5 ms·

You have to use a special "verbatim" search product from Google, it isn't the main search box anymore. Look under Advanced or something.

by sneak 3y ago

Izkata 3y ago
On the search results page, there's a "Tools" button in the upper-right that expands two dropdowns. Change "All results" to "Verbatim".
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  Wow, that's a good tip.
  - dihydro 3y ago
    Here's a URL Link to the advanced search: https://www.google.com/advanced_search?hl=en&fg=1 https://www.google.com/advanced_search?hl=en&fg=1
    - janlukacs 3y ago
      wow, thanks! how did you find this link? I don't see it anywhere in the main interface.
    - late25 3y ago
      I tried it and it looks like it does nothing but wrap my query in quotes… and then return non-exact results if not found. How is this any different than what people have historically done?
      - Izkata 3y ago
        That isn't different, Verbatim search isn't on the advanced search page. You can only get to it from the search results page like in my earlier comment.
    - Izkata 3y ago
      It's not on that page, you can only switch to Verbatim on the search results. OP was mistaken.
zulban 3y ago
I thought this was a joke.
- helboi4 3y ago
  What it is like anti-user design. Why take away a decades long precedent to hide it in a menu?
mannykannot 3y ago
For now, this seems to work: https://www.google.com/advanced_search https://www.google.com/advanced_search but, given the pace at which Google "improves" things, I don't have much hope that it will last.
- gniv 3y ago
  That page has been there forever. Here's the version from Dec 2000: https://web.archive.org/web/20001202041000/https://www.google.com/advanced_search https://web.archive.org/web/20001202041000/https://www.googl...
tda 3y ago
Great tip! Seems like this adds the query param "&tbs=li%3A1", so this might be something you can configure as an extra search engine in firefox. But then I am a happy kagi customer, and I was just thinking that I can't recall the last time I had to do a !g to find something. For me, google search si pretty much dead. I only use it now when on someone else's pc
- chankstein38 3y ago
  Sounds like a good case for an extension even! "Auto add this when I go to google"
  - rbinv 3y ago
    You can also adjust your browser's search engine defaults.
jamal-kumar 3y ago
Why would they make their very expected functionality something you have to dig around to find now? That just seems like really bad decision making that should have been spotted by someone on top and screams that the people on top are now disconnected from reality. I swear that it used to work for certain strings I'm trying to find now which I was able to find information on and now it isn't even returning, with "verbatim" set, something that is in a very well-known program's documentation. Bing finds like three results. Google has dropped the ball so hard it's embarrassing
- jplona 3y ago
  It's also possible they they're correct, and the average user of today has much less need for verbatim searches than the average user when the search engine was first designed.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - Filligree 3y ago
    This is definitely the case. Sit down next to a casual user one day, and you'll find that 'verbatim' is the absolute last thing they need.
  - jamal-kumar 3y ago
    Nah their product is broken and I'm going to avoid using it from now on except when I need to find something on a map or mess around on SEO for work If they break a key feature to MAKE a verbatim search happen with literally two keys pressed, and are apparently not even indexing what they used to anymore, they're dropping the ball. Most people know the quotation trick now and are probably assuming it still works
  - devmor 3y ago
    This is almost certainly the case. Those of us who learned to use and mastered keyword-style search are the minority. Most people search whole phrases, expecting a contextual answer.
tivert 3y ago
> You have to use a special "verbatim" search product from Google, it isn't the main search box anymore. Look under Advanced or something. I actually use that, but it has its faults. You get more spam results and iffy sites (e.g. Wikipedia clones). It's also missing some of Google's convenient features (like doing unit conversions and arithmetic). IIRC, Verbatim mode is closer to the raw results of Google's underlying search engine, before some of the massaging they do. Some of that massaging is bad, but some of it's all right.
crazygringo 3y ago
First of all, wow. It's there (under Tools, you don't even need to go to Advanced), it works, and yet I've never once seen anybody talk about that feature's existence on HN until now. And people have been complaining about not being able to do verbatim searches for years and years here on HN. Second, I just looked up when this feature was introduced (assuming it was fairly new), and it was in... November 2011. It's been there for the past twelve years. See: https://www.wired.com/2011/11/google-verbatim-search-back/ https://www.wired.com/2011/11/google-verbatim-search-back/ https://searchengineland.com/responding-to-complaints-google-adds-verbatim-search-results-101226 https://searchengineland.com/responding-to-complaints-google... https://www.searchenginewatch.com/2011/11/18/google-introduces-verbatim-searching/ https://www.searchenginewatch.com/2011/11/18/google-introduc... Thanks for letting us know! It's been right under our noses the whole time -- and it's not like the Tools menu is even particularly hidden, at least on desktop.
- gniv 3y ago
  There's been lots of talk about it over the years: https://www.google.com/search?q=google+%22verbatim%22+site%3Aycombinator.com https://www.google.com/search?q=google+%22verbatim%22+site%3... I think I also mentioned it a couple of times when the same complaint came up. The problem I think is that "verbatim" is not a word that one thinks of, so nobody searches for that. Plus it's hidden in a generic "Tools" menu. Sometime you get a link to search for the exact phrase at the bottom of results, but that too is subtle.
- marcosdumay 3y ago
  > I've never once seen anybody talk about that feature's existence on HN until now Every time I tried it, it didn't work. It certainly changed a lot on those years, but the reason nobody acknowledges it is probably because it's a coin-toss if Google wants "verbatim" to mean verbatim today. Quotes actually stopped working (they became a hint, instead of filtering the results) a long time ago, and many people insisted for years that the verbatim search worked. Probably because those tried it on the days when Google decided to use a standard dictionary. Nowadays even those people gave-up.
  - 3y ago

You have to use a special "verbatim" search product from Google, it isn't the main search box anymore. Look under Advanced or something.

by sneak 3y ago

You have to use a special "verbatim" search product from Google, it isn't the main search box anymore. Look under Advanced or something.

Izkata 3y ago

On the search results page, there's a "Tools" button in the upper-right that expands two dropdowns. Change "All results" to "Verbatim".

robertlagrant 3y ago
Wow, that's a good tip.
- dihydro 3y ago
  Here's a URL Link to the advanced search: https://www.google.com/advanced_search?hl=en&fg=1 https://www.google.com/advanced_search?hl=en&fg=1
  - janlukacs 3y ago
    wow, thanks! how did you find this link? I don't see it anywhere in the main interface.
  - late25 3y ago
    I tried it and it looks like it does nothing but wrap my query in quotes… and then return non-exact results if not found. How is this any different than what people have historically done?
    - Izkata 3y ago
      That isn't different, Verbatim search isn't on the advanced search page. You can only get to it from the search results page like in my earlier comment.
  - Izkata 3y ago
    It's not on that page, you can only switch to Verbatim on the search results. OP was mistaken.

zulban 3y ago

I thought this was a joke.

helboi4 3y ago
What it is like anti-user design. Why take away a decades long precedent to hide it in a menu?

mannykannot 3y ago

For now, this seems to work: https://www.google.com/advanced_search https://www.google.com/advanced_search but, given the pace at which Google "improves" things, I don't have much hope that it will last.

gniv 3y ago
That page has been there forever. Here's the version from Dec 2000: https://web.archive.org/web/20001202041000/https://www.google.com/advanced_search https://web.archive.org/web/20001202041000/https://www.googl...

tda 3y ago

Great tip! Seems like this adds the query param "&tbs=li%3A1", so this might be something you can configure as an extra search engine in firefox. But then I am a happy kagi customer, and I was just thinking that I can't recall the last time I had to do a !g to find something. For me, google search si pretty much dead. I only use it now when on someone else's pc

chankstein38 3y ago
Sounds like a good case for an extension even! "Auto add this when I go to google"
- rbinv 3y ago
  You can also adjust your browser's search engine defaults.

jamal-kumar 3y ago

Why would they make their very expected functionality something you have to dig around to find now? That just seems like really bad decision making that should have been spotted by someone on top and screams that the people on top are now disconnected from reality. I swear that it used to work for certain strings I'm trying to find now which I was able to find information on and now it isn't even returning, with "verbatim" set, something that is in a very well-known program's documentation. Bing finds like three results. Google has dropped the ball so hard it's embarrassing

jplona 3y ago
It's also possible they they're correct, and the average user of today has much less need for verbatim searches than the average user when the search engine was first designed.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- Filligree 3y ago
  This is definitely the case. Sit down next to a casual user one day, and you'll find that 'verbatim' is the absolute last thing they need.
- jamal-kumar 3y ago
  Nah their product is broken and I'm going to avoid using it from now on except when I need to find something on a map or mess around on SEO for work If they break a key feature to MAKE a verbatim search happen with literally two keys pressed, and are apparently not even indexing what they used to anymore, they're dropping the ball. Most people know the quotation trick now and are probably assuming it still works
- devmor 3y ago
  This is almost certainly the case. Those of us who learned to use and mastered keyword-style search are the minority. Most people search whole phrases, expecting a contextual answer.

tivert 3y ago

> You have to use a special "verbatim" search product from Google, it isn't the main search box anymore. Look under Advanced or something. I actually use that, but it has its faults. You get more spam results and iffy sites (e.g. Wikipedia clones). It's also missing some of Google's convenient features (like doing unit conversions and arithmetic). IIRC, Verbatim mode is closer to the raw results of Google's underlying search engine, before some of the massaging they do. Some of that massaging is bad, but some of it's all right.

crazygringo 3y ago

First of all, wow. It's there (under Tools, you don't even need to go to Advanced), it works, and yet I've never once seen anybody talk about that feature's existence on HN until now. And people have been complaining about not being able to do verbatim searches for years and years here on HN. Second, I just looked up when this feature was introduced (assuming it was fairly new), and it was in... November 2011. It's been there for the past twelve years. See: https://www.wired.com/2011/11/google-verbatim-search-back/ https://www.wired.com/2011/11/google-verbatim-search-back/ https://searchengineland.com/responding-to-complaints-google-adds-verbatim-search-results-101226 https://searchengineland.com/responding-to-complaints-google... https://www.searchenginewatch.com/2011/11/18/google-introduces-verbatim-searching/ https://www.searchenginewatch.com/2011/11/18/google-introduc... Thanks for letting us know! It's been right under our noses the whole time -- and it's not like the Tools menu is even particularly hidden, at least on desktop.

gniv 3y ago
There's been lots of talk about it over the years: https://www.google.com/search?q=google+%22verbatim%22+site%3Aycombinator.com https://www.google.com/search?q=google+%22verbatim%22+site%3... I think I also mentioned it a couple of times when the same complaint came up. The problem I think is that "verbatim" is not a word that one thinks of, so nobody searches for that. Plus it's hidden in a generic "Tools" menu. Sometime you get a link to search for the exact phrase at the bottom of results, but that too is subtle.
marcosdumay 3y ago
> I've never once seen anybody talk about that feature's existence on HN until now Every time I tried it, it didn't work. It certainly changed a lot on those years, but the reason nobody acknowledges it is probably because it's a coin-toss if Google wants "verbatim" to mean verbatim today. Quotes actually stopped working (they became a hint, instead of filtering the results) a long time ago, and many people insisted for years that the verbatim search worked. Probably because those tried it on the days when Google decided to use a standard dictionary. Nowadays even those people gave-up.
- 3y ago