Google adds tilde (~) operator

Google has added a new operator to its search engine. Earlier, you could use a + prefix to insist a common word should not be excluded, a – to say you only want to see pages where a particular word does not exist and of course double quotes for an exact match of a sequence of words.

Enter the ~

Now you can tell google to search for a word and its synonyms in a single search. If you search for “~help” it will also find “tutorial” and “aid.” And, of course, if you search for “~blog” you will also find “weblog.”

If you are curious what synonyms the google engine knows, search for “~word -word”.

Be warned that the google definition of “synonym” is very, very broad. Search for “~religion” and it matched not only religious, but also “culture” and “islam” (but not, apparently, other religions).

If you google for “~war” you not only get “military” and “battle”, but you also get “vietnam” which probably tells us something about a certain national trauma in google’s homeland.

I really think the synonym list may require a bit of tweaking.

Funnily, google thinks “office” is a synonym of “word.” Let’s see how long it takes you to figure that one out…

[Secular Blasphemy]