GoogleTips

Legacy Wiki Page

This page was migrated from the old MoinMoin-based wiki. Information may be outdated or no longer applicable. For current documentation, see python.org.

Google Tips for Python

People frequently have trouble finding stuff on the Python websites. Sometimes they are just too lazy to search. Other times they don’t shine a light in the proper corner. Google pokes in every corner, but you sometimes need a little help coaxing information out of it. This page gives a few idioms useful for searching Google effectively for content on the Python websites.

Searching a Single Site

Google enables you to restrict your search to a single site.

site:www.python.org spam

will search www.python.org for ‘spam’.

The next few sub-sections illustrate handy examples.

Searching Mailing Lists

site:mail.python.org listname terms

  • Search for discussions of packages in python-dev: site:mail.python.org python-dev packages

  • Search for BDFL pronouncements in python-list: site:mail.python.org python-list guido pronouncement

Searching the Library Reference Manual

site:www.python.org library reference terms

  • Search for information about regular expressions: site:www.python.org library reference regular expressions

  • Search for examples of using the logging module: site:www.python.org library reference logging example

Searching the Language Reference Manual

site:www.python.org reference manual terms

  • Search for reference description of list comprehensions: site:www.python.org reference manual list comprehension

Searching the PEPs

site:www.python.org PEP terms

* Search for PEP 289: site:www.python.org PEP 289

* Search for PEPs about rational numbers: site:www.python.org PEP Rational

Searching for a Phrase

If you simply type your seach terms into the google search box, google will return pages that use all of your search terms, no matter where they occur. If, instead, you surround your search terms with double quote marks, you will get back an exact-phrase search.

Thus, searching for

python wiki engine

will return any pages that mention all three terms, many of which won’t be about python wiki engines, per se. By contrast, a search for

“python wiki engine”

will only return pages which uses this exact phrase.