Google Search 195
Search options
The webpages maintained by the Google Help Center have text describing more than 15 various search options.[28]
The Google operators:- OR – Search for either one, such as "price high OR low" searches for "price" with "high" or "low".
- "-" – Search while excluding a word, such as "apple -tree" searches where word "tree" is not used.
- "+" – (Removed on 10/19/11[19]) Force inclusion of a word, such as "Name +of +the Game" to require the words
"of" & "the" to appear on a matching page. - "*" – Wildcard operator to match any words between other specific words.
Some of the query options are as follows: - define: – The query prefix "define:" will provide a definition[28] of the words listed after it.
- stocks: – After "stocks:" the query terms are treated as stock ticker symbols[28] for lookup.
- site: – Restrict the results to those websites in the given domain,[28] such as, site:www.acmeacme.com. The
option "site:com" will search all domain URLs named with ".com" (no space after "site:"). - allintitle: – Only the page titles are searched[28] (not the remaining text on each webpage).
- intitle: – Prefix to search in a webpage title,[28] such as "intitle:google search" will list pages with word "google"
in title, and word "search" anywhere (no space after "intitle:"). - allinurl: – Only the page URL address lines are searched[28] (not the text inside each webpage).
- inurl: – Prefix for each word to be found in the URL;[28] others words are matched anywhere, such as "inurl:acme
search" matches "acme" in a URL, but matches "search" anywhere (no space after "inurl:").
The page-display options (or query types) are: - cache: – Highlights the search-words within the cached document, such as "cache:www.google.com xxx" shows
cached content with word "xxx" highlighted. - link: – The prefix "link:" will list webpages that have links to the specified webpage, such as
"link:www.google.com" lists webpages linking to the Google homepage. - related: – The prefix "related:" will list webpages that are "similar" to a specified web page.
- info: – The prefix "info:" will display some background information about one specified webpage, such as,
info:www.google.com. Typically, the info is the first text (160 bytes, about 23 words) contained in the page,
displayed in the style of a results entry (for just the 1 page as matching the search). - filetype: – results will only show files of the desired type (ex filetype:pdf will return pdf files)
Error messages
Some searches will give a 403 Forbidden error with the text
"We're sorry...... but your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer
virus or spyware application. To protect our users, we can't process
your request right now.We'll restore your access as quickly as possible, so try again soon. In
the meantime, if you suspect that your computer or network has been
infected, you might want to run a virus checker or spyware remover to
make sure that your systems are free of viruses and other spurious
software.We apologize for the inconvenience, and hope we'll see you again on Google."
sometimes followed by a CAPTCHA prompt.[29]