Google Merges in Labs Glossary

[Brett_Tabke]

From a soon to-be-released press release:

Google introduced a new advanced search command that enables users to find the most current definitions to word(s) and phrases. Starting today, users can type the word "define," then a space, and the word or phrase they want defined into the Google.com search field. If Google has seen a definition for the word or phrase on the Web, it will retrieve that information and display it at the top of the search results page.

[skipfactor]

type the word "define," then a space, and the word or phrase they want defined

Sweet, actually define colon works better than define space:

define:widgets

[claus]

first a calculator, now a dictionary - google everywhere ;)

That will be a useful one - much shorter to type my G shortcut than that other url.

[Chris_R]

http://www.google.com/help/features.html#definitions

EVEN works for acronyms such as DESI:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=define%3A+desi

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&c2coff=1&q=define%3A+tall

For Example:

define: handsome

Type In:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&c2coff=1&q=define%3A+handsome

[ciml]

Nice find Chris, it looks like an enhancement to the Glossary beta [labs.google.com].

[Imaster]

Now for the main question, hmm, how to optimize for Google definitions? ;)

[Chris_R]

It also breaks out some acronuyms as to their meaning:

define: blog
define: scuba

[2_much]

Great find, any idea how they chose their sources for the definitions?

[Shak]

Nice Tool, had a bit of fun and specially liked:

define: seo

Shak

[Yidaki]

Is this a standard glossary feature that only singular returns acceptable results?

[google.com...]
[google.com...]

[google.com...]
[google.com...]

(: funny unbiased #1:
Currently the most important spidering search engine by far, Google is dominating the search engine market.
... [google.com...]

Know what's this?:
A popular search engine with the largest database on the web, indexing more than 140 million pages.
... [google.com...] - lol

[DaveN]

sweet but i don't live in a cave

[google.com...]

DaveN

[brotherhood of LAN]

Nice one dave, first flaw ;)

[google.com...]

>sources for the definitions

Doesnt look like a high rank for the term makes a difference, if any.

[DaveN]

ogletree better then yours

People who go in after the auditors and strip the bodies. ;)

[google.com...]

DaveN

[EliteWeb]

Funny I've been typing that into google for some time or define: or 'define word' and it never works ;) now i can define words. So will people have spam glossary pages? How do they define who's glos. page to use?

[edited by: EliteWeb at 8:58 pm (utc) on Oct. 20, 2003]

[GoogleGuy]

define:define defines define. Ow. My head hurts a little.. :)

[technoatheist]

Eh. Yahoo!'s been doing that trick for months now. I kinda like the formatting of Yahoo's better too.

heh, so Google got define from Yahoo! the calculator from All the Web, ad placements via searches from Overture. Apparently they're also getting their R&D ideas from Microsoft. ;)

[DaveN]

technoatheist nothing wrong with taking ideas from your competitors and making them better ;)

DaveN

[ogletree]

Actually my name is Dave as well and I'm not a lawyer I just work for them.

[mquarles]

I guess, despite what a certain Supreme Court justice said, there is at least one definition:

[google.com...]

[mquarles]

I assume anything is now ok:

[google.com...]

[dougb]

heh, so Google got define from Yahoo! the calculator from All the Web, ad placements via searches from Overture. Apparently they're also getting their R&D ideas from Microsoft. ;)

And Google Glossary does much the same thing as my own site, which has been around since early 1996. I can't post the URL here because of forum rules against self-linking, but needless to say I like my site more. :) Still, Google Glossary will probably become more popular since it is integrated with Google, thereby erasing my reason for being.

I have always felt it's unfair to rip content from sites that haven't given permission. For public domain resources like WordNet it's surely fine, but many dictionary/glossary providers rely on the advertising revenue they get from page views. I know this because I work directly with them.

[Eric in Tennessee]

It appears that the define: oneword works, but define: two words does not. Well not so well anyway. I have done a few and the only one that works for two words is "Search Engine" - imagine that!

[aus_dave]

It appears that the define: oneword works, but define: two words does not.

Quite a few two word definitions seem to work ok for me, maybe it's getting better as time goes on.

[jcoronella]

I think that although fun, this is google stealing content.

[HughMungus]

Only one problem with this: Doesn't handel mispellings the same way google search does (by suggesting propur spelings).

[rfgdxm1]

define: seo

"Search Engine Optimizer"
A despicable and immoral class of people who would happily kill strangers for money, and destroy websites while charging the webmaster for doing so.

[google.com...]
[salon.com...]

[shaadi]

LOL rfgdxm1;

define:webmasterworld

No definitions were found for webmasterworld.

Optimization?

[saoi_jp]

So far it seems to me that all results contain certain words in their URLs (and in some cases, not the URLs but in the titles)

glossary
gloss
glossary_* (where * is a letter or word)
define
dictionary

[vitaplease]

Good stuff!

and now for the other languages..

I wonder if it is an updated version of the glossary or an enhancement?

I have terms of my glossary in define: but not in [labs.google.com...]

[richmc]

define: artillery

comes back with:

"barbara"

some way down the first page

hmm.

seriously though, any idea if this supports the HTML standard Definition List stuff?