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Ask HN: How to do literal web searches after Google destroyed the “ ” feature? (derp.foo)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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I used this quite frequently but since Google """"improved"""" it last year (there was a popular HN post complaining about this) it doesn't work anymore. Search for a domain name with quotation marks for example just recombines the contents of the domain and returns a bunch of unrelated content completely cluttering what I am looking for. Until last year it used to return no search results if there weren't any exact matches, which is the whole point.

Does someone have a work around for this phenomenal Google decision?

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Duckduckgo is probably even worse for this. For example, you can't filter words with by putting "-" before it. You can find years worth of forum posts begging for the feature.

I committed to using ddg for a few years, but after realizing that I was using bangs for anything but the most trivial searches, I had to be honest with myself and just give up on it.

Oh shit... After looking it up it's gotten worse since I quit: https://www.ghacks.net/2023/04/24/duckduckgo-disables-most-search-filters-from-search/

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Dang I did notice it was pretty flakey with the "-"

What's not Google and better than ddg?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I wish I knew