Limiter | What Is Searched | Example |
---|---|---|
Quotation marks | Forces an exact-match search. Words have to appear as given, same order | Example: “Fender Guitar Owner’s Manuals” |
Site | Limit your search to a single site. (See below for limiting to a type of site (i.e., all sites ending in .edu) | Example: STEM site:ucdavis.edu |
Filetype | tells Google to return only results for a specific type of file, such as PDF | Example: seo filetype:pdf |
Source | Allows you to choose a specific source in Google News. | apple source: NY Times |
term1 around(5) term2 | Proximity search: term1 within 5 words of term2 |
(electric car) around(5) environment |
For more on Advanced Google Searches, see: |
This search technique lets you limit where Google searches to find more robust results.
Example: Open source info (on any topic) – is likely to be on the web, but where?
commercial websites (probably not)
government websites (maybe?)
non-profits (probably?)
university/college websites (likely)
Use the search statements below to limit where Google searches –> this can give you better results
Limiter | What Is Searched | Example |
---|---|---|
(search terms) site:*.gov | only government web sites | (“open source” and (farm* or agric*)) site:*.gov |
(search terms) site:*.edu | university & college web sites | (“open source” and (farm* or agric*)) site:*.edu |
(search terms) site:*.org | domains that end in .org | (“open source” and (farm* or agric*)) site:*.org |
(search terms) site:*.com | commercial sites | |
(search terms) site:*.mil | Military sites (mainly US?) | |
term1 around(5) term2 | Proximity search: term1 within 5 words of term2 |
(electric car) around(5) environment |
This isn’t foolproof, other domains exist, more info: Generic Top-Level Domain |