How to Google
How long have you been using Google for searching for the things you love and find those much needed information. Even if you are new to internet, you have definitely used this search engine at least once. I am person who queries Google at least 20 to 30 times in a day to find information on variety of subjects. Google has provided relevant and absolute piece of information based on the keyword which i type in. Google has been in the internet world for years and there is no doubt that Google is the best search engine in the world. There may be many other search engines but Google is the king.
Most of the people used key in the keyword or query on the Google’s search box and click on search or press enter key to find the results. On the search engine results pages, you will generally look for relevant information on the first 10 or 20 search engine results and upon not finding the needed information you will search with another keyword and will continue the process till you get the required information. I would say if you know some simple techniques on how to effectively search in Google then you can find the information really fast and hassle free.
You know how to search in Google, some simple changes on your search query will extensively change the search engine results. By changes to search queries like type in search queries withing quotes, key in or in between two search queries etc. This blog post revolves around this topic and introduce those techniques for those who want to know more about how to Google efficiently.
Here i am providing the list of some of Google’s advanced yet simple query syntax which you can use to find information really easy.
How and where to use quotes in a Google query? If you want to search with a query which has more than one word then you can use quotes. For example “simple life”. If you search for simple life without quotes then Google will bring those page which has the words simple and life in it. While using quotes Google will show those result pages which has the word `simple life` in it. Whenever you search for more than one keyword at a time, Google will search for all of them. If you search for simple way “of life”.
In another type of query if you want to tell Google that either of one keyword must be searched then you have to type in the Boolean or in between the keywords like simple OR way OR “of life”.
If you want tell Google that it should search for pages that has got one keyword and one of two or more other terms, put the keyword withing brackets, like simple (way OR “of life”). In this search query Google will search for the keyword “simple” or keyword “way” along with the word “of life”. You can also use the | (pipe) character instead of the Boolean OR like simple (way | “of life”)
In the above set of queries you have told Google that it should use one or more terms in the result pages. What about not to include a keyword in a search query. In this case you can use the minus symbol. If you are using a minus(dash or hyphen) symbol in front of a keyword in your search query it will discard that keyword from search results For example simple -way “of life”. This query will search for keyword with simple and of life but exclude pages with the word way.
Besides these boolean characters and strings like OR, and quoted strings, Google offers some more special featues for fine tuning your search results. Google has got each and every information in a webpage which it indexes or crawls instead of just titles and descriptions. Some of the special operators which i am going to tell you helps Google users search specific parts of web pages or specific types of information. Like whether you want to find data from the page titles, description or in the urls.
Here are some of the commonly preferred techniques or keywords which you can use while querying this search engine
intitle, allintitle
These operators restricts the search to the titles of web pages. allintitle: finds pages in which the keyword you have specified must be found in the page titles. For example intitle:”simple life”
allintitle:”simple way” of life.
inurl, allinurl
If you want to find those pages which has got a particular keyword in the web address or url then you can use inurl or allinurl. If you are using inurl along with a search term then Google will search for those pages which has got keyword in the web address and in other parts of the page. If you are specifying a keyword along with allinurl then Google will find those pages which has got that keyword only in web address or urls and no where else in the web page. For example inurl:simple, allinurl:simple way
intext, allintext
If you want to find those pages which has got a particular keyword in the content or body of the webpages then you can use intext or allintext. If you are using intext along with a search term then google will search for those pages which has got keyword in the body of the page rather than in title, description or url. If you are specifying a keyword along with allinurl then Google will find those pages which has got that keyword only in body of the page and no where else in the web page for example intext:simple, allintext:simple way
inanchor
How can you find those pages which has got a particular search term in their out going links then you can use inanchor along with the searching keyword. For example, inanchor:”simple life”.
site
Next operator is site. If you want to search in a particular website rather than the webpages from different website then you can use site. This is useful to narrow your search with in a website or a contents in a particualr domain. For example site:www.simplewayoflife.net simple
link
If you want to know the number of relevant links or webpages which are pointing to a website or domain you can use link. For example link:www.simplewayoflife.net. Do keep in mind that link will return only those webpages which google considers as a relevant ones.
cache
By using cache one can find the copy of the page and see how it looked when google has crawled it. The can be used to find the cached page of a website which usually changes very often. On using cache you can find the date and time on which google has last crawled a website. For example cache:www.simplewayoflife.net
filetype
If you want to find those pages which has got particuar extensions then you can use filetype. While crawling the internet google stumble upon file of various extensions and google will keep a record to all that data. On using filetype you can find those page with specific extensions. For example simplewayoflife filetype:html
related
This keyword lets you find pages that are related to the specified page. By using related you can find those pages which are having contents of a particular topic. For example, related:www.simplewayoflife.net
info
Info helps you to find out those information which includes includes a link to the URL’s cache, a list of pages that link to that URL, pages which are related to that URL, and pages that contain that URL. With info you can find each and every information that google knows about a particular domain like Google’s cache, similar web pages, web pages that link to a particular domain, pages associated with a particular domain, and pages which are mentioning a particular url. For example info:www.simplewayoflife.net
safesearch
How can you make your search engine result pages safe from adult or pornographic sites. For example safesearch: sex
Hope the above information has give you some idea on how to fine tune your google search results and find required information at a greater pace. If i have omitted some information regarding this topic then share it as a comment and point out mistakes if exists.
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February 10, 2009 | Filed Under technology, Internet
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