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The Basic Search
To enter a query, type in a few descriptive words and
press the Enter key or click the Search
button for a list of relevant results.
Google uses sophisticated text-matching techniques
to find pages that are both important and relevant
to your search. For instance, Google analyzes not
only the candidate page, but also the pages linking
into it to determine the value of the candidate page
for your search. Google also prefers pages in which
your query terms are near each other.
Note: Encrypted, viewable
PDF documents are converted to HTML for indexing; however, the HTML is not
displayed.
Spelling
A single spelling suggestion is returned with the
results for queries where the spell checker has
detected a possible spelling mistake.
The spell checker feature is context sensitive.
For example, if the query submitted is
"gail divers," "gail devers"
is suggested as an alternative query. However,
"scuba divers" would not return an
alternate query suggestion.
Note: Currently, the spell
checker supports only US English.
Synonyms
Synonyms are other words that have the same or
similar meanings. They are displayed as "Other
suggested searches" on the results page.
Sorting by Date
The Sort by Date feature sorts and presents
your search results based on date. The date of each
file is returned in the results. Results that do not
contain dates are displayed at the end, sorted by
relevance.
Automatic "and" Queries
By default, Google only returns pages that include
all of your search terms. There is no need to
include "and" between terms. For example, to search
for engineering product specification documents,
enter:
To broaden or restrict the search, include fewer or
more terms.
"OR" Searches
Google supports the logical "OR"
operator. To retrieve pages that include
either word A or word B, use an uppercase
"OR" between terms. For example, to search
for an office in either London or Paris, enter:
See Your Search Terms in the Results
Every Google search result lists one or more
excerpts from the web page to display how your
search terms are used in context on that page.
In the excerpt, your search terms are displayed
in bold text so that you can quickly determine
if that result is from a page you want to visit.
Does Capitalization Matter?
Google searches are not case sensitive.
All letters, regardless of how you enter them,
are understood as lower case. For example, searches
for "george washington," "George
Washington," and "George washington"
all return the same results.
Does Google Observe Stop Words?
Google ignores common words and characters known
as stop words. These include most pronouns and
articles. Google automatically disregards such
terms as "where" and "how,"
as well as certain single digits and single
letters. These terms rarely help to narrow a
search and can significantly slow searching.
If you want to use stop words in your search,
use the "+" sign or
enclose your phrase containing stop words in
quotation marks. Make sure that you
include a space before the "+" sign.
For example, to search for annual Report Version
I:
You can also include the "+" sign in
phrase searches.
Does Google Use Stemming?
To provide the most accurate results, Google
does not use "stemming" or support
"wildcard" searches. Rather, Google
searches for exactly the words that you enter
into the search box.
For example, searching for "airlin" or "airlin*" will
not yield "airline" or "airlines.". If in doubt, try both forms, for example:
"airline" and "airlines."
Refining Your Search
Since Google only returns web pages that contain
all of the words in your query, refining
or narrowing your search is as simple as adding
more words to the search terms you have already
entered. The refined query returns a specific
subset of the pages that were returned by your
original broad query.
Excluding Words
You can exclude a word from your search by
putting a minus sign ("-") immediately in
front of the term you want to exclude. Make
sure you include a space before the minus sign.
For example, the search:
will return pages about bass that do not contain the
word "music."
Phrase Searches
You can search for phrases by adding quotation
marks. Words enclosed in double quotes ("like
this") appear together in all returned documents.
Phrase searches using quotation marks are useful
when searching for famous sayings or specific names.
Certain characters serve as phrase connectors.
Phrase connectors work like quotes because they
join your search words in the same way double
quotes join your search words. For example, the
search:
is treated as a phrase search even though the search
words are not enclosed in double quotes. Google recognizes hyphens, slashes,
periods, equal signs, and apostrophes as phrase connectors.
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