop words, it ignores them so Google may return relevant results. If you’re seeking pages that include a stop word, e.g., “how the west was won,” learn how to force Google to search for a complete phrase or a specific word in Crafting Your Query and the following pages.

Avoid using words that you might associate with your topic, but you wouldn’t expect to find on the designated page(s). For example, queries that include “articles about,” “discussion of,” “documentation on,” and “pages about” are likely to return fewer results since information on the web is rarely labeled with such terms.

• USE [ lasik eye surgery ]
• NOT [ documentation on lasik eye surgery ]

• USE [ jobs product marketing Sunnyvale ]
• NOT [ listings of product marketing jobs in Sunnyvale ]

Suppose you want to know how old someone is, such as Nelson Mandela (the former President of South Africa). Pages with “birthday” or “age” might be more than a year old. Searching for pages that include “Nelson Mandela” and “born” are likely to include either “Nelson Mandela born” or “Nelson Mandela was born” followed by his birth date. You can figure out his age from knowing when he was born (to do the math, try the Google Calculator).

• USE [ Nelson Mandela born ]
• NOT [ Nelson Mandela birthday ] nor [ Nelson Mandela age ]

Not sure what word or phrase is likely to appear on pages you want? Consider running a word or phrase popularity contest with Google Smackdown, which you can find at www.onfocus.com/googlesmack/down.asp. This third-party application reports which of two terms or phrases Google estimates to be more prevalent on the web (actually on more web pages that Google has included in its index).

Although not as popular according to Google Smackdown, in Google Guide I use “screen shot” because it’s in my online dictionary and “screenshot” isn’t.

Note: How Google Works describes how Google finds web pages and constructs an index.

2. Be Specific

It’s better to use a more precise, less ambiguous term than a common one to “flesh out the topic by including facets that interest you,” notes Ned Fielden in his book Internet Research, Second Edition (McFarland & Company, 2001).

Does your query have enough specific information for Google to determine unambiguously what you’re seeking? If your query is too vague, it’s unlikely to return relevant results. Consider, for example, the query [ java ]. What do you suppose Google includes in the first page of results? An island in Indonesia? A beverage consisting of an infusion of ground coffee beans? A computer network-oriented platform-independent programming language developed by Sun Microsystems?

• USE [ Java Indonesia ], [ java coffee ], or [ java programming language ]
• NOT [ java ]

How can you come up with more specific search terms? What do you know about the topic? Consider answers to the questions, “who?”, “what?”, “where?”, “when?”, “why?”, and “how?”

When you search for [ Tom Watson ], on the first page of results you may get references to a member of Parliament, the golfer, the IBM executive, and a Populist Party candidate for President in 1900 and 1904. If you’re searching for something that could return many different types of results, you should add a term that distinguishes among them. This way you’ll get only results about the specific Tom Watson you’re interested in.

• USE [ Tom Watson MP ], [ Tom Watson golf ], or [ Tom Watson IBM ]
• NOT [ Tom Watson ]

• USE [ baby development ] or [ baby milestones ]
• NOT [ babies ]

• USE [ Betty Ford Center drug addiction ]
• NOT [ Ford Center ]

Note: Google limits queries to 32 words.

3. Brevity

For best results, use a few precise words. For example, a program on quitting smoking is more likely to include the terms “quit smoking program” than the words “program on quitting tobacco cigarette smoking addiction.”

• USE [ quit smoking program ]
• NOT [ program on quitting tobacco cigarette smoking addiction ]

4. Spelling

There’s a good chance that Google will recognize your mistakes and suggest an alternative more common spelling, usually faster than you can look up the term in an online dictionary.

When you enter: [ Anna Kornikova tennis ]
Google responds: Did you mean: Anna Kournikova tennis

Note: Before clicking on Google’s suggested spelling, consider whether it’s what you want. Spelling checkers, like people, make mistakes.

For more information on Google’s spelling correction system, see Spelling Suggestions.

Note: Even if you use the search tips described in Google Guide, you won’t be able to access authoritative information that’s available offline, e.g., old reference books, or is stored in specialized databases. For such information is not currently searchable with Google.

Next we’ll look at how Google interprets your query.

For more information on the basics of Google search, visit www.google.com/help/basics.html.

Exercises

These problems give you experience in selecting search terms. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page.

1. Find a page with “Google doodle.”
2. Find the Dilbert cartoon that Scott Adams developed by using Google’s logo.
3. What’s Google’s history?
4. Find contact information for your representative(s), e.g., senator, congresswoman (or congressman), or member of Parliament.
5. How long did it take the first person to cross the United States by car and in what year was it first done?
6. In the summer of 1997, an email message was widely circulated featuring the text of a “commencement speech” purportedly given by Kurt Vonnegut at MIT. The imaginary speech began “Wear sunscreen.” What’s the story behind this email hoax? What did this funny well-written fantasy “commencement speech” say?
7. Learn about the recommended tours of the Hearst Castle.
8. Find a recipe for lamb with mint sauce.

tags (keywords): brackets, narrowing search, queries, search terms, spelling, stop words

Understanding how Google treats your search terms will help you devise effective queries and revise ineffective ones.

1. All Search Terms Count

A search for [ compact fold-up bicycle ] finds pages containing the words “compact” and “fold-up” and “bicycle.” Because you don't need to include the word AND between your terms, this notation is called an implicit AND.

• [ compact fold-up bicycle ]

Because of implicit AND, you can focus your query by adding more terms.

• [ compact lightweight fold-up bicycle ]

Note: If you want pages containing any (instead of all) of your search terms, use the OR operator.

Note: Google sometimes returns pages that don't contain your query terms, as you can see in example. Google returns pages in which your query terms are included in the link text (interpreted as a description) to another page or place on the page, more commonly referred to as the anchor text of a link pointing to the page.

2. Search Terms Match Exactly

In his book Internet Research, Second Edition (McFarland & Company, 2001), Ned Fielden notes “Google simply matches strings of characters together and doesn't currently base inferences on uses of the language. Although this searching method has some drawbacks, it harnesses one of the fabulous powers of computers, [the ability] to sift through enormous heaps of data quickly and accurately.”

Note: There are exceptions when Google finds pages that include synonyms of your search terms, which are displayed in a boldface typeface in Google's snippet.

3. Similar Words Match

The query [ child bicycle helmet ] finds pages that contain words that are similar to some or all of your search terms, e.g., “child,” “children,” or “children's,” “bicycle,” “bicycles,” “bicycle's,” “bicycling,” or “bicyclists,” and “helmet” or “helmets.” Google calls this feature word variations or automatic stemming. Stemming is a technique to search on the stem or root of a word that can have multiple endings.

If you only want to search for pages that contain some term(s) exactly, precede each such term with a plus sign (+) or enclose more than one term in quotes (" ").

Google doesn't match variants when your query consists of a single term.

Note: When you want synonyms or variants that Google doesn't find, consider using either the OR or tilde operator.

4. Stop Words

Stop words tend to slow down your search without improving the results. Google will indicate if a stop word has been excluded on the results page below the search box.

[ lyrics to the Dixie Chicks' songs ]

Note: Use the + operator or enclose more than one term in quotes (" ") to force Google to include terms it would otherwise ignore. We'll describe these basic operators and others soon in Crafting Your Query.

If your query consists only of common words that Google normally ignores, Google will search for pages that match all the terms.

• [ the who ]

Note: Find more pages mentioning the rock band The Who by entering [ "the who" ], a notation you'll learn about soon in the page Quoted Phrases.

5. Word Limit

Google will indicate in a message below the query box at the top of the page if your query exceeds the 32-word limit. The 32-word limit applies to search terms and operators but not stop words.

The limit was previously 10 words, as shown in the following image.

The following query finds sites that have included Google Guide's description of how Google works.

• [ "Google consists of three distinct parts, each of which is run on a distributed network of thousands of low-cost computers and can therefore carry out fast parallel processing. Parallel processing is a method of computation in which many calculations can be performed simultaneously, significantly speeding up data processing." ]

6. Terms Nearby

Google considers the proximity of your search terms within a page. So the query [ snake grass ] finds pages about a plant of that name, while [ snake in the grass ] tends to emphasize pages about sneaky people. Although Google ignores the words “in” and “the,” (these are stop words), Google gives higher priority to pages in which “snake” and “grass” are separated by two words.

• [ snake grass ]
• [ snake in the grass ]

7. Terms in Order

Consequently, you should enter search terms in the order in which you would expect to find them on the pages you're seeking. A search for [ New York library ] gives priority to pages about New York's libraries. While the query [ new library of York ] gives priority to pages about the new libraries in York.

• [ New York library ]
• [ new library of York ]

8. Not Case-Sensitive

Ignoring case distinctions increases the number of results Google finds. A search for [ Red Cross ] finds pages containing “Red Cross,” “red cross,” or “RED CROSS.”

[ Red Cross ], [ red cross ], and [ RED CROSS ] return the same results.

There is no way to instruct Google to pay attention to case distinctions, e.g., you can't tell Google to find only occurrences of “Red Cross” where the first letter of each word is capitalized.

Note: The words “OR” and “AND” have special meanings if entered in uppercase letters.

9. Characters Ignored

Because punctuation is typically not as important as the text around it, Google ignores most punctuation in your search terms. There are exceptions, e.g., C++ and $99. Mathematical symbols, such as /, <, and >, are not ignored by Google's calculator.

[ Dr. Ruth ] returns the same results as [ Dr Ruth ]

What if you're seeking information that includes punctuation that Google ignores, e.g., an email address? Just enter the whole thing including the punctuation.

• [ info@amazon.com ]

Be aware that web pages sometimes camouflage email addresses to make collecting such information difficult for spammers. For example, on some sites you'll find the @ sign in an email address replaced with the word “at.”

Now we'll look at some special characters that Google doesn't ignore.

10. Apostrophes

A query with the term “we're” returns different results from a query with the term “were.”

• [ we're ] matches “we're” but not “were”
• [ were ] matches “were” but not “we're”

11. Hyphenated Terms

When Google encounters a hyphen (–) in a query term, e.g., [ part-time ], it searches for:

• the term with the hyphen, e.g., part-time
• the term without the hyphen, e.g., parttime
• the term with the hyphen replaced by a space, e.g., part time

• [ part-time ] matches “part-time,” “part time,” and “parttime”
• [ part time ] matches “part-time” and “part time”, but
• [ "part time" ] (with quotes) is better for space-separated words

Also:

• [ e-mail ] matches “e-mail,” “email,” and “e mail”
• [ email ] matches “email”

Note: Google may search for variations of your query terms that are included in the online dictionary that Google uses.

• [ non profit ] matches “non-profit,” “nonprofit,” and “non profit”

If you aren't sure whether a word is hyphenated, go ahead and search for it with a hyphen.

12. Summary

The following table summarizes how Google interprets your query.

Next we'll look at how to fine-tune your query.

For more information on the basics of Google search, visit www.google.com/help/basics.html.

Exercises

These problems are intended to help you understand how Google interprets your search terms. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page.

1. Indicate which queries would match a page containing "GoogleGuide."
   

   [ guide ]    [ goog ]    [ googleguide ]    [ GoogleGuide ]    [ google ]

2. What is the usual percentage gratuity (tip) to give in a big city in the United States to a person who provides take-out service, i.e., gives you your orders and accepts payment for the food?
3. Indicate which words the following queries will find:
   

   [ year-end ]	year-end	year end	yearend
   [ year end ]	year-end	year end	yearend
   [ yearend ]	year-end	year end	yearend

4. Which queries would you predict to be most likely to find sites with discounted designer linens?
   

   [ discounted designer linens ]

   [ discount designer linen ]

   [ designer linen discount ]

   [ linen designer discount ]

   [ linen discounted design ]

5. With the following queries, is Google doing stemming, i.e., matching variations of the search terms?

   [ color printer ]
   [ color printers ]
   [ color printer OR printers ]

6. Why doesn't the query [ Be Manual ] include any results about the Be operating system?

By using special characters and operators, such as +, –, ~, .., *, OR, and quotation marks, you can fine-tune your search query and increase the accuracy of its results.

For details, click an operator above or look in the following seven pages:

1. Quoted Phrases
2. The + Operator
3. The – Operator
4. The ~ Operator
5. The OR and | Operators
6. The .. Operator
7. The * Operator,
8. Summary

tags (keywords): google guide, queries, special characters

A query with terms in quotes finds pages containing the exact quoted phrase. For example, [ “Larry Page“ ] finds pages containing the phrase “Larry Page” exactly. So this query would find pages mentioning Google’s co-founder Larry Page, but not pages containing “Larry has a home page,” “Larry E. Page,” or “Congressional page Larry Smith.” The query [ Larry Page ] (without quotes) would find pages containing any of “Larry Page,” “Larry has a home page,” or “Congressional page Larry Smith.”

• [ “Larry Page“ ]
• [ Larry Page ]

A quoted phrase is the most widely used type of special search syntax.

• [ “close your eyes and I’ll kiss you“ ]
• [ “what you’re looking for is already inside you“ Anne Lamott speech ]

Use quotes to enter proper names.

• [ “Julia Robinson“ ]
• [ “Rio de Janeiro“ ]

Find recommendations by searching for pages containing lists.

• [ “favorite movies“ ]
• [ “best non-fiction books“ ]

Google will search for common words (stop words) included in quotes, which it would otherwise ignore.

• USE [ “to be or not to be“ ]
• NOT [ to be or not to be ]

• USE [ “how to change oil“ ]
• NOT [ how to change oil ]

Google doesn’t perform automatic stemming on phrases, i.e., searching for pages that match variants of any of your search terms, described in Interpreting Your Query. For example, if you want to see pages that mention only one favorite book rather than lists of favorite books, enclose your search terms in quotes.

• [ “favorite book“ ]

Some teachers use quoted phrases to detect plagiarism. They copy a few unique and specific phrases into the Google search box, surround them with quotes, and see if any results are too similar to their student’s supposedly original work. Find ways to detect and prevent plagiarism.

• [ “ways to detect plagiarism“ ]
• [ “how to detect plagiarism“ ]

You may include more than one quoted string in a query. All quoted query phrases must appear on a result page; the implied AND works on both individual words and quoted phrases. The following search would find pages containing both of the phrases “The Cat in the Hat” and “Green Eggs and Ham”:

• [ “The Cat in the Hat“ “Green Eggs and Ham“  ]

Note: In Using Search Operators (Advanced Operators) and the following list of search operators, you’ll learn how to find a page by specifying its title.

tags (keywords): fine tune, narrowing search, phrase, queries, quotes, special characters

To force Google to search for a particular term, put a + sign operator in front of the word in the query. Note that you should not put a space between the + and the word. So, to search for the satirical newspaper The Onion, use [ +The Onion ], not [ + The Onion ].

The + operator is typically used in front of stop words that Google would otherwise ignore or when you want Google to return only those pages that match your search terms exactly. However, the + operator can be used on any term.

Want to learn about Star Wars Episode One? “I” is a stop word and is not included in a search unless you precede it with a + sign.

• USE [ Star Wars +I ]
• NOT [ Star Wars I ]

Google excludes common words in English and in other languages, such as “la” (which means “the” in Spanish) and “de” (which means “of” in French, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese). So if Google ignores a term critical to your search, e.g., LA (common abbreviation for Los Angeles), put a + sign in front of it.

• USE [ jobs in central +LA California ]
• NOT [  jobs in central LA California ]

The query [ jobs in central LA California ] finds jobs in central California, since the term “LA” is ignored because it’s a stop word. Central California is at least a hundred miles (160 km) from central Los Angeles.

Disable automatic stemming, i.e., searching for pages that match variants of your search term(s), by preceding each term that you want to be matched exactly with the + operator. For example, if you want to see only pages mentioning one favorite book rather than lists of favorite books, precede the word “book” by a + sign.

• [ favorite +book ]

Google will search for “favourite” and “favorite” too. To prevent this, precede the word “favorite” by a + sign.

• [ +favorite +book ]

What if you’re looking for a string that contains a “+” sign? Though the character has special meaning, Google gives special attention to very common terms that include it, e.g., C++ (the name of a widely used computer language).

• [ C++ ]

tags (keywords): fine tune, narrowing search, queries, special characters, spelling, stop words

To find pages without a particular term, put a – sign operator in front of the word in the query. The – sign indicates that you want to subtract or exclude pages that contain a specific term. Do not put a space between the – and the word, i.e.

• USE [ dolphins –football ]
• NOT [ dolphins  – football ]

So, to search for a twins support group in Minnesota, but not return pages relating to the Minnesota Twins baseball team:

• USE [ twins support group Minnesota –baseball ]
• NOT [ twins support group Minnesota ]

No pages containing the word “baseball” will be returned by the first query.

Find pages on “salsa” but not the dance nor dance classes.

• USE [ salsa –dance –class ]
• NOT [ salsa ]

tags (keywords): fine tune, hyphen, narrowing search, queries, special characters

The tilde (~) operator takes the word immediately following it and searches both for that specific word and for the word’s synonyms. It also searches for the term with alternative endings. The tilde operator works best when applied to general terms and terms with many synonyms. As with the + and – operators, put the ~ (tilde) next to the word, with no spaces between the ~ and its associated word, i.e., [ ~lightweight laptop ] NOT [ ~ lightweight laptop ].

Why did Google use tilde? In math, the “~” symbol means “is similar to.” The tilde tells Google to search for pages that are synonyms or similar to the term that follows.

• [ ~inexpensive ] matches “inexpensive,” “cheap,” “affordable,” and “low cost”
• [ ~run ] matches “run,” “runner’s,” “running,” as well as “marathon”

Looking for a guide, help, tutorial, or tips on using Google?

• [ google ~guide ]

Interested in food facts as well as nutrition and cooking information?

• [ ~food ~facts ]

The tilde operator works best when applied to general terms and terms with many synonyms.

• [ ~cockroach ]

If you don’t like the synonyms that Google suggests when you use the ~ operator, specify your own synonyms with the OR operator, which I describe next.

tags (keywords): broadening search, fine tune, queries, special characters, synonyms, tilde

The OR operator, for which you may also use | (vertical bar), applies to the search terms immediately adjacent to it. The first and second examples will find pages that include either “Tahiti” or “Hawaii” or both terms, but not pages that contain neither “Tahiti” nor “Hawaii.” The third and fourth examples will find pages that contain any one, two, or all three of the terms “blouse,” “shirt,” and “chemise.”

• [ Tahiti OR Hawaii ]
• [ Tahiti | Hawaii ]

• [ blouse OR shirt OR chemise ]
• [ blouse | shirt | chemise ]

Note: If you write OR with a lowercase “o” or a lowercase “r” Google interprets the word as a search term instead of an operator.

Note: Unlike OR, a | (vertical bar) need not be surrounded by spaces.

• [ bicycle|cycle ]

Use quotes (“ ”) to group compound words and phrases together.

• [ filter OR stop “junk email“ OR spam ]
• [  “New Zealand“ OR “Ivory Coast“ holiday OR vacation package ]

tags (keywords): broadening search, fine tune, queries, quotes, special characters, synonyms

For example, specify that you are searching in the price range $250 to $1000 using the number range specification $250..$1000.

• [ recumbent bicycle $250..$1000 ]

Find the year the Russian Revolution took place.

• [ Russian Revolution 1800..2000 ]

tags (keywords): fine tune, narrowing search, numbers, prices, queries, special characters

Each * represents just one or more words. Google treats the * as a placeholder for a word or more than one word. For example, [ “Google * my life“ ] tells Google to find pages containing a phrase that starts with “Google” followed by one or more words, followed by “my life.” Phrases that fit the bill include: “Google changed my life,” “Google runs my life,” and “Google is my life.”

[ “Google * my life“ ]

If you know there’s a date on the page you’re seeking but you don’t know its format, specify several common formats using the OR operator. For example:

[ California election “Oct * 2003“ OR “10/*/03“ OR “October * 2003“ ]

When you know only part of the phrase you wish to find, consider using the * operator. Find the title of Sherry Russell’s book that can help you deal with the tragedies of 9/11 or losing a loved one.

[ “Conquering the * and * of Grief“ ]

Proximity searching can be useful when you want to find pages that include someone’s name in any of the following orders: first middle last, last first middle, first last, last first. To search for “Francis” adjacent or separated one word from “Coppola,” requires four queries:

[ “Francis Coppola“ ]
[ “Francis * Coppola“ ]
[ “Coppola Francis“ ]
[ “Coppola * Francis“ ]

If you want to search for two terms separated by no more than two words, i.e., a proximity search, you’ll need six queries. If you’re interested in running proximity searches, try out GAPS, a third-party search tool available at http://www.staggernation.com/cgi-bin/gaps.cgi.

Note: You can get around Google’s 32-word limit on the number of words in your query by substituting an * in place of each stop word or common word in your query. Wildcards are not counted.

USE [ All grown-ups * once children–although few * them remember * ]
NOT [ All grown-ups were once children–although few of them remember it ]

Google chose the symbol * to match one or more words because in some computer systems, such as Unix, Linux, and DOS, * stands for one or more unspecified characters. In those languages it is typically used for selecting multiple files and directories.

Note: Stemming is a technique to search on the stem or root of a word that can have multiple endings. For example, on some search engines the query bicycl* will return results that match words including bicycle, bicycles, bicycling, bicycled, and bicyclists. Google ignores asterisks (*) that are not surrounded by spaces. The query [ bicycl* ] finds documents that contain “bicycl.” Google automatically provides stemming.

If you want to search for a string with an asterisk or another special character, try using www.google.com/codesearch, Google’s Code Search Engine.

tags (keywords): No Tags

This table summarizes how to use the basic search operators described in this chapter. You may include any of these operators multiple times in a query.

Queries that use this special notation may also be entered by using Google’s Advanced Search, which we’ll look at next.

Exercises

This problem set is designed to give you practice in refining your queries and in using Google’s commands with special notation. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page.

1. Find the Google “cheat sheet” that lists search operators and services.
2. How long before you go outside should you apply sunscreen?
3. Find advice on writing a will.
4. Search for your own name. Does Google find any references to you or a namesake?

   See if there is any difference in your results if you type a period (.) between your names rather than enclosing your name in quotes and if you just enter the opening quote, i.e., compare the results from [ Nancy.Blachman ], [ ”Nancy Blachman” ], and [ ”Nancy Blachman ].

5. Find pages on daily life in Afghanistan that do not mention war or the Taliban.
6. What is the history of the McIntosh Apple (the fruit), not the computer?
7. Find the terms that Google considers approximately equivalent to the term “cheap.”
8. Find the terms that Google considers approximately equivalent to the term “volunteer.”
9. Find today’s weather forecast/condition.
10. Find recipes for zucchini, also known as courgette in the UK and France.
11. Find studio apartments for rent in Minneapolis or St. Paul, Minnesota.
12. Find Iranian restaurants in New Jersey and New York.
13. Why does the query [ “the who” ] give more priority to results about the rock band The Who than the query [ the who ] but return significantly fewer results?

tags (keywords): fine tune, queries, special characters, summary

When you don’t find what you’re seeking, consider specifying more precisely what you want by using Google’s Advanced Search feature. Don’t be frightened by the name “Advanced Search”; it’s easy to use, and it allows you to select or exclude pages with more precision than Google’s standard search box. Click on the Advanced Search link at the right of Google’s search box.

or visit www.google.com/advanced_search and fill in the form. (If you previously entered a query from the standard search box, then clicked on the Advanced Search link at the top of the results page, the Advanced Search form is automatically filled in with appropriate information from your previous query.)

The top of the Advanced Search form is where you’ll specify most of your search requirements. Clicking on the link “Date, usage rights, numeric range, and more,” or the + sign next to it, shows even more choices (which we’ll see in later sections). At the bottom of the search form are links to some of Google’s topic-specific searches, including special searches for various computer operating systems and universities.

The box at the top of the form, which first contains the gray text “Use the form below and your advanced search will appear here,” shows the Google query that’s generated by your advanced search — including special characters and advanced operators, if any. This is a great way to become familiar with those advanced Google features.

Note: This feature may not work on older browsers or if you’ve set a “high-security” mode — including disabling JavaScript in your browser.

Let’s look at some examples. If you click on the screen shots in this section, you’ll be taken to the results of running the corresponding search.

• To find tutorial introductions to Google, specify [ google ] in the top field (all these words), and [ tutorial ] [ guide ] [ introduction ] in the three fields on the third line (one or more of these words).
  
• Find how to export addresses from a Palm address book to print labels.
  

The second part of the Advanced Search page lets you omit pages containing certain words.

The next part of the Advanced Search page, Need more tools?,
gives more control over the pages listed in your search results.

Now we’ll look at the rest of the form — including the section that opens after you click on “Date, usage rights, numeric range, and more” or the + next to it. If you want to jump ahead to a particular part, though, choose it from this list:

• Results per page
• Language
• File Format
• Domain
• Date
• Usage Rights
• Occurrences
• Region
• Numeric Range
• SafeSearch
• Similar Pages
• Linking Pages

1. Results per page

To see more than ten search results at once, choose how many with the drop-down Results per page: box. The results page will take longer to load — though you may only notice the difference if you’re using a slow Internet connection. To see 50 results per page:

(Choosing the number of results doesn’t affect what you’ll see in the box “your advanced search will appear here” at the top of the form. However, after performing the search, the URL at the top of your browser window should include the text &num=50; it specifies 50 results per page.)

2. Language

The drop-down Language: box can resrict results to pages written in a specific language. For example, find pages in Spanish with recommendations for hotels in Andalucía, Spain.

(Choosing the language doesn’t change what you’ll see in the box at the top of the form. After performing the search, though, the URL at the top of your browser window should include the text &lr=lang_es; it specifies Spanish.)

If you always want only results in a certain language or set of languages, then change your search language in your Google preferences. See Customizing Your Preferences to learn how to change your Google preferences to modify the way your search results appear.

3. File Format

In the File Format area, you restrict your results to a particular file format, or exclude a format from your results. Choices include:

Since documents in PDF format tend to be better written than web pages, let’s search for documents on estate planning in PDF format.

You can restrict your search to other file formats by using the filetype: search operator.

4. Domain

To search only a specific website (e.g., www.eff.org) or domain (e.g., .org) or exclude that site or domain completely from your search, use the field Search within a site or domain:. In another page, we’ll see how to find the website or domain for a web page if you know its address.

Let’s look at a couple of examples. If you click on the screen shots in this section, you’ll be taken to the Advanced Search form specifying the corresponding search.

Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google’s founders, were graduate students at Stanford when they wrote a paper describing their prototype search engine. Let’s search for it by entering their names and restricting our search domain to Stanford University’s site, stanford.edu.

To find information on volunteering for an organization, search for results with the word “volunteering” and restrict the domain to “.org”.

5. Date

Here you can restrict results to pages that have been updated (created or modified), crawled, and added to Google’s index (indexed) in the past three, six, or twelve months. Popular pages that are updated often are crawled and indexed frequently.

Note: Any change in the page counts as an update, even a spelling correction.

This option is useful when searching for timely information such as annual events, specifications for a new model of car or appliance, or what people have been doing lately.

Recently, scientists reported new findings about the risks and benefits of hormone therapy used by 40% of postmenopausal American women to relieve menopause symptoms. We’re more likely to find links to this information by searching only for web pages updated in the last three months.

(Choosing the date range doesn’t affect what you’ll see in the box “your advanced search will appear here” at the top of the form. However, after performing the search, the URL at the top of your browser window should include the text &as_qdr=m3; it specifies 3 months.)

Visit the Wayback Machine if you want to see what a site looked like months or years ago or if a site is currently inaccessible. The Wayback Machine, also known as the Internet Archive, maintains a digital library of snapshots of many Internet sites.

6. Usage Rights

For pages covered by the Creative Commons license, Usage Rights: lets you specify what types of usage the page should allow.

In general — unless a page states otherwise — it’s safe to assume that pages you find with Google cannot be freely used in any way you like. However, some pages have special marking to tell search engines such as Google that the page is covered by the Creative Commons license — and what types of usage are permitted. The Usage Rights search finds these specially-marked pages.

Your choices are:

Note that simply finding pages with the Usage Rights search doesn’t guarantee your rights. You should check each page to be sure about its usage terms.

Let’s say that you want to build a website with recipes for vegetables. We’ll find pages on Google with Usage Rights “free to use, share or modify, even commercially”

(Specifying usage rights doesn’t change what you’ll see in the box at the top of the form. Setting this drop-down box makes a change in your browser’s URL that can be complicated. If you’re curious, experiment with various settings and check the URL you get after clicking the Advanced Search button.)

7. Occurrences

The field labeled Where your keywords show up: lets you specify where your search terms must occur on the page. Choices are anywhere on the page, in the title, in the text, in the URL, or in links to the page.

The title of a webpage is usually displayed at the top of the browser window and in the first line of Google’s search results for a page. The author of a website specifies the title of a page with the HTML <TITLE> element. There’s only one title in a webpage.

The Uniform Resource Locator, more commonly known as URL, is the address that specifies the location of a file on the Internet.

The link is the text on a page that is linked to another web page or a different place on the current page. When you click on the link, you will be taken to the page or place on the page to which it is linked.

Find pages on Google whose URL contains FAQ, an abbreviation for either Frequently Asked Questions or Frequently Answered Question. In the solution below I look for pages containing both Google and FAQ in the URL.

8. Region

Here you can request pages from a particular country or region of the world. (The results may show URLs from that part of the world, or they may end in more common domains like “.com”. In the latter case, the page may be from a regional version of a multinational website.)

To read pages from South Africa about President Clinton or Senator Clinton:

(Choosing the region doesn’t change the search shown in the box at the top of the form. After you search, though, the URL at the top of your browser window should include the text &cr=countryZA; ZA is the code for South Africa — and its Internet domain.)

9. Numeric Range

Use Numeric Range: when you want pages containing numbers in a specified range.

When I was interested in a “half-bicycle” trailer for my young twins, I searched for one called Trail-a-Bike in the price range $50-$1000.

(In this case, I could also have used Google’s Product Search — which has its own Advanced Product Search form, by the way.)

10. SafeSearch

The SafeSearch: area allows you to filter out sites that contain pornography or explicit sexual content and eliminate them from search results. Be aware that Google’s automated filtering doesn’t guarantee that you won’t be shown offensive content.

When you turn off SafeSearch filtering and search for non-pornographic content, Google will order your results in a way that adult sites won’t be listed prominently. For example, searching for [ breast cancer treatment ] with SafeSearch turned off, you’re unlikely to run across sites with provocative images of breasts.

In an effort to return as many useful results as possible, SafeSearch doesn’t currently filter out hate speech, anarchy, criminal activity, crude and tasteless material, illegal weapons, bomb making, etc., content that other filtering systems attempt to exclude.

11. Page-Specific Searches

The Advanced Search form also offers page-specific searches for finding pages similar to a page for which you have a web address (URL) and for finding out what pages link to a particular page.

• To find pages similar to Consumer Reports’ web page, fill in the first page-specific search box, Find pages similar to the page:. Then click on the associated Search button. For a description of how Google determines when pages are similar, see How does Google find similar pages?.
  

  (The page-specific searches are separate from the rest of the Advanced Search form, so they don’t change the box at the top of the form with the gray text “Use the form below and your advanced search will appear here.” After you search, though, the Google Search box near the top of the results page should begin with the search operator related: — in this example, related:www.consumerreports.org.)

• Web pages link from one to another. Links are unidirectional; you can follow links from one page to another. You cannot traverse the link the other way around, i.e., go from a page to the pages that link to it. However, Google keeps track of this information and makes it available. When you want to know who links to your website or to someone else’s, fill in a web address (URL) in the page-specific search section Find pages that link to the page:. Let’s find who links to the Doctors without Borders, aka Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), website www.doctorswithoutborders.org.

  

  (As for the similar-page search, you won’t see link-search terms in the box at the top of the Advanced Search page. However, the Google Search box near the top of the results page should begin with the search operator link: — in this example, link:www.doctorswithoutborders.org.)

  The most common users of backward links are webmasters and website publishers who are curious to know what sites link to theirs. People also use them to find out who links to competitors’ sites.

Unlike the other fields in the Advanced Search form, the page-specific searches can’t be combined with other query terms. Consequently each has its own Search button.

You can easily run these page-specific searches from Google’s Toolbar.

Instead of going to the Advanced Search form, you can search for a web site by entering its address in the search box and Google returns a link to the website, as well as links to:

• Google’s cache of the site
• Web pages that are similar to the site
• Web pages that link to the site
• All Web pages from the site that Google has crawled, listed in PageRank order
• Web pages that contain the URL

For example, to find out about the wonderful reference site www.refdesk.com, enter www.refdesk.com into Google’s search box.

tags (keywords): advanced search, creative commons license, date, domain, file format, language, narrowing search, numbers, phrase, queries, safe search, search terms, URLs

11. Alerts

Once you’ve refined your Advanced Search, you can watch for changes in the top 20 results by setting up Google Alerts. Google will find and deliver links to new web pages once a week, once a day, or as soon as Google finds them. Simply copy and paste your advanced search query into the search box on the Google Alerts page.

12. Google Ultimate Interface

If you want to specify what you’re looking for with more precision than Google’s Advanced Search form offers, try the Google Ultimate Interface, a third-party application available at www.faganfinder.com/google.html. With the Ultimate Interface you can:

• Search with any of Google’s search engines, i.e., Web Search or some of the tools in the Part named Services.
• Find pages that have been updated between any two specific dates
• Select letters with practically every different kind of diacritical marking, such as umlauts or accent marks, from the keyboard near the bottom of the page.

Michael Fagan developed Google Ultimate Interface when he was a teenager.

13. Soople

If you’re not sure of all the types of information that you can search for with Google, check out Soople, www.soople.com/soople_int.php.

I describe many of the capabilities included in Soople in the Parts Understanding Results and Search Tools.

tags (keywords): advanced search, narrowing search, queries, soople, ultimate interface

Refining a query means changing or adding to the set of search terms to do a better job of returning the pages you’re seeking. Successful researchers frequently enter several queries to find what they’re seeking.

The search boxes at the top and bottom of the results page show the query for the current results page. If the query uses special operators that you entered either directly or indirectly through the advanced search form, they will appear in the search box as well. To refine your query, edit what’s in the search box and then click the Google Search button or hit the ENTER key.

Let’s look at a few examples.

• Get ideas for subsequent searches by reviewing your results, including the snippets that Google returns and the pages they came from.
  1. Should you get a flu shot this winter?
     • TRY [ flu shot ]
  2. Many of the results refer to influenza vaccine.
     • REFINE [ flu OR influenza shot OR vaccine ]

• Exploit successful queries: look deeper within your results.

  Scroll to the search box at the bottom of your results page and click on the link “Search within results.” This causes Google to run a new search using your newly specified terms (those in the search box) only on the pages it found from your initial query, rather than a search over the entire web.

  

  Search within results

  You can get the same results in one step fewer by simply specifying additional terms to your previous query.

  On Internet Explorer and on some other browsers, you can change a term or an entire query easily. First, highlight the part you want to change by double-clicking a word, or triple-clicking to highlight the entire query. Then either press the DELETE key to remove the highlighted text or type new text to replace it.

  For example, to change “great vacation spots” to “great vacation areas,” double-click on the word “spots” below and type “areas.”
• Instead of searching for related topics with a single query, divide the query into several parts. Looking for a job? By searching for tips on each aspect, you’ll find more sites than by searching for sites that describe all the aspects of a job search.

The following table presents suggestions to narrow or focus a search, as well as tips for broadening a search that has produced few useful results. Click on a link in the table to be taken to the section in Google Guide that describes features and ways to refine your query.