[Buddha-l] Search engines [was: Religious violence, Buddhist violence and spelling]

R B Basham bshmr at aol.com
Thu Jan 21 14:10:04 MST 2010


Thank you, Franz.

On Thu, 2010-01-21 at 11:39 -0700, Richard Hayes wrote:
>I'm not sure how to explain that. Can you explain it R.B.?
>

Well, only after wanton fantasizing then checking google (support):

< http://www.google.com/support/websearch/bin/answer.py?answer=136861 >

{quote}....

# Search exactly as is (+)
Google employs synonyms automatically, so that it finds pages that
mention, for example, childcare for the query [ child care ] (with a
space), or California history for the query [ ca history ]. But
sometimes Google helps out a little too much and gives you a synonym
when you don't really want it. By attaching a + immediately before a
word (remember, don't add a space after the +), you are telling Google
to match that word precisely as you typed it. Putting double quotes
around a single word will do the same thing.

# The OR operator
Google's default behavior is to consider all the words in a search. If
you want to specifically allow either one of several words, you can use
the OR operator (note that you have to type 'OR' in ALL CAPS). For
example, [ San Francisco Giants 2004 OR 2005 ] will give you results
about either one of these years, whereas [ San Francisco Giants 2004
2005 ] (without the OR) will show pages that include both years on the
same page. The symbol | can be substituted for OR. (The AND operator, by
the way, is the default, so it is not needed.)

...{/quote}

1. The '+' is not the pure inverse of '-' so I was deluded and misspoke
(miswrote) today on that. Note: I am not a 'zen buddhist' as some here
are <G> but a hinayana with un-skillful speech issues.

2. Default search logic is typical conjunctive (AND) or for all
significant words (apparently subject to a 'dictionary' (token-ized??)
unless specified otherwise). 

3. Someone else can research the history of google's default search
logic or volunteer their 'past life' recall. [The support page showed a
copyright of 2009 sans an 'updated' tag.] 

Richard Basham 




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