5 ms·

Google can search backwards

115 points by blago 15y ago

espeed 15y ago
looc s'taht llew
- narad 15y ago
  when I searched that, Google is showing results for "loc state law". :-)
waqf 15y ago
This is a trick with Unicode RTL. The search query in the URL contains the character U+202E RIGHT-TO-LEFT OVERRIDE, followed by the searched-for text in normal (nonreversed) order. Apparently Google ignores this character when searching for matches (so the matches are displayed normally), but the character appears when the query is reproduced in the search box at top of the screen, so the search string appears backwards.
- blago 15y ago
  Bingo. I wish I had a price for you.
  - veyron 15y ago
    s/price/prize/
- sjs 15y ago
  Interesting character. You can copy & paste it in front of any text in an editable field and the text immediately flips.
  - lukejduncan 15y ago
    Not only that, but the entire directionality of the text box does to. E.g. arrowing right and left is flipped as well.
- blago 15y ago
  Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm: http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr9/ http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr9/
- praptak 15y ago
  This character is interesting, one more thing to watch out for in user-provided input. You do your homework and escape HTML in users' comments but if you don't escape the RTL overrides, their effects can "bleed" to other parts of the page, rendering it unreadable or at least hard to read.
  - Figs 15y ago
    The bleeding over seems to apply to Google's title. In my browser, it shows up as "xoferiF allizoM - hcraeS elgooG"...
- gus_massa 15y ago
  Bing has the same "feature": http://www.bing.com/search?q=%E2%80%AEthe%20answer%20to%20life%20the%20universe%20and%20everything http://www.bing.com/search?q=%E2%80%AEthe%20answer%20to%20li...
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
antimora 15y ago
But did you guys know you can search a height of a celebrity? https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=hieigh+of+obama#hl=en&sa=X&ei=MRfTTtP8B-fLsQLOuvTPDg&ved=0CD4QvwUoAQ&q=height+of+obama&spell=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=eace23dd34db2182&biw=999&bih=545 https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#... https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=hieigh+of+obama#pq=height+of+hillary+clinton&hl=en&cp=13&gs_id=1q&xhr=t&q=height+of+ashton+kutcher&tok=FTLzB4gxsRmjgy19D4upfw&pf=p&sclient=psy-ab&source=hp&pbx=1&oq=height+of+ash&aq=0&aqi=g4&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=eace23dd34db2182&biw=999&bih=545 https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#... Try some other celebrity
- nostrademons 15y ago
  Buildings and ships too: https://www.google.com/search?q=height+of+empire+state+building https://www.google.com/search?q=height+of+empire+state+build... https://www.google.com/search?q=length+of+titanic https://www.google.com/search?q=length+of+titanic
- kittxkat 15y ago
  However, it seems to show its results only in inches and feet though.
  - noblethrasher 15y ago
    But curiously the height for Bill Gates is given in meters.
namank 15y ago
This is cool! So Google is Wolfram Alpha for everything in the world?
nishantmodak 15y ago
This is not working for any other texts that I tried. Any reason why? sdrowkcab hcraes nac elgooG egap siht etalsnarT tnahC aykanahC lortnoc txet lanoitceridiB weiver koob a yhw nosaer yna All I get are results from elgoog.rb-hosting.de or none at times!
andrewhillman 15y ago
so can bing, yahoo and every other search engine.
- generators 15y ago
  proof please.
henryw 15y ago
they might have just index that phrase backwards. if you were to search for "hacker news" backwards, you get nothing related. http://www.google.com/search?gcx=w&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=swen+rekcah http://www.google.com/search?gcx=w&sourceid=chrome&i...
- ploxination 15y ago
  magic: https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=%E2%80%AEthe%20answer%20to%20life%20the%20universe%20and%20everything#pq=%E2%80%AEthe+answer+to+life+the+universe+and+everything&hl=en&sugexp=ppwe&cp=12&gs_id=3c&xhr=t&q=%E2%80%AEhacker+news&pf=p&sclient=psy-ab&source=hp&pbx=1&oq=%E2%80%AEhacker+news&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&fp=e57431f3bd267428&biw=1080&bih=1790 https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#...
- ricardobeat 15y ago
  http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy-ab&hl=en&safe=off&site=&source=hp&q=%E2%80%AEhacker%20news&pbx=1&oq=bacon&aq=f&aqi=g4&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=2304l2701l0l2827l5l3l0l0l0l0l371l371l3-1l1l0&fp=1&biw=1056&bih=679&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&cad=b http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy-ab&hl=en&safe=off...
  - henryw 15y ago
    Interesting that you can do this if you put all those url parameters in. But the default google search won't get you these backwards results. if you go to google.com and enter "swen rekcah", you won't get these results. Also, the url contains &q=%E2%80%AEhacker%20news& which is not hacker news backwards.
yuvadam 15y ago
Not only that, Google also does keyboard-layout mapping if you forgot to switch your keyboard layout before searching. For example, if I want to search in Hebrew for "חיפוש בעברית" but accidentally typed in English and typed "jhpua gchcr," (same keys as the Hebrew chars) - I'll still get the results I was looking for [1]. [1] - https://www.google.com/search?q=jhpua%20cgcrh https://www.google.com/search?q=jhpua%20cgcrh,
- rplnt 15y ago
  If I remember correctly from one talk, it does this by remembering how users correct themselves.
  - mkopinsky 15y ago
    In the case of Hebrew, I doubt they go to such lengths. ןא ןד הקרט קשדט אם בםמהקרא דןמבק פרקאאט צוביקהקרטםמק ודקד איק דשצק לקטנםשרגץ (Google the hebrew text to decode to English. :-) )
growt 15y ago
The answer is 24.

115 points by blago 15y ago

espeed 15y ago

looc s'taht llew

narad 15y ago
when I searched that, Google is showing results for "loc state law". :-)

waqf 15y ago

This is a trick with Unicode RTL. The search query in the URL contains the character U+202E RIGHT-TO-LEFT OVERRIDE, followed by the searched-for text in normal (nonreversed) order. Apparently Google ignores this character when searching for matches (so the matches are displayed normally), but the character appears when the query is reproduced in the search box at top of the screen, so the search string appears backwards.

blago 15y ago
Bingo. I wish I had a price for you.
- veyron 15y ago
  s/price/prize/
sjs 15y ago
Interesting character. You can copy & paste it in front of any text in an editable field and the text immediately flips.
- lukejduncan 15y ago
  Not only that, but the entire directionality of the text box does to. E.g. arrowing right and left is flipped as well.
blago 15y ago
Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm: http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr9/ http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr9/
praptak 15y ago
This character is interesting, one more thing to watch out for in user-provided input. You do your homework and escape HTML in users' comments but if you don't escape the RTL overrides, their effects can "bleed" to other parts of the page, rendering it unreadable or at least hard to read.
- Figs 15y ago
  The bleeding over seems to apply to Google's title. In my browser, it shows up as "xoferiF allizoM - hcraeS elgooG"...
gus_massa 15y ago
Bing has the same "feature": http://www.bing.com/search?q=%E2%80%AEthe%20answer%20to%20life%20the%20universe%20and%20everything http://www.bing.com/search?q=%E2%80%AEthe%20answer%20to%20li...

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

antimora 15y ago

But did you guys know you can search a height of a celebrity? https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=hieigh+of+obama#hl=en&sa=X&ei=MRfTTtP8B-fLsQLOuvTPDg&ved=0CD4QvwUoAQ&q=height+of+obama&spell=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=eace23dd34db2182&biw=999&bih=545 https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#... https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=hieigh+of+obama#pq=height+of+hillary+clinton&hl=en&cp=13&gs_id=1q&xhr=t&q=height+of+ashton+kutcher&tok=FTLzB4gxsRmjgy19D4upfw&pf=p&sclient=psy-ab&source=hp&pbx=1&oq=height+of+ash&aq=0&aqi=g4&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=eace23dd34db2182&biw=999&bih=545 https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#... Try some other celebrity

nostrademons 15y ago
Buildings and ships too: https://www.google.com/search?q=height+of+empire+state+building https://www.google.com/search?q=height+of+empire+state+build... https://www.google.com/search?q=length+of+titanic https://www.google.com/search?q=length+of+titanic
kittxkat 15y ago
However, it seems to show its results only in inches and feet though.
- noblethrasher 15y ago
  But curiously the height for Bill Gates is given in meters.

namank 15y ago

This is cool! So Google is Wolfram Alpha for everything in the world?

nishantmodak 15y ago

This is not working for any other texts that I tried. Any reason why? sdrowkcab hcraes nac elgooG egap siht etalsnarT tnahC aykanahC lortnoc txet lanoitceridiB weiver koob a yhw nosaer yna All I get are results from elgoog.rb-hosting.de or none at times!

andrewhillman 15y ago

so can bing, yahoo and every other search engine.

generators 15y ago
proof please.

henryw 15y ago

they might have just index that phrase backwards. if you were to search for "hacker news" backwards, you get nothing related. http://www.google.com/search?gcx=w&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=swen+rekcah http://www.google.com/search?gcx=w&sourceid=chrome&i...

ploxination 15y ago
magic: https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=%E2%80%AEthe%20answer%20to%20life%20the%20universe%20and%20everything#pq=%E2%80%AEthe+answer+to+life+the+universe+and+everything&hl=en&sugexp=ppwe&cp=12&gs_id=3c&xhr=t&q=%E2%80%AEhacker+news&pf=p&sclient=psy-ab&source=hp&pbx=1&oq=%E2%80%AEhacker+news&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&gs_sm=&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&fp=e57431f3bd267428&biw=1080&bih=1790 https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#...
ricardobeat 15y ago
http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy-ab&hl=en&safe=off&site=&source=hp&q=%E2%80%AEhacker%20news&pbx=1&oq=bacon&aq=f&aqi=g4&aql=&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=2304l2701l0l2827l5l3l0l0l0l0l371l371l3-1l1l0&fp=1&biw=1056&bih=679&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&cad=b http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy-ab&hl=en&safe=off...
- henryw 15y ago
  Interesting that you can do this if you put all those url parameters in. But the default google search won't get you these backwards results. if you go to google.com and enter "swen rekcah", you won't get these results. Also, the url contains &q=%E2%80%AEhacker%20news& which is not hacker news backwards.

yuvadam 15y ago

Not only that, Google also does keyboard-layout mapping if you forgot to switch your keyboard layout before searching. For example, if I want to search in Hebrew for "חיפוש בעברית" but accidentally typed in English and typed "jhpua gchcr," (same keys as the Hebrew chars) - I'll still get the results I was looking for [1]. [1] - https://www.google.com/search?q=jhpua%20cgcrh https://www.google.com/search?q=jhpua%20cgcrh,

rplnt 15y ago
If I remember correctly from one talk, it does this by remembering how users correct themselves.
- mkopinsky 15y ago
  In the case of Hebrew, I doubt they go to such lengths. ןא ןד הקרט קשדט אם בםמהקרא דןמבק פרקאאט צוביקהקרטםמק ודקד איק דשצק לקטנםשרגץ (Google the hebrew text to decode to English. :-) )

growt 15y ago

The answer is 24.