10 secret Google search tricks – smooth operators

March 2, 1:33 PMGenealogy and Technology ExaminerThomas MacEntee

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10 secret Google search tricks – smooth operators

Many users rely upon Google for their Internet searches but few know about the important operators that can really turbo-charge your results. Use them during your next search for family history information or when looking for surnamed and you’ll be surprised at what you find!

1. cache: include with other keywords in the query and those words are highlighted within the site’s content as cached by Google. Example: cache:www.nara.gov archives will show the cached content for The National Archives with the word help highlighted
   
   
2. link: produces results showing links to the specified site. Example: link:www.ancestry.com displays sites that have links pointing to Ancestry
   
   
3. related: displays sites that are “similar” to a specified site. Example: related:www.footnote.com lists sites that are similar to Footnote
   
   
4. info: produces information about a site. Example: info:www.geni.com
   will show web page information about Geni
   
   
5. define: provides a definition of the words entered after it. Example: define:ahnentafel produces definitions for the word from several sources. Note: type an entire phrase and definitions will include all the words in the exact order entered
   
   
6. site: results are restricted to those sites in the given domain. Example: Germany site:www.cyndislist.com locates sites about Germany within Cyndi’s List. Germany site:com will find pages about Germany within all sites ending in .com
   
   
7. intitle: restrict results to sites containing a specified keyword in the title plus other keywords anywhere in the site. Example: intitle:African-American ancestry will display sites that mention the word African-American in the title and mention the word ancestry anywhere in the site
   
   
8. allintitle: only see results with all of the query words in the title. Example: allintitle:Dutch ancestry will return only documents that have both Dutch and ancestry in the title
   
   
9. inurl: results are restricted to those containing a specified keyword in the url. Example: inurl:ahnentafel Smith will return sites that mention the word ahnentafel in the url and mention the word Smith anywhere in the rest of the site
   
   
10. allinurl: used with keywords and locate sites with all of the words in the url. Example: allinurl:Jewish genealogy will return only documents that have both Jewish and genealogy in the url