Google is working hard to improve search, and it’s doing such a great job that the general public doesn’t seem to be noticing. Google search operators help us to search faster, and you can use search operators and other punctuation to get more specific search results. Today we cover some of the basic search operators:
site:
Include “site:”” to search for information within a single website, this one in particular can be a godsend when trying to match styles, specific spellings or usages to a client with a website full of already published works.
Example: site:nbc.com
define:
Include a word or phrase immediately after the operator “define:”” to find the definition of said word or phrase, just like a dictionary.
Example: define:food
related:
Type a URL after “related:”” to be presented with a list of pages that Google considers to be related to the one you’ve entered.
Example: related:geekhmer.github.io
OR
If you want to search for pages that may have just one of several words, include OR (must be capitalized) between the words. Without the OR, your results would typically show only pages that match both terms.
Example: olympics location 2014 OR 2018
info:
Type a URL after “info:” to be presented with a short description of the site and a list links to other information related to the site in question.
Example: info:geekhmer.github.io
”” (double quotes)
Use double quotes to search for an exact word or set of words in a specific order, without normal improvements such as spelling corrections and synonyms. Extremely useful for searching for proper nouns, expressions and examples of usage, etc.
Example: "read a book written over 100 years ago"
* (asterisk)
Use an asterisk (*) within a query as a placeholder for any unknown or “wildcard” terms.
Example: Food * Translators
– (minus sign)
Add a dash (-) before a word to exclude all results that include that word. This is especially useful for synonyms like mountain lion the large cat species and mountain lion the Apple OS.
Example: mountain lion -apple
~ (tilde)
Normally, synonyms might replace some words in your original query. Add a tilde sign (~) immediately in front of a word to search for that word as well as even more synonyms.
Example: ~food facts
filetype:
Include “filetype:” to search for files of a specific type, such as PDFs.
Example: filetype:pdf chicago manual of style facsimile
.. (two periods)
Separate numbers by two periods (with no spaces) to see results that contain numbers in a given range of things like dates, prices, and measurements.
Example: paralympic gold medalists 1996..2012
allintitle:
Use “allintitle” to restrict a search so that all of the keywords must appear in the page title.
Example: allintitle: books for translators
allintext:
Use “allintitle” to restrict a search so that all of the keywords must appear within the body of the text on the page, rather than in any of the titles, etc.
Example: allintext: signs and symptoms of translators dementia
time:
Promised a client that you’ll have a finished piece of work with them before 3pm? Is that 3pm in their country or yours? What time is it in their country now? Or what time is it in your country for that matter? 4am? …isn’t it about time you went to bed?
Example: time:Phnom Penh
So far so good, That’s it!!! See ya!!! :)