Forum Moderators: open
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.
It would be nice to know, what kind of sites are being a part of their result pages.They could possibly conver up more results in the GDRPs.
Nice addition to the google, provided they add other sites also in their index for glossary!
Cheers
Bill Gates
A very evil man who wants to run the world. Gates has successfully built a network of websites and computer software that will not operate properly if you have not installed all of his other products.
Microsoft
Swear-word used whenever anything goes wrong. His HTML page looked like gnoef with Internet Exploror so he exclaimed: "Microsoft!". While stepping into a pile of dog****, he shouted: "Microsoft!" Something works like Microsoft - Something does not work at all.
Sweet, actually define colon works better than define space:
Have you tried: define:colon ;)
"the large intestine" and "A colon is a punctuation mark that separates the main portion of a sentence from what follows, usually some form of list."
didn't really surprise me. But how about:
"One of the rabble leaders in Hudibras was Noel Perryan, or Ned Perry, an ostler, who loved bear-baiting, but was a very straight-laced Puritan of low morals."
"Used in the ternary conditional expression and after labels"
There also is a "basic unit of money" and the "port city at the Caribbean entrance to the Panama Canal"
Interesting what you can learn here - if I ever should feel bored, I have a new pastime ("A device for promoting dejection. Gentle exercise for intellectual debility" -
OR: "The Big Book of Glue").
The latter definition comes from a webpage that also translates
"tube" with "Place for coffee and polka music" and
"grog":
"What they celebrate St. Patrick's day with in San Francisco".
Is this just a mistake when selecting the dictionaries - or does Google actually employ editors with a sense of humour ("a message whose ingenuity or verbal skill or incongruity has the power to evoke laughter")?
Laurenz
No definitions were found for pagerank.
sorry the wrong thread
As if it operates properly if you have installed it all? Dream on, dude.
I was just toying with this and thinking that it can't be good for webmasters. I mean, if I'm looking for a definition now, I'll use this instead of possibly going to a website that has definitions. Also, how does google overcome copyright issues since it appears to be showing definitions written by third parties?
They don't overcome copyright issues. They simply ignore them, or call it fair use, or say that it doesn't matter because it's useful. At least, that's been Google's M.O. for a half dozen bad decisions this year, and this one seems to fit.
This is completely different from the Web snippets or news blurbs that they generate for other purposes. In this case, the definitions are the *totality* of what searchers would otherwise come to a glossary site for, and Google is appropriating them into their service, and profiting from them, without permission.
The links don't suffice. Nor would some after-the-fact way to opt out. Unless they ask permission first from the glossary authors -- which I gather they didn't -- then it's theft, plain and simple.
They don't overcome copyright issues. They simply ignore them, or call it fair use, or say that it doesn't matter because it's useful. At least, that's been Google's M.O. for a half dozen bad decisions this year, and this one seems to fit.This is completely different from the Web snippets or news blurbs that they generate for other purposes. In this case, the definitions are the *totality* of what searchers would otherwise come to a glossary site for, and Google is appropriating them into their service, and profiting from them, without permission.
The links don't suffice. Nor would some after-the-fact way to opt out. Unless they ask permission first from the glossary authors -- which I gather they didn't -- then it's theft, plain and simple.
There's no way to pull snippets of content from a website automatically and ensure fair use. Fair use means not taking the majority of the text and reproducing it, and as far as I can tell Google isn't taking into account what percentage of the page is copied. You should also take care that what you quote does not devalue the original document. That is exactly what this define: function is doing.
If the definitions are taken from the DT tag, it would be easy to get round this copyright theft. But this page is returned with define:anything
[cogsci.princeton.edu...]
I can't figure out which element on the page would suggest to a robot that it's a dictionary definition.
Yahoo!'s been doing that trick for months now.
And interestingly makes a better fist of at least one example:
[search.yahoo.com ]
[google.com ]
Though Yahoo offers no definition for google.
Type in anything with an aphostrophe (define:O'Murphy) to find out about javascript errors.
[google.com...]
(note that I didn't use "define:")
It's not perfect, however:
[google.com...]
I wonder if they'll list all homonyms.
e.g.
[google.com...]
Results not influenced by Google language settings.
i wonder if the use of definition lists ("dl", "dt" and "dd" elements) will have any impact on definition-rankings.
regards
martin
<dl>
<dt>Word</dt>
<dd>Definition by domain.com: definition of word</dd>
</dl>
What a pain.
For fairness sake they should've promoted the source of the definition more prominently perhaps with page title.
SN
