First, I sincerely appreciate Google’s efforts to acknowledge there are issues and fix them; it’s amazing, thank you!
______
TLDR: It’s impossible to report issues when Google makes it impossible to replicate the issues. In the below text, found four errors: (1) feature mentioned in Google’s blog post is not working; (2) quoted search is not working; (3) + search operator does not work as it used to work; (4) it is impossible to replicate results. — Aware of likely hundreds of bugs like this, wish Google would listen.
______
This comment was a response to another comment, but given all the bugs I found, decided to make it a top level comment.
______
It does not, at least in one way, which was as a substitute for quotes when injected into a string where +’s replaced spaces; just confirmed this does not work, indifferent about it returning; see links below for proof.
My core concern is Google list ALL search operators OR operations AND publicly make SERP experiments per each that are reproducible without millions in resources AND whitelist for automated execution of these tests; if in unlikely chance Google’s looking for strong opinions how to radically improve search quality, I am willing to do it for free or paid.
Here’s the example searches that show + does not work in at least one way it once did as mentioned above:
- Note: if you look at the screen shot above, you will see a SERP that breaks the feature Google announced that in the blog post; specifically that the query is not highlighted in the SERP description. More importantly, I searched for "test test test test test z" but got results for "text text text text text z" — which means quoted search itself is broken.
And proof I then got a bug (zero results) using the exact same search:
* Conclusion: To me, if you cannot share a search result and get the EXACT same search results (and possibly ability to see different ones AND annotations of why they are different) — how this not a bug; how can anyone independently test Google’s search quality?
If you want the old stricter Google behavior be sure to check the "Verbatim" option under 'tools', or add "&tbs=li:1" to your uri.
Around 2008 Google started testing a new search engine logic, codenamed caffeine?, which eventually became the default. Without being sure, I think verbatim uses the old engine which wasn't trying to be smarter than you and your query, certainly is stricter and reminds the old Google a lot.
True. Aware of verbatim, though oddly forget and assume “quoted” text is verbatim. Personally I would perfect Google provide option to have verbatim on by default and enable non-verbatim per keyword; obviously average user would not like that.
EDIT: Tested if verbatim flag fixed the issue above, it did not; Google still randomly returns or does not return results, returns description with the query shown in description (or does not), etc
Oddly, if you get no results, and add [stack exchange] to query, which in theory should be from same index since it a more narrow subset of the prior, does return results, which is odd:
______
TLDR: It’s impossible to report issues when Google makes it impossible to replicate the issues. In the below text, found four errors: (1) feature mentioned in Google’s blog post is not working; (2) quoted search is not working; (3) + search operator does not work as it used to work; (4) it is impossible to replicate results. — Aware of likely hundreds of bugs like this, wish Google would listen.
______
This comment was a response to another comment, but given all the bugs I found, decided to make it a top level comment.
______
It does not, at least in one way, which was as a substitute for quotes when injected into a string where +’s replaced spaces; just confirmed this does not work, indifferent about it returning; see links below for proof.
My core concern is Google list ALL search operators OR operations AND publicly make SERP experiments per each that are reproducible without millions in resources AND whitelist for automated execution of these tests; if in unlikely chance Google’s looking for strong opinions how to radically improve search quality, I am willing to do it for free or paid.
Here’s the example searches that show + does not work in at least one way it once did as mentioned above:
- millions of results
https://www.google.com/search?q=test%2Btest%2Btest%2Btest%2B...
- 3 results
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22test+test+test+test+test+...
* This is not the same as the +keyword syntax mentioned in thread; I will try to find an example.
EDIT: weird...
If I click this link:
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22test+test+test+test+test+...
I get zero result results, but if I click:
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22test+test+test+test+test+...
Then edit the a to z without making any other changes, like this:
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22test+test+test+test+test+...
I get 3 search results... which clearly is a bug.
EDIT: Grr... I was able to reproduce it, but then Google broke it. Using method above, here’s proof it returned 3 results:
https://ibb.co/kG8sYZS
- Note: if you look at the screen shot above, you will see a SERP that breaks the feature Google announced that in the blog post; specifically that the query is not highlighted in the SERP description. More importantly, I searched for "test test test test test z" but got results for "text text text text text z" — which means quoted search itself is broken.
And proof I then got a bug (zero results) using the exact same search:
https://ibb.co/6JjLX6y
____
* Conclusion: To me, if you cannot share a search result and get the EXACT same search results (and possibly ability to see different ones AND annotations of why they are different) — how this not a bug; how can anyone independently test Google’s search quality?