Show HN: A Firefox add-on to strip Google search results of 'blacklisted' URLs
github.com
github.com
Anyway, you can still use prevailing `site:` operator with "minus" negation (e.g.[1]) , so you can have bookmarked search with your custom blocklist in query [2]
[1] no SO and no w3schools example, non-personalized ("verabatim"): https://www.google.com/search?q=how+to+merge+arrays+javascri... [2] place `%s` into query and set bookmark keyword (Firefox) or chrome://settings/searchEngines - Add: https://www.google.com/search?q=%s+-site:stackoverflow.com+-...
Google search doesn't work like this anymore. Search results for everyone are custom based on what they know about your. For example check out filter bubbles[1]. A blacklist would probably help their models. As for why it got removed we can only guess. I'm guessing it has to do with either bad UX (if you forgot you added domains they will never show up) or them wanting to be in full control of your search experience.
[1]: https://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_b...
People with 1000 fake accounts were charging to blacklist a specific domain. Because so few actual search users made use of the feature, it didn’t take many accounts to impact search rank. So that feature had a short lifespan.
In spite of the name, it works on all search engine sites I've tried it on; Google, Startpage, DuckDuckGo, Qwant. It adds a "Block" button beside each search result which allows you to block sites from appearing in that particular search result. Or to 'perma-ban' them from ever showing in future search results.
No affiliation. Just a satisfied customer.
[1] https://www.tampermonkey.net
[2] https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/1682-google-hit-hider-by-d...
Unfortunately it can't do anything about search results returning precisely the opposite of what you searched for; eg.
SEARCH: "How to completely uninstall XXX from YYY"
RESULT: "How to install XXX on ZZZ"
SEARCH: "How to completely +uninstall -install +XXX +from -on +YYY -ZZZ
RESULT: "Install YYY on ZZZ with this howto"
[Insert sound of computer being thrown across room]
And, while I'm on the subject, my tuppence worth for the list. Fucking You-fucking-Tube being returned as the first dozen search results for some crappy one liner which you've forgotten and need to look up quickly...
SEARCH: "cheatsheet keyboard shortcut for function Z in app Y"
WHAT I WANT THE SEARCH TO RETURN: "App Y Keyboard shortcut cheatsheet"
WHAT THE SEARCH ACTUALLY RETURNS: [almost an entire page of] "Take zen ninja mastery of Application Y in minutes by learning this arse-sum keyboard shortcut!" --a 45 minute unedited epic, filmed by a monosyllabic arsehole on a shaking, continually auto-focussing phone camera, orientated vertically. Featuring 20 minutes of "er... um... well..." mumbling at the beginning, telling the viewer how "arse-sum" this keyboard shortcut is going to be --if the fucker ever gets around to actually showing you it!
Followed by the actual clicking of the shortcut which the narrator manages to do while the camera is pointed at the wrong part of the screen and out of focus.
Maybe worthwhile to document these on a GH markdown file or contribute cheat sheets to DuckDuckGo.
Try this: https://www.runnaroo.com/search?term=cheatsheet+keyboard+sho...
I built it with heavy influence [0] from this and similar comments on HN. Quotes are respected, and it will directly include Stack Overflow results (also saw that mentioned in this thread).
[0] https://www.runnaroo.com/blog/the-search-engine-hacker-news-...
Obviously a just small typo but I suppose I'm surprised this text was typed by a human in the first place. FWIW it's spelled correctly just above.
Every "Deep Search" is manually tuned and added as a search within the search, and each one is slightly different depending on the type of information that data source returns.
In a just world this would redirect you to the Seasoned Advice Stackexchange [1]
Generally Google gets the questions where I feel like I'm an idiot for asking, or when I feel like the question is best answered as if one were an idiot. Don't worry about spelling or formulation. Google gets to flex its AI "I know what you want" muscles, and you get an answer without having to think about the question very much.
I don't get any videos: https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=cheat%20sheet%20functi...
If you are interested, here's an article: https://www.ghacks.net/2019/09/10/firemonkey-uses-firefoxs-o...
The article you linked to is quite vague as to what the security implications might be. It says that FireMonkey extensions run in a sandbox. But you're still being asked the usual "This extension wants to see and modify your data on all websites.." [or whatever the exact wording is]. So, you're still letting the installed scripts have access to your browsing.
One good thing about <whatever>Monkey and userscripts is that they make it trivially easy to inspect the scripts and see what exactly is being done. Whereas a browser extension is more of a 'black box'. So, there is more potential to spot potentially nefarious code in a userscript.js.
Since Google can monetize YouTube results, I'm afraid this is only going to get worse.
If in fact this is more of a general trend and not my little bubble, then I wonder if this is caused by Stack Overflow mods closing any question that may have an opinion in the answer and since these answers have not shown activity for years, perhaps other links and sites are slowly starting to eat SO's lunch.
Pure speculation on my side.
from memory, the period when this feature actually worked, wasn't very long?
but I agree about the advanced search operators, and just generally paying better attention to my keywords.
The plugin maintains a persistent and customizable list of URLs (keywords) that are used as a 'blacklist' for stripping results.
Otherwise some search results might still be plagued with offenders, though admittingly their presence is much more sufferable.
Are you using this?
[1] https://github.com/honestbleeps/Reddit-Enhancement-Suite
I miss the niche subs with quality discussion and content, but the rest of Reddit just started overflowing there too and ruined it.
I do not regret deleting my account. Although whenever a web search returns a Reddit link, I don't have RES and old.* redirect to make the site usable any more. Don't know how anyone uses new Reddit.
You can have URL patterns for example: en.cppreference.com/<asterisk>
Edit: I wasn't able to get the star to work in the post
I look to the bottom of the page every time to avoid this terror...
Mine and my partners parents learned c (badly) at some point. Nearly everyone on the b2b customer support team at my last job could sling some js. A surprising number of marketers learn to wrangle some carousels/buttons/etc. vba script excel monster stories are prevalent.
These people are great to monetize. They are paid well and doing something they don't understand well.
Sure they have. They just don't care as long as they made their quick buck off of it.
For image search, fucking pinterest!
It's incredible to me that Google isn't doing SOMETHING to prevent Pinterest from duking their results, and actually seems to be losing ground to Pinterest's SEO dark patterns.
Of the remaining 6 results on that page, 3 of them were low-quality articles with generic language about paint schemes and lots of images, ALL of which had those little Pinterest share badges on them. I don't know it for a fact, but I strongly suspect that these ubiquitous types of websites are either produced in Pinterest's own content mills or are paid for by Pinterest marketing teams.
If I were to put my cynical tinfoil hat on, I would say Google has optimized a lot of search results to be favored towards sites which heavily advertise/track their users. Google results are no longer "search term" being matched to "content" but there are additional layers which do more magic, like "is this publisher considered favorable or trustworthy to Google" and "will this result generate a positive ROI for Google".
https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/guidelines.raterh...
You can read about what the criteria is, but in short, it directly asks raters to boost established sites and downrank things like forums, personal blogs, and niche websites.
I can see how forums would take a hit because users are anonymous, but personal blogs and niche websites should be rated high. Assuming the blog owner has some expertise to back their work, then just listing a relevant Ph.D. or other professional affiliations on the site about page would be more than good enough to fit these guidelines. This would seem to go more so for niche websites as demonstrated expertise should be more apparent.
Note that site reputation was listed as the very least important metric.
I doubt anyone else read all 168 pages, but can you direct me to the page that supports your claim? I didn't find anything that I would qualify as "directly asks raters to boost established sites and downrank things like forums, personal blogs, and niche websites."
That is pretty exclusive, IMO.
Forums, personal blogs and niche websites are often exactly what I want.
Can you point to anything that might convince skeptical non-Googlers that Google does not do this?
I think that's what they call "damning with faint praise"
The idea behind pinterest is that unsuspecting users grant it legal immunity and full worldwide free distribution rights on everything that they "upload".
So basically, it's a convenience plugin for copyright infringement. Add some ads to other people's content and you're making money.
WTF Google how do you still allow this crap?
https://gizmodo.com/a-gasmask-becomes-the-most-terrifying-sh...
Googling “gas mask shower head” gave me a Pinterest dump for pages
- TLS would improve the site ranking and make it look much more serious. These days plain HTTP is just a red flag.
- "This Site's URL is permanently http://fileformats.archiveteam.org!" is the first thing I see. That's just weird. Who actually cares? And when was the last time you saw a URL spelled out with the protocol part visible to the end user? This is just confusing and makes the site look like it hasn't changed since the 90s.
- "First Time Visiting This Wiki? Please read the Statement of Project to understand why this project exists. Then check out the FAQ for some frequently asked questions about the project and its goals and procedures. Finally, brush up on the guidelines for Editing." Err, no, that's not what any first time user would do, that's what power users might do.
I’d expect a site like this to have a big list of extensions on the first page.
In my URL bar right now. It requires a browser that respects one's intelligence.
Sorry for it not being a concrete example, it was last week and I don't have access to my machine atm.
Even in that case W3schools is mostly good for getting in the way of the much more useful MDN link that should be the top result.
Anyway when I know exactly the method I want I just add mdn to the search to make it come up. Especially because if it is a specific method I probably want a deep dive, not just some examples.
webmd.com
mayoclinic.com
thoughtcatalog.com
livestrong.com
tutorialspoint.com
OK, I see the problem, and I'm not sure how Google can solve it. The problem is that you are unlike the vast majority of other Google users. Most of the time someone is searching for an illness, it's because they think they (or someone they know) has it. Mayo Clinic is great for that.
I personally sometimes search for more detail, but then I usually go directly to Wikipedia (which has as much info as a layperson like me can understand, but much more than Mayo Clinic).
I love wikihow, but probably not for the reasons they want to be loved.
I'm curious what saagarjha's experience is, too.
But I trust cppreference more for the details, which are often necessary for C++ because, well, the devil's in the details. (And to be totally honest, the styling is just nicer.)
Compare the docs for std::vector for example, cplusplus[0] and cppreference[1]. The former spends three paragraphs explaining the internals, whereas the latter only spends one. The latter also includes information about what's been introduced on which language version (11, 17, 20) and assorted facts that the former doesn't discuss, e.g. the various container contracts that vector fulfills.
Edit: unfortunately it doesn't work on image search. Oh well.
We need this for YouTube as well, though the blacklist would be extremely large.
In fact, I wonder if this could be implemented as a filter list for uBlock Origin?
-site:example.com
Then, you can configure your search bar to automatically add those terms to your query.
I use FF more nowadays, though, so I'll have to check yours out.
> The plugin maintains a persistent and customizable list of URLs (keywords) that are used as a 'blacklist' for stripping results.
Could you explain a little more about how the stripping of the 'blacklist' works.
var blacklist = new RegExp('https?:\/\/.*\.(geeksforgeeks|tutorialspoint).*\.*');
function clearURLs(urls) {
var i, j, arr, res, url;
arr = [];
res = document.querySelectorAll('div.rc');
for (i = 0; i < res.length; i++) {
for (j = 0; j < urls.blacklistURLs.length; j++) {
if (res[i].firstChild.firstChild.getAttribute('href').indexOf(urls.blacklistURLs[j]) !== -1) {
arr.push(i);
}
}
}
arr = [...new Set(arr)];
for (i = 0; i < arr.length; i++) {
url = res[arr[i]].firstChild.firstChild.getAttribute('href');
url = 'Wiper blacklisted URL: <a href="' + url + '">' + url + '</a>';
res[arr[i]].parentElement.innerHTML = url;
}
}
browser.storage.local.get('blacklistURLs').then(clearURLs);I rather suspect this has to do with the search algorithm favors known and big domains in the ever going on war against scam and fake sites.
I use DuckDuckGo as my main search engine these days and I'm actually reasonably happy with it. The results used to be laughably bad but they've really improved lately.
Sadly, the one thing where DDG is usually crap is for anything code-related, especially if I'm searching for something very specific like an error message or an obscure library. That's when I have to jump back to Google (well, actually Startpage.)
As an experiment I just typed in the first thing that came to my mind: "thorn in cat's paw". One of the results is "Cat porn videos", on the very first page! And this is far from the worst case I've encountered...
With safe search moderate, which is default in private windows, I don't think I should be getting hardcore porn results even if I'm searching for hardcore porn terms.
Aside from that, 99% (or maybe all) of my searches are "not many sites contain what you want to see, so here's a ton of other shit to wade through", necessitating another tedious, furious click to get what I asked for.
Not many results contain covid? Okay. The only reason to DDG is to add !g or !s or even !b to every search.
It's also one of the best extensions I've seen in terms of code quality: https://github.com/iorate/uBlacklist
[1] https://www.tampermonkey.net/ [2] https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/1682-google-hit-hider-by-d...
ASIDE: whatever the merits of this particular extension, I think the choice of name is a pretty snidey attempt by the developer to cash in on the popularity of uBlock Origin and uMatrix.
I'm not sure how flexible extensions are, but maybe you could intercept all request attempts to google search, append the blacklisted URLs to the search query, then hide them on the loaded page so that the user doesn't have to see the long list of appended, blacklisted URLs.
And feel free to contribute on Github if you like :)
Although - like zargon says in a top-level comment - this clearly should just be built into search engines themselves. The only semi-legitimate reason I can think of that they wouldn't be is that results for a given query would be even less reproducible than they already are from person-to-person. But since Google already "personalizes" results, I don't think that's really a factor for them. They could just have a little button at the bottom that says "3 results from sites you've blacklisted - wanna see them?" or whatever.
Google News does this on every link (Hide stories from XXX, More stories like this, Fewer stories like this) so clearly the feature exists.
I actually have a keyworded URL in my Firefox bookmarks for that, IIRC there is a limit (a very low one if you really want to get rid of all the spam options) for how many sites you can block this way
https://www.google.com/search?q=test+-site%3Aa1.com+-site%3A...
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-search-bloc...
Not only would it keep people coming back for actually valuable results, but it would feed them with an up-to-the minute listing of sites people don’t trust.
[1]: https://github.com/codyogden/killedbygoogle/issues/674
[2]: https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/hide-sites-to-find-m...
+10 points for bringing the facts.
I'd especially like to know for c++.
cppreference.com is what I usually use for C++. It's well organized, well cross-linked, and uses exact standards language whenever possible. It's also very good about showing the differences between successive versions of the C++ standard libraries, which is invaluable if you're working with any sort of legacy code and wondering why something looks funny.
For HTML5/JS, MDN (Mozilla) was my default when I did front-end, but it's been a little while. I'm sure Mozilla is still great, but there might also be something easier to traverse.
I felt it was wrong because I was concerned about SQL injection, but my professor really didn't care about security so I wasn't too too concerned. Later on my professor mentioned that pre-compiled statements (I think that's what they are called) and I facepalmed because that would have been way more secure and been 5x easier anyways.
So yea, I guess they still are giving bad advice.
[0] https://www.w3schools.com/jsref/jsref_reduce.asp [1] https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Refe...
Its a lot worse for python than, say, kotlin. That was one of the biggest things I noticed when changing languages recently.
It ended up being removed from the core product and replaced by an extension which they abandoned.
It's currently community maintained: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/personal-blocklist...
I like that this doesn't completely blow away the result, but I do kind of wish is was further de-emphasized. Maybe smaller font or faded text.
What's worse is I then berate myself mentally as I know that Google has some metric on how many times these suggestions get clicked, and there's some product owner somewhere saying "wow!, x% of users use these suggestions, let's keep this feature!"
I notice -shopping helps... magically. But not enough.
Maybe the blacklist is the right idea. Can there be a magic incantation to exclude or include groups of blacklisted sites on a whim?
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/searchmage-se...
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/searchmage/oldjnha...
Check out some old screenshots from Firefox version 1.0: http://getoutfoxed.com/screenshots
It went viral on del.icio.us and let to me taking venture funding to found www.lijit.com, which lives on now as http://sovrn.com/
Two genuine anecdotal experiences: - MDN search used to be super slow, and to this days its results page is not super nice and still slower than Google:
In-site: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/search?q=mutationObserve... Google scoped: https://www.google.com/search?lr=lang_en&q=mutationObserver%...
- jQuery API docs search felt the same: slow and slightly confusing compared to GSERP. (Much better now with Algolia, but still prefer Google:
In-site: https://api.jquery.com/?s=off Google scoped: https://www.google.com/search?q=off%20site:api.jquery.com
The Firefox UI won't let me see what the other 195 domains are.
https://github.com/davidahmed/wiper/blob/master/manifest.jso...
EDIT: Even better, they're also listed right on the extension's page:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/wiper/
Left side, "Permissions" (click to view all)
I have been also mildly pissed at Youtube results and given how permeated it is into a 'learner's' life, I have been thinking about Youtube too. But in that case I'll have to take more usability into account to allow for right-click>add_to_blacklist kind of thing since there are so many low-quality ad-loaded channels.
Bravo! Thanks so much or developing this.
[0] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/ssure/
[1] https://github.com/7w0/ssure
It's terrible to configure because it was only intended for personal use. The only reason it's in the add-on repository at all is the annoying fact you can't reasonably use a locally installed add-on.
https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&sa=1&q=-pinterest.com...
it strips out all results from pinterest and youtube thumbnails. though with the lack of direct image links i've been leaning more on ddg and bing these days.
Similar, but also enables highlighting of certain domains.
Also available on Chrome: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/google-search-filt...
It works for Google, Yahoo!, Bing, DuckDuckGo and a few others, but I haven't finished it or packaged it up to submit to Google yet. Some rough edges and lots of TODOs still.
Anyway, it's here if anyone is interested in the code or would like to collaborate: https://github.com/daverayment/SearchHide
Interesting project and I think I am on board with it. Google search results have declined a lot in the last 2 years, mostly because of oversaturation by brands that have been playing the SEO game for years.
It's getting increasingly harder to land on pages that have been written by someone without a strict interest in search engine traffic.
As for only results from specific websites, you may use Google Operators (like inurl, site, etc.)
From a "freedom" perspective, I think individuals are free to impose their own filters but generally the default should be unrestricted access. That would possibly be with the caveat of the provably vulnerable (children, mental disabilities, etc).
Keep up the good work!
https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/1682-google-hit-hider-by-d...
I've also cobbled together a Tampermonkey script which I wittily call "HackerChoose" which allows me to similarly block domains from appearing on HN. Unfortunately my JS-foo isn't up to making it interactive, so I have to manually update the list of banned domains. But, if anyone's interested, here it is:
This actual Tampermonkey stub script imports the full userscript from a location elsewhere on my hard drive. This makes it easier to maintain the list of banned domains by editing that imported file directly, rather than having to make edits from within Tampermonkey's clunky interface:
This is the imported userscript. I pretty much lifted it from one someone else had made and then twiddled it a bit. So apologies to whoever the original author was, but I've forgotten where I got it, so can't give you the credit:
Even with some advanced cosmetic rules the most you could do is remove the <a> tag fields, not the full title/text of the results.
Edit: or you can use upward().
Needs to be unfucked via antitrust IMO they have lost their way.
Use case: I am as guilty of mindless browsing as the next person but seeing news / click-bait headlines about certain celebs like the kardashians makes my blood boil.
||youtube.com/|$document,xhr
||youtube.com/?pbj*|$document,xhr
I have a small list of content I try to avoid using this, mostly Reddit subs and "main" pages like r/all or r/popular. With this in mind, my ideal YT & reddit feeds are only content I explicitly want to see.
Else, I'd recommend a feed curator like Feedly. You can set up custom site feeds and so you'll only see those. I started using it after Firefox killed its RSS. This way there's no algorithm except popularity of a given link from a feed, not what is on the feed at all. So the onus of balance is still on you, but way easier.
I tried to watch the animation to understand, but it's too low resolution for me to read.
Anyone here work at Pinterest?
html a tag -w3schools.com
I'd blacklist that. Rarely if ever has an actual answer to the question asked in my experience and for some reason comments seem to get duplicated.
pinterest.com
forbes.com
amazon.co.uk
amazon.com
pinterest.co.uk
ebay.com.au
ebay.ca
pinterest.at
ebay.fr
pickclick.co.uk
pickclick.fr
etsy.com