Yes, Google, that's what I was looking for

error

It seems like Google search is worthless now unless you remember to throw in quotation marks. Intuitive!

Pages and pages of not-what-I-searched-for.

Google's results have been getting worse for some time now.
On the off chance you aren't aware of it yet, go More > Search Tools > All Results > Verbatim. Doing that usually gets what you are looking for, until Google decides to remove that feature like so many other things they've removed.

flabdablet

Easy fix for Firefox

Registry tweaks for IE

Tacroy

Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result. Did you mean to search for something more like this?

@Salamander said:

More > Search Tools > All Results > Verbatim

Which should be the deault for all searches without having to actually tell Google "Hey, I want you to search for WHAT I FUCKING TYPED!!!"

There is a conspiracy theory going around that Google does this deliberately to increase ad revenue -- making it harder to find what you want increases the chances of you clicking on something that makes them money. I think I'm starting to believe it.

dhromed

@Tacroy said:

Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.

When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.

error

@dhromed said:

@Tacroy said:
Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.

When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.

I wanted to implement Find In Explorer functionality in my .NET application.

boomzilla

@joe.edwards said:

@dhromed said:
@Tacroy said:
Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.

When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.

I wanted to implement Find In Explorer functionality in my .NET application.

I still don't know what you're talking about. AM I SUPPOSED TO READ YOUR MIND?!

@boomzilla said:

@joe.edwards said:
@dhromed said:
@Tacroy said:
Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.
When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.
I wanted to implement Find In Explorer functionality in my .NET application.

I still don't know what you're talking about. AM I SUPPOSED TO READ YOUR MIND?!

It has something to do with Excel.

boomzilla

@El_Heffe said:

It has something to do with Excel.

Is there nothing it can't do?

Tacroy

@joe.edwards said:

@dhromed said:
@Tacroy said:
Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.
When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.
I wanted to implement Find In Explorer functionality in my .NET application.

Then the proper search is for ".net open in file explorer" or ".net open in explorer"

It's not Google's fault you're using the wrong terms for things. You'll never be able to find a search engine that frees you from the burden of clarifying your ideas.

error

@Tacroy said:

@joe.edwards said:
@dhromed said:
@Tacroy said:
Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.
When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.

I wanted to implement Find In Explorer functionality in my .NET application.

Then the proper search is for ".net open in file explorer" or ".net open in explorer"
It's not Google's fault you're using the wrong terms for things. You'll never be able to find a search engine that frees you from the burden of clarifying your ideas.

OK you added one word to my query which caused Google to stop reinterpreting Find as "determine" and Explorer as "browser"? That makes perfect sense.

It does make perfect sense. Find can mean either "determine" or "search". If you had searched for .Net show file in explorer or .Net select file in explorer, you would have gotten useful results.

It's like asking for the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything. 42 may as well be the most correct answer there is, because there's no value to the question.

flabdablet

@boomzilla said:

@El_Heffe said:
It has something to do with Excel.

Is there nothing it can't do?

It can't undo after save! And Microsoft knows this.

Tacroy

@joe.edwards said:

@Tacroy said:
@joe.edwards said:
@dhromed said:
@Tacroy said:
Honestly, even as a human I have no idea what you were looking for and what would count as a good result.
When you input gibberish, you get gibberish results.
I wanted to implement Find In Explorer functionality in my .NET application.

Then the proper search is for ".net open in file explorer" or ".net open in explorer"
It's not Google's fault you're using the wrong terms for things. You'll never be able to find a search engine that frees you from the burden of clarifying your ideas.
OK you added one word to my query which caused Google to stop reinterpreting Find as "determine" and Explorer as "browser"? That makes perfect sense.

It does make perfect sense. You were searching for a vague thing; "find in explorer" is a vaguely defined menu entry in some programs. If instead you'd searched for what you want to do, namely "open in explorer", you would have gotten better results.

Also, keep in mind that "in" is a stop word. Google ignores it. Would you agree that the results you got were reasonable for ".net find explorer"? Because that's what you were searching for, whether you realized it or not.

OldCrow

@joe.edwards said:

OK you added one word to my query which caused Google to stop reinterpreting Find as "determine" and Explorer as "browser"? That makes perfect sense.

To speed up the search and decrease the load on machines, the actual search keywords (or sometimes phrases) get turned to index numbers before any actual database lookup is performed.

If a word has multiple meanings, like "explorer" can mean Columbus, IE, or Windows Explorer, to name a few, then Google decides the right translation to a platonic idea index number from the context. Add "file" to the context, and "Windows Explorer" is now more likely the right one than IE.

Simple, no?

dhromed

To be fair, " .net "find in explorer" " doesn't yield anything useful either.

PJH

@boomzilla said:

@El_Heffe said:
It has something to do with Excel.

Is there nothing it can't do?

Emacs emulator?

error

@OldCrow said:

@joe.edwards said:
OK you added one word to my query which caused Google to stop reinterpreting Find as "determine" and Explorer as "browser"? That makes perfect sense.

To speed up the search and decrease the load on machines, the actual search keywords (or sometimes phrases) get turned to index numbers before any actual database lookup is performed.
If a word has multiple meanings, like "explorer" can mean Columbus, IE, or Windows Explorer, to name a few, then Google decides the right translation to a platonic idea index number from the context. Add "file" to the context, and "Windows Explorer" is now more likely the right one than IE.
Simple, no?

Google sure put in a lot of work to get it wrong. I appreciate all the technical explanations, but the point (which everyone missed) is that it's Google's responsibility to figure out what the user meant, not the other way 'round. Now, understandably this is capital-I Impossible for the general case, but in this particular instance it just meant passing my terms on unmolested.
To paraphrase ~~a great man~~ an asshole, "blame the users! Blame the users! Blame the users! How come we have no users?" Google hasn't lost the leading market share. Yet.

@OldCrow said:

@joe.edwards said:
OK you added one word to my query which caused Google to stop reinterpreting Find as "determine" and Explorer as "browser"? That makes perfect sense.
To speed up the search and decrease the load on machines, the actual search keywords (or sometimes phrases) get turned to index numbers before any actual database lookup is performed.
If a word has multiple meanings, like "explorer" can mean Columbus, IE, or Windows Explorer, to name a few, then Google decides the right translation to a platonic idea index number from the context. Add "file" to the context, and "Windows Explorer" is now more likely the right one than IE.
Simple, no?

Translation:

In order to make things easier for themselves, Google has implemented a system that returns results based on "index numbers" with no regard for whether or not those results have any relevance to what the person actually type in their search query. And if people don't like getting meaningless search results, so what. What are they going to do, switch to Bing?

OldCrow

@El_Heffe said:

@OldCrow said:
@joe.edwards said:
OK you added one word to my query which caused Google to stop reinterpreting Find as "determine" and Explorer as "browser"? That makes perfect sense.
To speed up the search and decrease the load on machines, the actual search keywords (or sometimes phrases) get turned to index numbers before any actual database lookup is performed.
If a word has multiple meanings, like "explorer" can mean Columbus, IE, or Windows Explorer, to name a few, then Google decides the right translation to a platonic idea index number from the context. Add "file" to the context, and "Windows Explorer" is now more likely the right one than IE.
Simple, no?
Translation:
In order to make things easier for themselves, Google has implemented a system that returns results based on "index numbers" with no regard for whether or not those results have any relevance to what the person actually type in their search query. And if people don't like getting meaningless search results, so what. What are they going to do, switch to Bing?

To be fair, load-managing became mandatory when people started using the Google bar instead of the address bar.

<sarcasm> By the way, why has Firefox not yet removed/hidden the address bar in the default installation? </sarcasm>

dhromed

I had a weird dream where address bars would show the title of the page instead of the URL, even though it would copy the url when you'd select and copy.

anonymous235

@dhromed said:

I had a weird dream where address bars would show the title of the page instead of the URL, even though it would copy the url when you'd select and copy.

That wasn't a dream, you tried that browser for Android and your brain is now (understandably) blocking the memories. For your own sake, try not to think much about it.

Ben L.

@anonymous235 said:

@dhromed said:
I had a weird dream where address bars would show the title of the page instead of the URL, even though it would copy the url when you'd select and copy.

That wasn't a dream, you tried that browser for Android and your brain is now (understandably) blocking the memories. For your own sake, try not to think much about it.

Mother: Wake up dear, wake up.

Pither: Mother!

Mother: Come on dear.

Pither: So, it was all a dream.

Mother: No, no dear, this is the dream, you're still in the cell.

dhromed

I'm living the dream!

error

OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Ronald

@joe.edwards said:

OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Did you try WebCrawler? I wonder if Google is provided with the origin of the search.

KattMan

Interesting maybe google got this right:

Google

that gives me all the other search areas to ask my question

Lorne Kates

@Ronald said:

@joe.edwards said:
OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Did you try WebCrawler? I wonder if Google is provided with the origin of the search.

I'm not happy of either choices, so I'm stuck with Google. There may be other search engines, but I can't think of any way of locating that information.

Ben L.

@Lorne Kates said:

@Ronald said:
@joe.edwards said:
OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Did you try WebCrawler? I wonder if Google is provided with the origin of the search.

I'm not happy of either choices, so I'm stuck with Google. There may be other search engines, but I can't think of any way of locating that information.

I like to use grep as a search engine. I have the entire internet mounted as a network drive. It takes ages to load, though.

KattMan

@Ben L. said:

I like to use grep as a search engine. I have the entire internet mounted as a network drive. It takes ages to load, though.

You mounted teh interweb? no wonder there is so much pron on there.

error

@Ben L. said:

@Lorne Kates said:
@Ronald said:
@joe.edwards said:
OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Did you try WebCrawler? I wonder if Google is provided with the origin of the search.

I'm not happy of either choices, so I'm stuck with Google. There may be other search engines, but I can't think of any way of locating that information.

I like to use grep as a search engine. I have the entire internet mounted as a network drive. It takes ages to load, though.

Just type del /s /q I:\. It might take a while to execute, but after that it should mount much more quickly.

Ronald

@joe.edwards said:

@Ben L. said:
@Lorne Kates said:
@Ronald said:
@joe.edwards said:
OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Did you try WebCrawler? I wonder if Google is provided with the origin of the search.

I'm not happy of either choices, so I'm stuck with Google. There may be other search engines, but I can't think of any way of locating that information.

I like to use grep as a search engine. I have the entire internet mounted as a network drive. It takes ages to load, though.
Just type erase /s /q I:\. It might take a while to execute, but after that it should mount much more quickly.

Cool people use erase, not del.

anonymous235

@joe.edwards said:

OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.

Try Startpage.com. It's basically a google proxy.

error

@anonymous235 said:

@joe.edwards said:
OK, today Google is blocking searches from my work proxy due to excess volume (not surprising, thousands of us are sharing one external IP).

Fuck this, I'm switching to Bing.
Try Startpage.com. It's basically a google proxy.

[quote user="Startpage.com"]

StartPage protects you from NSA surveillance and spying.

Your search session with StartPage is protected through powerful SSL encryption so no one - not hackers, not your ISP, not even the federal government - can eavesdrop on your searches.

[/quote]

Sadly, my employer has installed their own root certs on my machine and their proxy does a MITM attack on my HTTPS traffic. My usage of their network implies consent to this.

They should probably mention this possibility somewhere.

Snooder

Anyone else remember back when schools taught basic search engine skills? With nifty tips like how to use boolean operators, and the proper use of quotation marks?

I think google has spoilt too many people who don't remember what it was like back when your search terms actually had to be pretty specific and you couldn't just depend on google to magically find the result for you.