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Hey Phil, DuckDuckGo employee here - Be sure to use the 'feedback' button that you find on the search results page whenever you feel a search isn't up to stand

by AdamSC1 10y ago

Hey Phil, DuckDuckGo employee here - Be sure to use the 'feedback' button that you find on the search results page whenever you feel a search isn't up to standards. Our team has been working hard at increasing relevancy, but the best changes come when users let us know what they need. Since we don't filter bubble results (https://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles https://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_b...) results certainly feel different when making the leap, and that takes an adjustment period for most people. But, if you actually feel you have examples where you can't find what you're looking for, then we want to know so we can provide you a seamless search experience as well!

johnnyg 10y ago
Thanks for the tip. I'll do that. I use DDG as primary but any time the search results aren't relevant, I fall back to Google. I fall back a lot right now and I think this is the area for DDG to focus in.
ximeng 10y ago
Google has a list of scheduled flights when you put in two airport codes which is useful, doesn't look like DDG does the same.
- tyingq 10y ago
  Google paid $700m to get that functionality though.
  - ximeng 10y ago
    This is a significant subset of what ITA does though - just a list of what flights go on each day of the week and at what time. I expect that can be built for significantly less than 700 million, certainly among the popular airports that most people search for. I suspect they might have had it before the ITA purchase as well but not 100% sure. The Google flights search with pricing and custom dates and routes came after ITA was bought I think.
    - tyingq 10y ago
      It's basically QPX. Not just flights and times, but prices as well. It is the most significant part of ITA. Flights, times, and fares is deceptively hard to get right. There's a reason there are only a few providers. Edit: Ahh. If you're saying DDG could get by with just flights and times, and no fares, I see what you mean. That seems to be reflected in the pricing for the FlightStats product vs Google's flight/times/fares API pricing, yes. Parity with Google search requires fares though.
- AdamSC1 10y ago
  At DuckDuckGo we've got open-source Instant Answers that currently pull in information from over 1100 sources: (https://duck.co/ia https://duck.co/ia) If you know of a good data source for scheduled flights you can easily contribute an Instant Answer, or leave the source as a suggestion for our community!
  - ximeng 10y ago
    Sorry I don't know a source... actually I don't think I've seen this on any other sites. Just one of those small things that keeps me with Google.
- hedora 10y ago
  Here is a reasonable looking service: http://www.flightstats.com/go/Mobile/flightStatusByRoute.do?departure=%28SFO%29+San+Francisco+Intl%2C+San+Francisco%2C+CA%2C+US&arrival=%28JFK%29+John+F.+Kennedy+Intl%2C+New+York%2C+NY%2C+US&airportQueryDate=2017-01-21&airlineToFilter= http://www.flightstats.com/go/Mobile/flightStatusByRoute.do?... It looks like a nice weekend project for someone. I typed in sfo and jfk, but it looks like the java script submitted longer names, so there might be some non-trivial airport name handling to wire in.
  - tyingq 10y ago
    Flightstats is a popular service. Not free though: https://developer.flightstats.com/getting-started/pricing https://developer.flightstats.com/getting-started/pricing Similarly, Google sells api access to their flight search api: https://developers.google.com/qpx-express/v1/pricing https://developers.google.com/qpx-express/v1/pricing I have no idea if DDG could leverage either and not wreck their business model.
philfrasty 10y ago
Hey Adam, thanks for the tip! Will do for sure in the future. Edge cases I have in mind are usually related to indexing of forum posts, where I search for a specific-term (say bookkeeping) and roughly know the Google results of the most important forums by heart, but DDG does not even show them. Second case I just used yesterday was searching for an exact match for an @gmail address of a priest (for our marriage) where Google had a lot more results than DDG. Keep up the great work!
hedora 10y ago
There was a long HN thread talking about DuckDuckGo results vs Google behavior. Some people are put off by the fact that you don't substitute synonyms as aggressively as google. A concrete example was "foss [search term]". Google seems to rewrite this to "[open source] foobar", even with bubbling off. I prefer the duck duck go behavior (and google's aggressive query rewriting drove me nuts back when I used google -- it makes it hard to run precise searches!). After all, if I bothered to type an obscure acronym, I'm looking for results that actually contain the acronym! Maybe a "did you mean 'open source [search term]'" link at the top of the page, and even a preference toggle to enable aggressive query rewording by default would help.
- chrisper 10y ago
  I believe if you do "foss" (with quotation marks) in Google it will not rewrite it. But I am not sure.
gingerlime 10y ago
Not sure how this might affect privacy, or maybe you're doing it already, but couldn't you guys sample every time someone runs a search and then the same search with !g ?
- AdamSC1 10y ago
  Hi Gingerlime, Thanks for the suggestion. Part of the reason we don't do this is the returned search results on Google are Google's commercial property. To use them in such a capacity would require us to reach a commercial agreement with them. These agreements come with stipulations that we don't feel represent the privacy interests of our users, so we don't pursue such agreements. The other reason, is because of the 'filter bubble' Google tailors results based on user tracking, which is what helps with result accuracy. So the results we as DuckDuckGo see on a query would be different than what you see. Plus, even if we could see your results, we wouldn't want to. We don't think it is good to be filter bubbled, we want to serve you the best results we can without censoring you. It should be your decision to a view a certain website, not ours!
  - ximeng 10y ago
    You could still identify searches where there's room for improvement even without comparing with Google results.
    - tfigment 10y ago
      I may be wrong but the reason is again privacy (and probably cost). If they tracked your queries and tied them back to you for future then they need to store your information or enough to tie to you and what you clicked on and the history to improve things. These all become things that they can be subpoenaed for which is anti-privacy. Don't believe for a second that governments are not already banging at the door for access. The only ways to combat is either hosting in neutral offshore datacenter and incorporating there and living there is to not collect "useful" information in the first place on users. I think they went for the latter.
pmoriarty 10y ago
I've had a lot of problems with literal searches on DDG over the years. That is, searches containing search terms in double quotes, like this: "my search terms". DDG is committed to returning literal search results for the exact query that the user typed within double quotes, right? Sometimes I wonder if DDG is going the route of other search engines and trying to return "relevant" results instead of only results containing the exact search term the user asked for within double quotes. Could you make clear exactly what DDG's policy is on exact search terms within double quotes? Does DDG honor such requests?
asb 10y ago
I'd be really interested in a write-up of how you use and process feedback.
- AdamSC1 10y ago
  Hey Asb, That's a great idea - I'm not personally involved in the feedback process, but I'll certainly bring this up to the relevant team!
nof 10y ago
I often experience that ddg gives me results from really old websites. In cases this is OK, but when used for tracking down bugs or software errors it can be frustrating. Still love you though!

by AdamSC1 10y ago

johnnyg 10y ago

Thanks for the tip. I'll do that. I use DDG as primary but any time the search results aren't relevant, I fall back to Google. I fall back a lot right now and I think this is the area for DDG to focus in.

ximeng 10y ago

Google has a list of scheduled flights when you put in two airport codes which is useful, doesn't look like DDG does the same.

tyingq 10y ago
Google paid $700m to get that functionality though.
- ximeng 10y ago
  This is a significant subset of what ITA does though - just a list of what flights go on each day of the week and at what time. I expect that can be built for significantly less than 700 million, certainly among the popular airports that most people search for. I suspect they might have had it before the ITA purchase as well but not 100% sure. The Google flights search with pricing and custom dates and routes came after ITA was bought I think.
  - tyingq 10y ago
    It's basically QPX. Not just flights and times, but prices as well. It is the most significant part of ITA. Flights, times, and fares is deceptively hard to get right. There's a reason there are only a few providers. Edit: Ahh. If you're saying DDG could get by with just flights and times, and no fares, I see what you mean. That seems to be reflected in the pricing for the FlightStats product vs Google's flight/times/fares API pricing, yes. Parity with Google search requires fares though.
AdamSC1 10y ago
At DuckDuckGo we've got open-source Instant Answers that currently pull in information from over 1100 sources: (https://duck.co/ia https://duck.co/ia) If you know of a good data source for scheduled flights you can easily contribute an Instant Answer, or leave the source as a suggestion for our community!
- ximeng 10y ago
  Sorry I don't know a source... actually I don't think I've seen this on any other sites. Just one of those small things that keeps me with Google.
hedora 10y ago
Here is a reasonable looking service: http://www.flightstats.com/go/Mobile/flightStatusByRoute.do?departure=%28SFO%29+San+Francisco+Intl%2C+San+Francisco%2C+CA%2C+US&arrival=%28JFK%29+John+F.+Kennedy+Intl%2C+New+York%2C+NY%2C+US&airportQueryDate=2017-01-21&airlineToFilter= http://www.flightstats.com/go/Mobile/flightStatusByRoute.do?... It looks like a nice weekend project for someone. I typed in sfo and jfk, but it looks like the java script submitted longer names, so there might be some non-trivial airport name handling to wire in.
- tyingq 10y ago
  Flightstats is a popular service. Not free though: https://developer.flightstats.com/getting-started/pricing https://developer.flightstats.com/getting-started/pricing Similarly, Google sells api access to their flight search api: https://developers.google.com/qpx-express/v1/pricing https://developers.google.com/qpx-express/v1/pricing I have no idea if DDG could leverage either and not wreck their business model.

philfrasty 10y ago

Hey Adam, thanks for the tip! Will do for sure in the future. Edge cases I have in mind are usually related to indexing of forum posts, where I search for a specific-term (say bookkeeping) and roughly know the Google results of the most important forums by heart, but DDG does not even show them. Second case I just used yesterday was searching for an exact match for an @gmail address of a priest (for our marriage) where Google had a lot more results than DDG. Keep up the great work!

hedora 10y ago

There was a long HN thread talking about DuckDuckGo results vs Google behavior. Some people are put off by the fact that you don't substitute synonyms as aggressively as google. A concrete example was "foss [search term]". Google seems to rewrite this to "[open source] foobar", even with bubbling off. I prefer the duck duck go behavior (and google's aggressive query rewriting drove me nuts back when I used google -- it makes it hard to run precise searches!). After all, if I bothered to type an obscure acronym, I'm looking for results that actually contain the acronym! Maybe a "did you mean 'open source [search term]'" link at the top of the page, and even a preference toggle to enable aggressive query rewording by default would help.

chrisper 10y ago
I believe if you do "foss" (with quotation marks) in Google it will not rewrite it. But I am not sure.

gingerlime 10y ago

Not sure how this might affect privacy, or maybe you're doing it already, but couldn't you guys sample every time someone runs a search and then the same search with !g ?

AdamSC1 10y ago
Hi Gingerlime, Thanks for the suggestion. Part of the reason we don't do this is the returned search results on Google are Google's commercial property. To use them in such a capacity would require us to reach a commercial agreement with them. These agreements come with stipulations that we don't feel represent the privacy interests of our users, so we don't pursue such agreements. The other reason, is because of the 'filter bubble' Google tailors results based on user tracking, which is what helps with result accuracy. So the results we as DuckDuckGo see on a query would be different than what you see. Plus, even if we could see your results, we wouldn't want to. We don't think it is good to be filter bubbled, we want to serve you the best results we can without censoring you. It should be your decision to a view a certain website, not ours!
- ximeng 10y ago
  You could still identify searches where there's room for improvement even without comparing with Google results.
  - tfigment 10y ago
    I may be wrong but the reason is again privacy (and probably cost). If they tracked your queries and tied them back to you for future then they need to store your information or enough to tie to you and what you clicked on and the history to improve things. These all become things that they can be subpoenaed for which is anti-privacy. Don't believe for a second that governments are not already banging at the door for access. The only ways to combat is either hosting in neutral offshore datacenter and incorporating there and living there is to not collect "useful" information in the first place on users. I think they went for the latter.

pmoriarty 10y ago

I've had a lot of problems with literal searches on DDG over the years. That is, searches containing search terms in double quotes, like this: "my search terms". DDG is committed to returning literal search results for the exact query that the user typed within double quotes, right? Sometimes I wonder if DDG is going the route of other search engines and trying to return "relevant" results instead of only results containing the exact search term the user asked for within double quotes. Could you make clear exactly what DDG's policy is on exact search terms within double quotes? Does DDG honor such requests?

asb 10y ago

I'd be really interested in a write-up of how you use and process feedback.

AdamSC1 10y ago
Hey Asb, That's a great idea - I'm not personally involved in the feedback process, but I'll certainly bring this up to the relevant team!

nof 10y ago

I often experience that ddg gives me results from really old websites. In cases this is OK, but when used for tracking down bugs or software errors it can be frustrating. Still love you though!