Personalized Google Searching

Google gained popularity primarily because of the accuracy and speed of its search. The new Personalized Search feature promises to improve its accuracy even further.

To use the feature, you'll need a Google account. Create one, or if you already have one, sign in to it. (To create an account, go to https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount.)

Once you have an account, go to Google, and click "Search History" in the upper right-hand part of the page. You'll come to a blank Search History page. Click "Resume." From now on, Google will keep a record of all your searches and which pages you clicked from those searches. As it learns what you click on and what you search for, it will begin to shape its search results to your search behavior. At first, that most likely won't be noticeable, but over time, you should notice that your searches return more accurate results.

The feature does more than fine-tune your searches, though. It also lets you easily revisit pages and searches you've already done, and to search only through your previous search results. This is particularly useful when you remember that you once performed a Google search that gave you good results, but you can't remember the query or the site you visited.

When you turn the feature on, all your searches are saved, as shown in the nearby figure. To get there, go to Google and click "Search History," or else go to http://www.google.com/searchhistory. Once you're on the page, to revisit a site or search, click it. You can also revisit all the searches you performed on a given day by using the calendar on the right side of the screen.

What makes this page particularly powerful is that you can search only through your search history instead of the entire Web. To do it, type in a search term and click the "Search History" button. You'll search only through your previous results.

There's really only one problem with this feature—it can quickly become cluttered. To clean up the page, you can remove any searches or sites. Click "Remove items," and from the page that appears, check the boxes next to any item you want removed, and then click "Remove."

Google by the Numbers

Modern life is filled with numbers—zip codes, area codes, UPC (universal product codes) Federal Express tracking numbers, and more. One of Google's least-known capabilities is its ability to ferret out information based on numbers you type into it—and in most instances, you don't even need to tell Google what kind of number it is. It will figure it out for itself.

For example, let's say you're considering buying a used car. You'd like to find out whatever you can about the car before buying. Look on the front of the windshield and find its 17-character Vehicle Information Number (VIN). (The VIN number may also be in the owner's manual.) Type the VIN number into Google as you see it, without hyphens or spaces (for example, 1g2pm37rxfp271693), and you'll find a link to a page on the Carfax service, which gives you basic information about the car, including year, make, model, body style, engine type, and the country in which it was manufactured. If you want a complete history of the car, you can pay $19.99 for a complete report, including a record of accidents, whether it was in a major accident, and so on.

There are a lot of other numbers you can type into Google to find information. Here's a short list:

• Type in a product's UPC code and you'll be sent to the UPC Database, which gives you manufacturer information about any product.
• Type in a Federal Express tracking number, and you'll be a FedEx page that supplies tracking information.
• Type in a U.S. Postal Service tracking number, and you'll be sent to a page with tracking information. You can only do it on packages that you can also track through the U.S. Postal Service site, which means only for letters or packages that you've sent via a means that allow tracking. So, for example, if you simply have a USPS number from having shipped a package, but haven't paid for a service that offers tracking, such as registered mail or certified mail, it won't work.
• Type in the flight number of an airplane, including the airline, such as Delta 1098, and you'll get a list of pages from which you can track the status of a flight.
• Type in the tail number of an airplane, and you'll see its full registration form for the plane.
• Type "Patent" and then a patent number (like this: "patent 5123123") to get information about any patent.

Map Relationships Among Web Sites

The Web got its name because it is a giant spider web of invisible connections among sites. If you could see the relationships, it would, in theory, be much easier to find information you're looking for.

The TouchGraph Google Browser maps out those invisible connections and in doing so, makes it easier to find information you want. Beyond that, it's a great way to meander through the Web, following logical connections until you end up in unforeseen places.

To use the browser, go to http://www.touchgraph.com/TGGoogleBrowser.html. then type in a URL, for example, www.pcmag.com. A new window will open, and after a bit of screen pyrotechnics, the site you searched for will be in the middle of the screen, connected to related sites—with those sites connected to related sites, and so on, as you can see in the nearby figure.

Click on a site, and a small green info box appears. Click that box, and you'll get a snippet of information about the site. If you want to visit the site, click the URL inside the snippet, and the URL will launch in a new browser window. If you want to map the connections from any site on the map, double-click it and it will become the center of the map, with all the relationships to it displayed.

Better Google Image Searching

You most likely know that Google Images (http://www.google.com) is a great place to find pictures on the Web. But if you've ever used the site, you know that it's tough to narrow your search, and you usually end up with far too many results.

To solve the problem, use Advanced Search and extra search syntax. Clicking "Advanced Image Search" brings you to the pages shown in the nearby figure, which lets you narrow down your results by filtering by file type, file size, domain, and coloration (black and white, grayscale, or full color).

There are other ways that can help you quickly find the picture you want. You can use other Google search syntax (although not all of it) in Google Images.

The most useful is "intitle:" When you use this syntax, it finds the keyword or keywords you're looking for in the page title. This may be the most useful search syntax of all. So to look for paintings by Hieronymus Bosch, you might use this syntax:

Painting intitle: Bosch

Note that you can combine this with the Advanced Image Search. Type the syntax in the "related to all of the words" search box.

If you're a fan of using the basic Google search box, and don't want to have to use the Advanced Image Search form, you can use Google syntax there for some of the advanced image-searching features. Use "filetype:" to narrow the search to a specific file type; and "site:" to narrow it to a Web page or domain. So, to search for paintings by Bosch in the .jpg format in the www.mystudios domain, you'd type this syntax:

Bosch filetype:jpg site: www.mystudios.com