I spotted this post via HackerNews named Google search parameters in 2012.
It is one of the most comprehensive posts explaining what all the various URL parameters in Google's search URL strings mean.
This post goes through about 75 different URL parameters that either change the search query, refinement, set of results or mean something in terms of tracking or other metrics.
It is broken down by:
- Normal Search Query
- Advanced Search Operators
- Country and Language
- Advanced Search Tools
- Other Parameters
- Unknown Parameters
Matt Cutts of Google replied to the HackerNews thread saying:
You can also make a custom setting in Chrome to send only the parameters to Google that you want. In the Settings panel, click on Manage Search Engines. Make a "new" search engine but make the query go to Google (or YouTube, or whatever) with only the parameters you want. You can start with the url for Google and prune down the input encoding or the sourceid or whatever you want, or just make the path be "/search?q=%s" if you want to go really minimal.
The response was pretty classic where one HackerNews user said:
that's a great solution. it would be also quite great if you would tell us what these (to us) unknown parameters mean :)
Check out the post at RankPanel.com.
Forum discussion at HackerNews.
Image credit to Big Stock Photo for www
