I haven't followed the Google+ saga, so forgive me if this has already been answered:
Does the shutdown of Google+ mean that Google Search users will get the + operator back?
Does the shutdown of Google+ mean that Google Search users will get the + operator back?
More than one author has described this better than I can, in articles, blog posts, and comments. (If you can "find" them -- heh; but of an unexpected joke come up as I type this.)
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"6 common misconceptions when doing advanced Google Searching"
http://musingsaboutlibrarianship.blogspot.com/2015/10/6-comm...
(Blogger "Javascript era/template workaround):
I wasn't aware of some of the tips described there, but still not parity.
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The + operator has been replaced. (google.com)
261 points by hammock on Oct 21, 2011 | hide | past | web | favorite | 167 comments
+ was an exact match. I believe it also precluded stemming; thus the ~ operator, when you wanted stemming (stemming: Not just "wonder", but also "wondering", "wondered", "wonderful", ...).
+ designated "must be in result". With double quotes -- this may be part of or in kind with other changes made to by Google to search results matching -- Google insists and becomes more aggressive at including results that don't include all the specified terms. Sort of a forced default "Did you mean..." inclusion that many find has come to clutter search results to the point of being unusable.
There are some other aspects, I believe, that I'm not recalling right now.
My experience seems to mirror others': I know what I'm looking for. I may well even have seen it, months or even years ago -- my memory's pretty decent, in such matters. Yet I can no longer get Google to cough it up in a search result -- or, it's on page 15 or 20. Despite my focusing my search terms to try to target it.
There are other factors in this degradation. But, to the best of my recollection, the loss of the + operator was a significant factor.
And the link in a sibling comment states that + is/was simply double quotes. No magic at all.
"foo bar" is actually treated like "foo" "bar", which is far less useful than it once was.
No it isn't. Compare "internal engine" with "internal" "engine":
However, it doesn't work the way it used to either.
I get frustrated once or twice a year about this, and every time I fight with the many (old) tutorial examples, but eventually end here: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/websearch/6gH...
Where we see that "foo bar" only says that "foo" will appear in the text before "bar" (but anything can be between them), and that's assuming the bug is actually fixed.
That status of "we think it's fixed and users don't agree" is the last I've ever seen.
Also, the intext: operator works for me (make sure there is no space after ':').
There was a time when one could ask meaningful questions and see links to useful websites like hyperphysics, engineering toolbox, and others. Now, even if you're lucky enough that Google recognizes the technical nature of your question, you still end up with a page full of ads, commercial websites, blogs, and unrelated garbage on the first page[1]. Remember when if it wasn't on the first page it probably didn't exist?
I only lament that I have no way to compare modern and legacy Google search functionality to prove the decline I've noticed for years. Even the way we search has changed, as Google seems to have normalized asking full questions instead of just searching for keywords.
The internet seems to be regressing. This is just one of many fronts. Of course Google is only partly to blame. Users and their obliviousness to harmful commercialization are also a part of the problem.
1. Unless you're asking a coding related question, in which case Google is still great for directing you to the correct stack overflow question.
>I know from considerable experience that the plus operator had a distinct meaning from the quotes operator so this change definitely implies that Google queries will be less fine-grained no matter what quotes means now.
I remember those discussions, but I'm not aware of even one great example of how + was so amazing compared to "...". (others pointed out it allowed spellchecking, which is okay, but far from the secret dark arts)
Granted, the amount of UI they are carrying along with them is much larger, but the attitude of Google with regards to existing users has gone from really cool to downright disdainful. If you aren't a 20-something or barely 30-something techie, they think you should just go along and acknowledge their intellectual superiority. What you want either agrees with what they want, or is misguided.