Maximum Search: How To Use Google To Deliver Fast, Accurate Results

On
any day, Google Search brings in approximately 30% of the visits to
this blog. The most significant portion of that group arrive at this
site by literally typing demosthenes.info
into the Google search bar, which indicates that many people don’t know
how to use Google or their browser efficiently. A future article will
cover how to use a modern browser: for now, let's cover some basic
points on how to use Google.

1. Don’t go to google.com
   
   There
   is rarely any need to go directly to google.com in order to initiate
   search. All modern browsers allow search directly from the URL bar or a
   specialized search bar to the side. All of the techniques I’m about to
   discuss can be typed directly into the URL bar or the sidebar, shaving
   several seconds from every search.
2. Use Boolean search
   
   Google will often deliver millions of results in response to search terms. To narrow the field, indicate words that you do not want with a minus sign:
   
   penguin -book -clothes -game -computing
   
   …will deliver web pages with “penguin” in the content but without the words “book”, “clothes”, “game”, or “computing”.
3. Use phrases, rather than terms
   
   To further narrow search results, group words together inside of quotes: this means that the words must appear together. For example:
   
   "blue footed booby"
4. Receive files, not web pages, as search results
   
   For
   specialized topics, documents can often deliver more information than
   standard HTML pages. Google indexes everything that can be searched on
   the web: to deliver only results from documents, use the filetype command with an appropriate extension. For example:
   
   "yellow eyed penguin" filetype:ppt
   
   This will deliver only Powerpoint files in which the phrase “yellow eyed penguin” is used. Some other extensions:
   
   

   filetype:doc	Word documents
   filetype:xls	Excel Spreadsheets
   filetype:ppt	Powerpoint presentations
   filetype:pdf	PDF documents
   filetype:torrent	Torrent files

5. Use your postal code, not an address
   
   Google
   Maps suggests that you use your street address to find locations near
   you. It’s not necessary: simply use your postal code. There’s no need to
   go to local.google.com either. For example, type the following into the URL bar:
   
   pizza T2M 0L4
6. Restrict search within a particular site
   
   Finding
   what you want inside a large site can be difficult; often, site's
   built-in search can provide sparse results. In those cases, restrict
   Google to search inside a particular URL with site: For example:
   
   CSS site:demosthenes.info

demosthenes.info – Maximum Search: How To Use Google To Deliver Fast, Accurate Results