I know this isn't strictly a Linux question but it is general computer knowledge. I've been hunting for suppliers of the Foxconn G31MG-S motherboard over the past few weeks. There's one hit comes up in Google Products but I'm not entirely sure that I trust it so I've been doing straight Google searches as well. I've just noticed that if I search for just "G31MG-S" (no quotes) and click on the "pages from the UK" button I get just 26 results whereas if I search for "Foxconn G31MG-S" (again no quotes) I get "about 244000", huh? I thought adding terms was meant to narrow the search. In fact lots of the "Foxconn G31MG-S" results don't appear to have "G31MG-S" in them at all - is Google losing the plot and trying to be too clever for its own good? I don't want it second guessing me and offering results with only some of my search terms in them. -- Chris Green
Chris G wrote:
I know this isn't strictly a Linux question but it is general computer knowledge.
I've been hunting for suppliers of the Foxconn G31MG-S motherboard over the past few weeks. There's one hit comes up in Google Products but I'm not entirely sure that I trust it so I've been doing straight Google searches as well.
I've just noticed that if I search for just "G31MG-S" (no quotes) and click on the "pages from the UK" button I get just 26 results whereas if I search for "Foxconn G31MG-S" (again no quotes) I get "about 244000", huh? I thought adding terms was meant to narrow the search.
In fact lots of the "Foxconn G31MG-S" results don't appear to have "G31MG-S" in them at all - is Google losing the plot and trying to be too clever for its own good? I don't want it second guessing me and offering results with only some of my search terms in them.
Why do you *really* need to post yet again to the list with a question of such nature. http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Foxconn+G31MG-S%22&btnG=Search Just a stab in the dark really, but does that not display numerous results with the entire phrase? Problem solved, move on, stop spamming the list.
On Sun, Feb 15, 2009 at 11:04:56AM +0000, steveydoteu wrote:
Chris G wrote:
I know this isn't strictly a Linux question but it is general computer knowledge.
I've been hunting for suppliers of the Foxconn G31MG-S motherboard over the past few weeks. There's one hit comes up in Google Products but I'm not entirely sure that I trust it so I've been doing straight Google searches as well.
I've just noticed that if I search for just "G31MG-S" (no quotes) and click on the "pages from the UK" button I get just 26 results whereas if I search for "Foxconn G31MG-S" (again no quotes) I get "about 244000", huh? I thought adding terms was meant to narrow the search.
In fact lots of the "Foxconn G31MG-S" results don't appear to have "G31MG-S" in them at all - is Google losing the plot and trying to be too clever for its own good? I don't want it second guessing me and offering results with only some of my search terms in them.
Why do you *really* need to post yet again to the list with a question of such nature.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Foxconn+G31MG-S%22&btnG=Search
Just a stab in the dark really, but does that not display numerous results with the entire phrase? Problem solved, move on, stop spamming the list.
Yes, I know that if I search for "Foxconn G31MG-S" with the quotes then it searches for the phrase as a whole. However there's no guarantee that every supplier puts the phrase as a whole on their web pages. And even then I fail to understand why "Foxconn G31MG-S" (with the quotes) returns "about 6310" results and G31MG-S without quotes returns only 25 - it makes little sense to me. I was really asking the question to find out how Google does things rather than asking for help searching for a motherboard. It just seemed to me that Google was becoming, as I said, too helpful and I thought it might be of interest to find what others thought and also if they could explain what was happening. In fact, on thinking about it, I *think* what Google is doing is searching for "G31MG -S" (no quotes), i.e. it's looking for the string G31MG and 'not' the string S. Google treats - as a delimiter and never searches for it which is a nuisance sometimes. Yes, I think that's probably it as a search for "G31MG-S" with quotes produces more sensible results. Well, thank you anyway for pointing me in the right direction to find out why Google was confusing me! :-) -- Chris Green
Chris G wrote:
On Sun, Feb 15, 2009 at 11:04:56AM +0000, steveydoteu wrote:
Chris G wrote:
I know this isn't strictly a Linux question but it is general computer knowledge.
I've been hunting for suppliers of the Foxconn G31MG-S motherboard over the past few weeks. There's one hit comes up in Google Products but I'm not entirely sure that I trust it so I've been doing straight Google searches as well.
I've just noticed that if I search for just "G31MG-S" (no quotes) and click on the "pages from the UK" button I get just 26 results whereas if I search for "Foxconn G31MG-S" (again no quotes) I get "about 244000", huh? I thought adding terms was meant to narrow the search.
In fact lots of the "Foxconn G31MG-S" results don't appear to have "G31MG-S" in them at all - is Google losing the plot and trying to be too clever for its own good? I don't want it second guessing me and offering results with only some of my search terms in them.
Why do you *really* need to post yet again to the list with a question of such nature.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Foxconn+G31MG-S%22&btnG=Search
Just a stab in the dark really, but does that not display numerous results with the entire phrase? Problem solved, move on, stop spamming the list.
Yes, I know that if I search for "Foxconn G31MG-S" with the quotes then it searches for the phrase as a whole. However there's no guarantee that every supplier puts the phrase as a whole on their web pages.
And even then I fail to understand why "Foxconn G31MG-S" (with the quotes) returns "about 6310" results and G31MG-S without quotes returns only 25 - it makes little sense to me.
I was really asking the question to find out how Google does things rather than asking for help searching for a motherboard. It just seemed to me that Google was becoming, as I said, too helpful and I thought it might be of interest to find what others thought and also if they could explain what was happening.
In fact, on thinking about it, I *think* what Google is doing is searching for "G31MG -S" (no quotes), i.e. it's looking for the string G31MG and 'not' the string S. Google treats - as a delimiter and never searches for it which is a nuisance sometimes. Yes, I think that's probably it as a search for "G31MG-S" with quotes produces more sensible results.
Well, thank you anyway for pointing me in the right direction to find out why Google was confusing me! :-)
Clearly your talents are wasted here, Chris. Perhaps you should check if Google have any jobs going.
participants (2)
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Chris G -
steveydoteu