2. Search Term Modifers
+ strengthens the requirement that the word
appear in the search results
- removes all instances of the word from the
search results
“” allows specifying multi-term strings
OR allows finding pages which contain one of
two words
~ allows searching for a term and its
synonyms
3. Google-specific options
Advanced search – has all of the
shortcuts that we’ll be covering today.
Image search – allows a very specific
type of search. Returns thumbnails so
that you can see what you’re getting.
5. Google Switches
site: limits search to one site. Can be
used if a site doesn’t have a built-in
search engine.
example:
+“Sorghum rust” site:okstate.edu
will return all pages containing “Sorghum
rust” from okstate.edu
6. Google Switches
Link:URL searches for pages that link to
the specified URL.
example:
link:countyext.okstate.edu returns all
pages that link to countyext.okstate.edu
7. Google Switches
filetype: limits search to one type of file
- .doc, .pdf, .jpg and so on.
example:
+“Sorghum rust” filetype:pdf
will return all pages containing “Sorghum
rust” that are PDF files.
8. Google Switches
inurl: limits results to pages that
contain the string in their URLs (or
website addresses).
example:
inurl:“Sorghum”
will return all pages containing “Sorghum”
in the URL; for example,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/sorghum.html
9. Google Switches
intitle: limits results to pages that
contain the string in the page title.
example:
intitle:“Sorghum”
will return all pages containing “Sorghum”
in the title, but not those that only have
sorghum in the text or URL.
10. Google Switches
intext: limits results to pages that
contain the string in the page itself.
example:
intext:“Sorghum”
will return all pages containing “Sorghum”
in the text, but not those that only have
sorghum in the title or URL.
11. Google Switches
inanchor: limits results to pages that
contain the string in links on the page.
example:
inanchor:“boer goats”
will return all pages that have links
containing the phrase “boer goats”
12. Google Switches
If you are using multiple search terms,
you can prefix all of the “in-” switches
with “all”; for example, “allintext:rust
sorghum wheat” will return all pages with
those three terms appearing in the text
of the page.
13. Google Switches
All of these switches can be combined; it
is possible to build searches like this:
inurl:sorghum site:tamu.edu filetype:pdf
This returns all pages from tamu.edu that
both have sorghum in the URL and are
PDFs.
14. Google Switches
You can also build searches using the
minus sign with a switch; for example:
+sorghum site:tamu.edu –filetype:pdf
will return all pages containing “sorghum”
from tamu.edu that are not PDF files. Or,
you could exclude tamu.edu:
+sorghum –site:tamu.edu