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I'm more than happy with DuckDuckGo. I would love more specialized search engines. Back in the day I've used several search engines depending the task i needed

I'm more than happy with DuckDuckGo. I would love more specialized search engines. Back in the day I've used several search engines depending the task i needed to perform, from Altavista to Yahoo to Google.

netfl0 7y ago
Beat me to it! Very happy here as well. I also love the bang short cuts. I am actually at the point where google is clearly inferior. I will grant that Google has a more intelligent indexing and ranking of Stack Overflow. However, DDG is making major progress there, and I rarely need to add !g Pro tip: with the bang shortcuts, you can add them anywhere in your query, it does not need to be in the beginning of your query string.
- buzzerbetrayed 7y ago
  I’ve tried switching to ddg a number of times in the past. Every time the same thing happens: “This result isn’t that great. I’m going to !g just this once” Then, one week later I’m adding !g to literally every singe search so I switch back to google because what’s the point? I really do hope to one day get off of google though.
  - ummonk 7y ago
    For me it helped to switch over my mobile browser in addition to desktop. It's much more of a hassle to type !g so I try to make do with ddg and only use !g if I really have to. After a month or so it seems like my choice of search queries has adapted to better make use of Bing's algorithms, and when I do find myself trying !g, half the time it results in even worse results.
  - visarga 7y ago
    I use StartPage.com which is based on Google but strips the private data.
    - DavideNL 7y ago
      "Startpage is now owned by an advertising company" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21371577 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21371577
- heisenhuegel 7y ago
  Bangs are nice in DDG. In Cliqz, there is also limited support, but you have to put it at the end ("test !g"): https://beta.cliqz.com/ https://beta.cliqz.com/
s_dev 7y ago
I use DDG but I still have to resort to Google for 5% of searches because it dosen't deliver the results as well. I desperately want to pay for something that has the quality of Google but the privacy of DDG.
- markosaric 7y ago
  There's the !sp on DDG which gives you Google results without all the profiling using StartPage.com
mtVessel 7y ago
Isn't DDG just white labeling search results from Bing?
- __ka 7y ago
  They largely are. Here's an interesting thread, which I and people from DDG partcipated in a few days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21653476 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21653476
neltnerb 7y ago
This new search engine doesn't even function without javascript enabled, unlike DDG which works just fine.
- __ka 7y ago
  We're trying to get a version that works with javascript disabled (for TOR), but are trying to avoid having to maintain two separate clients. We'll try to push it out soon. Many thanks for the feedback on our beta.
- lamkhanhsong 7y ago
  We have just released a new version which allows you to use the SERP with Javascript disabled. Enjoy!
JaRail 7y ago
I try to use DDG as my default but it's so awful at knowledge-graph questions. I find myself using !g for knowledge queries before even attempting it. An example would be something like "Rick and Morty episodes." I know google will give me a list with recent/upcoming episode names and air dates for pretty much any show. DDG will link me wikipedia and fan wikis. I make a "<show> episodes" query anytime I want to know when the next episode of something is released. DDG's knowledge graph (and/or query parsing) is just so limited I skip it anytime I think google will be able to produce the answer directly. Similarly, there are things I'm confident asking a voice assistant, and there are things I won't even bother trying. If it's something I'd ask an assistant, I'm skipping DDG.

netfl0 7y ago

Beat me to it! Very happy here as well. I also love the bang short cuts. I am actually at the point where google is clearly inferior. I will grant that Google has a more intelligent indexing and ranking of Stack Overflow. However, DDG is making major progress there, and I rarely need to add !g Pro tip: with the bang shortcuts, you can add them anywhere in your query, it does not need to be in the beginning of your query string.

buzzerbetrayed 7y ago
I’ve tried switching to ddg a number of times in the past. Every time the same thing happens: “This result isn’t that great. I’m going to !g just this once” Then, one week later I’m adding !g to literally every singe search so I switch back to google because what’s the point? I really do hope to one day get off of google though.
- ummonk 7y ago
  For me it helped to switch over my mobile browser in addition to desktop. It's much more of a hassle to type !g so I try to make do with ddg and only use !g if I really have to. After a month or so it seems like my choice of search queries has adapted to better make use of Bing's algorithms, and when I do find myself trying !g, half the time it results in even worse results.
- visarga 7y ago
  I use StartPage.com which is based on Google but strips the private data.
  - DavideNL 7y ago
    "Startpage is now owned by an advertising company" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21371577 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21371577
heisenhuegel 7y ago
Bangs are nice in DDG. In Cliqz, there is also limited support, but you have to put it at the end ("test !g"): https://beta.cliqz.com/ https://beta.cliqz.com/

s_dev 7y ago

I use DDG but I still have to resort to Google for 5% of searches because it dosen't deliver the results as well. I desperately want to pay for something that has the quality of Google but the privacy of DDG.

markosaric 7y ago
There's the !sp on DDG which gives you Google results without all the profiling using StartPage.com

mtVessel 7y ago

Isn't DDG just white labeling search results from Bing?

__ka 7y ago
They largely are. Here's an interesting thread, which I and people from DDG partcipated in a few days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21653476 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21653476

neltnerb 7y ago

This new search engine doesn't even function without javascript enabled, unlike DDG which works just fine.

__ka 7y ago
We're trying to get a version that works with javascript disabled (for TOR), but are trying to avoid having to maintain two separate clients. We'll try to push it out soon. Many thanks for the feedback on our beta.
lamkhanhsong 7y ago
We have just released a new version which allows you to use the SERP with Javascript disabled. Enjoy!

JaRail 7y ago

I try to use DDG as my default but it's so awful at knowledge-graph questions. I find myself using !g for knowledge queries before even attempting it. An example would be something like "Rick and Morty episodes." I know google will give me a list with recent/upcoming episode names and air dates for pretty much any show. DDG will link me wikipedia and fan wikis. I make a "<show> episodes" query anytime I want to know when the next episode of something is released. DDG's knowledge graph (and/or query parsing) is just so limited I skip it anytime I think google will be able to produce the answer directly. Similarly, there are things I'm confident asking a voice assistant, and there are things I won't even bother trying. If it's something I'd ask an assistant, I'm skipping DDG.