I searched for Magic The Gathering cards earlier on my phone (FireFox mobile), and got YouTube shorts in the results. This was in addition to a large amount of useless info panels and junk in the search results. I just wanted the official links or even an Amazon URL to the upcoming precons, not slowly regurgitated info!
I feel like I’ve been going crazy, web searching as a developer has become a daily nightmare and all the devs I ask are like “yeah, maybe it’s gotten a bit worse? Haven’t really noticed”
I just go the official docs even if their old and then switch to the latest version once I’m on the website. Most of the software I use has easy index to switch between versions.
You didn't include a version in your query. You also could try using quotes, though this specific entry may not be helped by it (e.g. "in operator"). For most things, you can click a link with the older version and somewhere there is typically a dropdown or something to change the version and, if not, you'll at least know which section/etc. it is in in the new documentation.
If you don't include a version, it's probably going to pull up questions/answers that it finds most match in general and maybe people just aren't asking that question for your version.
I think there's a lot to hate about modern search results, but I also think there's some opportunity to search better. I do miss the days when AND, OR, and NOT operators actually worked all the time and as expected.
While I don’t miss checking the index of my wall of Microsoft books (the light gray binders with the squishy plastic). At least those were (mostly^1^) correct and ad free.
Then the future began and you got MSDN subscription on CD with sample code. Woohoo.
they included a somewhat 20 pages of erratas that you sooner or later managed to memorize or punch and put in the correct place.
Doesn’t matter, billions of other people do, and they prioritize ads, and results with AdSense on the pages above relevancy. They’ll even show you shit results to keep you searching longer, which allows them to show you more ads.
Do they though? I don’t know a single person that has ever clicked on an ad. I know, sample size of one, but it just seems so basic to know not to click on them. Maybe those people really do exist. Sigh
Do you think Google has become one of the most powerful & profitable companies on the planet through a revenue model that doesn’t work? Of course people click them. If people didn’t click them then Google would have gone bankrupt decades ago. One thing I learned years ago is that I use the Internet very differently than an average person, and I constantly overestimate the intelligence and knowledge of the average person. Corporations bank on stupidity, because it’s abundant.
I have no idea how they make money, it never made sense to me. It still blows my mind to think there are that many people that click on ads, I just have a really hard time believing it still.
Some of the ads are charged by CPM (cost per 1000 impressions), meaning Google get paid just because people see the ads. That’s similar to how ads in traditional media are billed - TV, billboards, newspapers, etc.
Not all ads use CPM though. Some use CPC (cost per click) and some use CPA (cost per action).
I don’t mean to sour the funny, because it is funny/sad indeed, but
If you know you want the info from the official docs, why not do a search that forces results from that site, or search just for the official docs and then find the page you’re after on the docs themselves?
To be fair, back in the day you could get better results by relying on Google with site:foobar and the Boolean/"power user" stuff. A lot of built-in search boxes on sites were a bit dodgy, or at least less flexible than AND/OR/NOT and other "power user tricks".
Of course, these days those seem to be ignored wholesale and even "verbatim quotes" are an utter crapshoot, this was back when Google didn't fucking blow.
Nowadays I’m pretty sure stuff like site: foobar still works no? Idk I use ddg so I can’t say with certainty but I feel like “basic” power user stuff should still work right?
"site" does work still, I think, just plus a lot of irrelevant drivel - standard Google fare, you see it on Youtube too.
I'd consider the most basic case to be, specifically, the "quotes for verbatim results", which definitely do not work anymore. Neither does + for a positively (hue hue) required term, a close second.
Eh I mean alphabet and Google do have legitimate reasons for antitrust lawsuits, but that’s independent of how shit Google search has become.
Anyway, for those who are fed up with the terrible results, use Ecosia. I’ve basically never needed to use anything else and the advertising money goes towards planting trees responsibly to rebuild ecosystems.
Anti-trust is not about seeking perfection, it’s a defense against abuses of power. That’s a good thing unless you like to be abused by the powerful, in which case lick some more boots.
Haha, nope. The links points to a table of contents after which you are on your own. The right link should point to a specific page instead, but the problem here is that postres docs are poorly optimized for search engines. If you click on the top link from google, you would see there’s a notice that the page is outdated, with a link to a current version, but said link is dead. It’s not an issue I’ve ever experienced with mysql docs for example.
And yes, w3schools, despite how terrible it is, is still above the official docs because it is more popular with newbies. I remember a time when I just started, I preferred sites like it, because they were simple and on point, rather than technically correct and comprehensive like the official docs are. If you forgot the feeling, try learning math on wikipedia (assuming you don’t have a math degree).
For the rest I cannot argue. Generated/AI shit is indeed ruining the internet and search engines giving up and joining them isn’t helpful either.
After which ctrl+f " in" takes you to the correct chapters. I do agree that a direct link would be more helpful.
And for learning postgresql I agree it isn’t very helpful - using their tutorial links, w3schools or something like udemy if you prefer video format is the way to go in that use case.
I remember back when you were told to learn to work with the documentation, not memorize it, because you will always have access to it as a reference. Maybe bookmarking reference books/documentation will make a come back as the search engines degrade.
" in" appears 25 times on the page to be exact, with 16 of those being in the table of contents and 9 being in the text afterwards.
“in” appears 54 times, as you know end up hitting “string” and so on.
Had I known that the functions table of contents was as short as it is I would probably have just scrolled.
Kagi only lists postgresql.org for the first 10 entries, but outdated ones in first place. With the programming scope it collapses all official do s entries to one, with GH and SO filling the rest.
For the quick answer, it also uses the ‘outdated’ docs as source, but as it only gives a very shallow overview there shouldn’t be any difference in version (i.e. it checks for a value in a list in all versions the same, and quick answer leaves out details specific to different versions)
Get with the times. When Google isn’t a useful tool anymore, use a different one.
Curate and maintain your own list of links to official documentation.
I think we’re almost at a point where having a library of books next to your workstation would be beneficial again.
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