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Google search result URLs used to be simpler, but they made a decision not to care how they look years ago and they keep stuffing more and more data into them.
by NelsonMinar 14y ago
Google search result URLs used to be simpler, but they made a decision not to care how they look years ago and they keep stuffing more and more data into them. I assume it helps their tracking and maybe optimization.
Even more offensive are the result URLs on the result page. Here's the URL for a logged out search for "hacker news". https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CDMQFjAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fnews.ycombinator.com%2F&ei=k99eUcfzOsePiAKjgIG4DA&usg=AFQjCNGxnV8qCnv_rujodDj6o2ZhqU8Nxg&bvm=bv.44770516,d.cGE https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&...
- NelsonMinar 14y agoHa, the Hacker News page won't even display the URL, it's so ugly. Let's examine it in its full glory https://www.google.com/url https://www.google.com/url? sa=t& rct=j& q=& esrc=s& source=web& cd=1& cad=rja& ved=0CDMQFjAA& url=https%3A%2F%2Fnews.ycombinator.com%2F& ei=k99eUcfzOsePiAKjgIG4DA& usg=AFQjCNGxnV8qCnv_rujodDj6o2ZhqU8Nxg& bvm=bv.44770516,d.cGE Note that none of this is necessary for clickthrough tracking; it's easy to do that separately from the href.