July 9, 2010

New Format for Google's Definition Results

Three months ago, I found some Google search shortcuts that trigger results from Google Dictionary and Google Translate. The keywords for Google Translate no longer work, but you can still add "en:en" before an English word to see the definition from Google Dictionary.

Google's results now include links to Wikipedia, Dictionary.com, Merriam-Webster and Answers.com. Two of these sites (Dictionary.com and Answers.com) have been previously used to show definitions for each word of a query. They have been replaced by Google Dictionary and the feature has been removed when Google launched a new interface, two months ago.

Here's an example of query that triggers the special definition results: [en:en overcast].


Google has another special result that's displayed if you search for [define word] or [word definition]. This time, Google shows definitions from WordNet.


There's also a define: operator that shows definitions from WordNet, Wikipedia, glossaries and other web pages.
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3 comments:

  1. UnknownJuly 9, 2010 at 10:02 AM

    so, it's back to the past?

    ReplyDelete
  2. GaryJuly 9, 2010 at 4:24 PM

    I believe at many engines all three versions have worked for some time.

    At Wolfram Alpha 2 of the 3 work (no define:)

    At Bing all 3 Work

    At Ask.com all 3 Work

    At Duck Duck Go all 3 Work

    At Yahoo 2 of the 3 work (no define:)
    but links to the reference sites

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sam DavisJuly 14, 2010 at 11:02 AM

    LOL, but none of them link to their actual google.com/dictionary definition?

    Why did they ever get rid of that? The wiktionary links rarely ever have the actual definition and google dictionary was perfect.

    How about you just bring that button back Google?

    ReplyDelete

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