Google Hacks: Tips & Tools for Finding and Using the World's Information
Rael Dornfest, Tara Calishain, Paul Bausch, Chris DiBonaBooks.org participates in affiliate programs including Bookshop.org and the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. We may earn a commission from qualifying purchases made through links on this page, at no additional cost to you.
Overview
Everyone knows that Google lets you search billions of web pages. But few people realize that Google also gives you hundreds of cool ways to organize and play with information.
Since we released the last edition of this bestselling book, Google has added many new features and services to its expanding universe: Google Earth, Google Talk, Google Maps, Google Blog Search, Video Search, Music Search, Google Base, Google Reader, and Google Desktop among them. We've found ways to get these new services to do even more.
The expanded third edition of Google Hacks is a brand-new and infinitely more useful book for this powerful search engine. You'll not only find dozens of hacks for the new Google services, but plenty of updated tips, tricks and scripts for hacking the old ones. Now you can make a Google Earth movie, visualize your web site traffic with Google Analytics, post pictures to your blog with Picasa, or access Gmail in your favorite email client. Industrial strength and real-world tested, this new collection enables you to mine a ton of information within Google's reach. And have a lot of fun while doing it:
- Search Google over IM with a Google Talk bot
- Build a customized Google Map and add it to your own web site
- Cover your searching tracks and take back your browsing privacy
- Turn any Google query into an RSS feed that you can monitor in Google Reader or the newsreader of your choice
- Keep tabs on blogs in new, useful ways
- Turn Gmail into an external hard drive for Windows, Mac, or Linux
- Beef up your web pages with search, ads, news feeds, and more
- Program Google with the Google API and language of your choice
For those of you concerned about Google as an emerging Big Brother, this new edition also offers advice and concrete tips for protecting your privacy. Get into the world of Google and bend it to your will!
Since the last version of this bestselling book, Google has added a dozen new features and services to its expanding universe. By responding with 25 new hacks and dozens of updated ones, the authors have made this expanded edition into a brand-new and infinitely more useful Hacks book for this powerful search engine.
Synopsis
Since the last version of this bestselling book, Google has added a dozen new features and services to its expanding universe. By responding with 25 new hacks and dozens of updated ones, the authors have made this expanded edition into a brand-new and infinitely more useful Hacks book for this powerful search engine.
Editorials
From Barnes & Noble
The Barnes & Noble ReviewGoogle's corporate mission is to "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful." They've gone a long way toward that goal. But to take full advantage of their achievements, you need the technical knowledge in this book.
Chapter 1's "hacks" take you as far as you can go without coding. You'll master Google's special search syntax; then discover Google's many "specialty searches" (phone number lookups, stock prices, and so forth). Along the way, the authors unearth some cool web tools: for instance, one that visualizes the relationships amongst your results.
Now you're ready for real power: programmatic control over Google. Most of the authors' programs are written in Perl, but you'll find some Python, PHP, Java, and .NET code, too. Most use Google's powerful API, but there's some classic spidering and screen scraping, too. (FYI, if you find spidering useful, check out O'Reilly's Spidering Hacks, too.)
So, what can you do with Google Hacks' techniques? You can calculate the "mindshare" of your company in your industry. Make sure none of your site links have recently gone X-rated. Create searches limited to U.S. government documents. Use geotargeting to spot emerging trends. Build newsfeeds that automate recurring searches. Convert Google Video into AVIs you can actually use. Uncover every blog comment linked to any page. Find lyrics to whatever you're playing in iTunes. And create all manner of Google Maps mashups that weren't even possible when this book's last edition was written.
Google Hacks wraps up with tips for webmasters: everything from improving your positioning in Google searches to visualizing your site's traffic with Google Analytics. Bottom line: This book puts you in control the world's information -- and, in the information age, what could be more important? Bill Camarda, from the November 2006 Read Only