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Alexandria Search

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Re: Alexandria Search

#131

Post by seltzered_ »

8n4vidtmkvmk wrote: post #128
version_five wrote: post #30

There have been a few search engines out recently. I'm curious how people evaluate them quickly. I've realized my searching is basically optimized for google and the web that has grown up around it. Also, in 1998 I wasn't as aware of what was out there as I am now. It's pretty rare (even if its possible) that I do a search and come across a completely new site that I haven't heard of before, for anything nontrivial.…

maybe the solution is to make google itself reddit style. let users downvote the seo spam websites and allow them to be downranked. sure it opens the door for a different kind of abuse... but maybe that problem is more fixable?

I feel like this was tried a decade ago: https://developers.google.com/search/blog/2011/03/introducin... ("Introducing the +1 button", Google, 2011)

Re: Alexandria Search

#132

Post by Seirdy »

version_five wrote: post #56
ffhhj wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There have been a few search engines out recently I'd like to try them out, could you mention which?

you.com and kagi.com off the top of my head

I've been keeping my eye on You.com, tracking a few SERPs over time compared to other Bing- and Google-based engines. So far, the results don't seem independent.

Try comparing results with a Bing-based engine (e.g. DuckDuckGo) or a Google-based one (e.g. StartPage, GMX) to see if they differ. (Don't use Google or Bing directly, since results will be personalized based on factors like location, device, your fingerprint, etc.).

Re: Alexandria Search

#133

Post by Seirdy »

pygar wrote: post #129
outcoldman wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've realized my searching is basically optimized for google Is it just me, or I feel like Google does not provide anymore good results for me. Like every time I search something completely out of my knowledge, like "How to purchase a property in Mexico", it will give me 100+ results of some results with autogenerated content like "10 best places to buy property in Mexico". And the only way to fix that would be to…

> Is it just me, or I feel like Google does not provide anymore good results for me. I am starting to suspect that there might be nothing to find. I just don't think people (other then the tech oriented) are creating websites and running forums - and why would they? Reddit might be be only place you _can_ find that type of content. What should search engines do then? With a tiny number of exceptions, it might be that…

Kagi's "noncommercial" lens, search.marginalia.nu, and engines that don't parse JS (e.g. Mojeek) can add some variety. Another thing I like doing is adding phrases like "creative commons" to already-long queries to filter out some corporate results, or adding `-gdpr -ccpa -"sell my info"` to limit results to sites made by small orgs and individuals who don't collect enough data or make enough money to warrant compliance measures.

Re: Alexandria Search

#134

Post by Seirdy »

I discovered Alexandria a month ago and was shocked by the quality of its results; while it's no Google/Bing replacement, it was leagues ahead of most other independent engines I'd collected and monitored for over a year[0].

[0]: https://seirdy.one/2021/03/10/search-engines-with-own-indexe...

It's earned a spot in my search bookmarks alongside Right Dao and Marginalia for when I want a bit of serendipity in my results.

I also appreciate the minimal UI, without any JavScript or other unnecessary bells and whistles.

Re: Alexandria Search

#135

Post by bricemo »

orlp wrote: post #58
amelius wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At some point, AI and NLP and raw processing power will have progressed so much that "search" is not a problem anymore, and I think we're getting there. Google can up their game but it won't matter much. The only thing they have left is brand recognition.

IMO search has had its goalpost moved. It used to be about scale, technical challenges, bandwidth, storage, etc. It is still about that, but a significantly harder challenge to solve has come up: searching in a malicious environment. SEO crap nowadays completely dominates search, Google has lost the war. Simply put, I believe that Google sucks at search, in the modern context. It is great at indexing, it has solved p…

You can just append “Reddit” or “stackoverflow”, you don’t need to write “site:Reddit.com”

Re: Alexandria Search

#136

Post by Seirdy »

josefcullhed wrote: post #106
waynecochran wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what is different in terms of its indexing algorithm? The original secret sauce for google was the pagerank algorithm which was mathematically genius. Are you using a similar algorithm.

Founder here. We are using harmonic centrality instead of pagerank. But of course much more work needs to be done to make the search engine usable.

I'm curious as to which reasons/tradeoffs were involved in the decision to use harmonic centrality, if you wouldn't mind sharing.

Re: Alexandria Search

#138

Post by danuker »

coverband wrote: post #67
danuker wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because they are optimizing for the current state of the web. I believe people will at least start looking for alternatives. For example, I have been collecting search engines, and whenever I encounter a page with too many commercial-laden SEO-porked results, I use a different search engine in Firefox. I have enabled the Search Bar, I can do Alt+D, Tab, Tab, enter my query, then click a different search engine, whi…

Could you paste again as text links? Thanks.

Firefox uses a custom format for compressing the SEARCH ENGINES. I am appalled.

I had to do a `pip install lz4` then apply and run this change: https://gist.github.com/Tblue/62ff47bef7f894e92ed5?permalink...

And it did not work. I hit a brick wall. I completely lost trust in Firefox. I want a browser created by a non-profit. Thank you Google for corrupting everything you touch.

I then found this blessed soul: https://www.jeffersonscher.com/ffu/searchjson.html

And here are the ones not built-in:

https://metager.org/meta/meta.ger3?eingabe={searchTerms}

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php?title=Special:Search&se...

https://www.mojeek.com/search?q={searchTerms}

https://www.openstreetmap.org/search

https://pypi.org/search/?q={searchTerms}

https://www.qwant.com/?q={searchTerms}&client=opensearch

https://searx.xyz/

https://swisscows.com/opensearch.xml

https://yandex.com/search/?text={searchTerms}&from=os&clid=1...

https://whoogle.sdf.org/search

https://lazyweb.ai/nav/

https://en.wiktionary.org/w/api.php?action=opensearch&format...

https://github.com/search?q={searchTerms}&ref=opensearch

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term={searchTerms}

http://alternativeto.net/browse/search/?q={searchTerms}

https://search.marginalia.nu/search?query={searchTerms}&ref=...

https://kagi.com/search?q={searchTerms}

https://you.com/search?q={searchTerms}

https://millionshort.com/search?keywords={searchTerms}&remov...

https://search.f-droid.org/?q={searchTerms}&opensearch=1

https://www.gnod.com/search/

http://teclis.com:1333/?topics={searchTerms}

https://wiby.me/?q={searchTerms}

https://www.alexandria.org/?q={searchTerms}

Re: Alexandria Search

#140

Post by danuker »

blewboarwastake wrote: post #117
danuker wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because they are optimizing for the current state of the web. I believe people will at least start looking for alternatives. For example, I have been collecting search engines, and whenever I encounter a page with too many commercial-laden SEO-porked results, I use a different search engine in Firefox. I have enabled the Search Bar, I can do Alt+D, Tab, Tab, enter my query, then click a different search engine, whi…

Pro tip: Alt+E takes you directly to the search bar, then you can press Tab for selecting the search engine. The best part is that you never use the mouse this way. You can also use ddg bangs, they contain every search-engine/site by pressing Alt-D if you remember the bang for the site.

Alt+E takes me to the Edit menu.
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