Do you ever find yourself frustrated when searching for something on the internet? You either get too much information, or it’s hard to find exactly what you’re looking for. Here are some tips that I use to streamline my searching:
EXACT MATCH:
When you use quotation marks, you only search for what is inside the quotes. For example:
Coffeehouses “live music”
will bring up all the coffeehouses that have live music.
EXCLUSION:
When you use the minus sign, you’ll exclude that information from your search. For example:
“Republican candidates” -“Donald Trump”
will bring up information about all the Republican candidates except Donald Trump.
WILD CARD:
When you use the asterisk with another word or phrase, you’ll get lots of different options. For example:
Hollywood *
will provide results like “Hollywood Bowl”, “Hollywood Blacklist”, and “Hollywood movies”.
SPECIFIC WEB SITE:
Do you want to search within a specific web site? Use “site:website”. For example:
“Jerry Lewis” site:nyt.com
will bring up articles relating to Jerry Lewis on the New York Times site.
MORE:
Have you used Google’s Search Tabs? Underneath Google’s search bar, there are a number of options:
WEB NEWS IMAGES VIDEOS BOOKS MORE SEARCH TOOLS
NEWS:
If you are looking specifically for a news story that occurred in the last 24 hours, follow these steps:
- Enter your search terms in the search bar.
- Click on the News tab.
- Click on the Search Tools Tab
- Click on “Anytime” and select “24 hours” from the drop down menu
IMAGES:
If you’re looking for an image, enter a description in the search bar and click on the Images Tab. If you want to fine tune your search, you can add other criteria. Click on “Search Tools” and select the color, type of image, usage rights, etc.
LOCATION:
If you want to find something in a particular location, click on “Search Tools”, then click on “Location”, then type in where you would like to search. For example:
“Hot Springs” California
will bring up a list of all the hot springs in California.
Have you used these tips before for searching? Are there other tips you use? Please share them in the comments below!
Chris Eddy of Geek For Hire, Inc. has been providing computer service to families and small businesses with Mac’s and PC’s for the past fourteen years. His company is highly rated by both the BBB (Better Business Bureau) and by Angie’s List. You can find more on our website. Geek For Hire, Inc. provides onsite service (Tier 3) to the Denver / Boulder / Front Range area and remote service throughout North America.
