I cringe a bit when I watch this video that I made in 2010 due to the voice, and my emphasis, but even more importantly, some of the information is no longer valid. Here’s a highlight of what’s different in using Search operators in Google now.
- +word used to be a verbatim search where word had to exist on the page, but this was deprecated in 2011, and now it is a search for word on Google+ pages. You can still use “word” to do a verbatim search for either a word or a phrase.
- ~ used to be a synonym search and is now used for nothing
The video is still valid from 1:04 to 3:53. The only curiosity is that a search of define:iron gives many more results than define iron, and I haven’t figured out why that is. Answers welcomed.
Operators covered in the video
- –
- OR
- verbatim/phrase search
- * wildcard search
- define
If you’re doing a Google search, and need help with the operators, take a look at Advanced Search.