Google.com Search Engine Tips and Tricks

GOOGLE IMAGES SEARCH: Use the "Click Images" feature on the front page to sesrch or find photographs on the Web. Of course, just because you find a photo that rocks your world, doesn't mean you can always reprint it.

More Phone Fun: The regular search box also works as a reverse phonebook. Type in a phone number and if the number is listed, you will get back who owns it. Pretty cool, eh? *Does the long live Google chant*

Last Tele Tid bits: For its phone listings, not only does Google provide you with a number, but often, with a map as well. Since some people don't want such personal information available on the Web, Google does help you remove it from their database. Removing it from Google does NOT remove it from other parts of the Web, however.

Google Calulator: You can use the search box to make certain calculations and conversions. Examples: "100+100=" (without quotes) will get you um, hold on, -- yeah, 200!; "2*2=" (without quotes) will get you 4. To run conversions, use the following format: "100 miles = ? km" (without quotes) or "100 pounds = ? kilos"). Currency conversion is coming soon to a Google portal near you.

Google Answers: Pay a researcher to find answers to questions, events or things you haven't been able to successly find elsewhere (starting at $2.50). Hell, I could even perform that service for ya at perhaps say, a buck fifty?

Definitions Ala Google: Or Googlnitions? Anyway, If you type "apple" into a search engine, you get the computer company, not the fruit. But let's say you didn't know what an apple was and wanted a definition of the word. Then, typing "define:apple" will give you definitions. BTW, an apple is "a fruit with red or yellow or green skin and sweet to tart crisp whitish flesh. *ech*

Intitle & Intext Will restrict searches to title or text of the web page. A regular search for "sreenivasan" yields 20,000+ results; a search for "intitle:sreenivasan" brings in less than 1,000 pages that have "sreenivasan in the title itself (ie, the blue stuff that gets bookmarked). Another example, If you are trying to find a page that had "red apple" in the title and "sauce" in the text you would search for "intitle:apple intext:sauce." This is especially invaluable for trying to recover url's you may have forgotten

Froogle Search through thousands of shopping sites for a particular product all at once. The name is a play/pun on the words "frugal" and Google.

Google Groups: This a way to read the Usenet Newsgroups - people discussing tens of thousands of topics - that predate the Web. Great source for info, connecting with people, finding obscure facts (and fiction).

Who links to a site : Type in "link:www.nytimes.com" to find out how many sites have a link from their sites to the NYT (these are actual hyperlinks to nytimes.com, not just mentions of the paper).

Google Page Viewer: Instead of seeing results in text format, how about seeing each Web site itself? Enter your search terms and you get a slideshow of the sites.

Voice Operated Search: This is an odd little feature: Call a number in California, speak your query, and the results show up on a Web page. It's coolishly spooky - and I haven't quite figured out how it works.

LABS: Keep track of all Google developments here.