Monday, November 5th, 2007

Ubuntu Search Engine

Foreword: I set-up this Ubuntu Search Engine as an experiment and to satisfy my own curiosity about Google's CSE service. It's ironic but I only found uboontu.com when testing my own effort. I'm also aware of the existence of ubuntuwire.com, however I've not been able to connect to this service for the last few days. There isn't much difference between the any of these services [this is to be expected as they all use the same backend.] My version of an Ubuntu Search Engine has the slight advantage of having its results hosted on Google. Hopefully this will minimize the chances of the service going down or becoming unavailable in the future. Besides, you can never have too much Ubuntu goodness ;)


Ubuntu Search Engine Logo - based on Google

Google Custom Search Engine for Ubuntu

I've set-up a new Google Custom Search Engine for Ubuntu. So far it provides results from a list of 169 separate Ubuntu related domains. The usual suspects are included in the list i.e. www.ubuntu.com, wiki.ubuntu.com, help.ubuntu.com, ubuntuforums.org etc. The list also includes blogs listed on planet.ubuntu.com and various other Ubuntu related sites.

Firefox Tools

I've created a couple of Firefox tools to accompany the service. See: http://crunchbang.org/ubuntu-search-engine/firefox-tools/

About the design & logo

The user interface to my Ubuntu search engine should appear familiar to users of Google. This is intentional as I don't want to confuse anyone with a new Web 2.0 atrocity. Also, I like to keep to the K.I.S.S principle where possible and I don't think you can get much more simple than Google's default interface. Finally, this wasn't an exercise in stroking my design ego.

The logo may also look familiar — I'm hoping I don't receive any threatening letters from Google Inc :)

Spread the word

If you enjoy this version of an Ubuntu Search Engine please consider spreading the love by sharing with your colleagues, friends, family and complete strangers. There are a couple of ways you could help share this service:

1. Add an "Ubuntu Search Engine" search box to your blog or web site with this code.

2. Share with: Digg - Del.icio.us - StumbleUpon etc.

Thank you :)

Disclaimer

Google search engine and the Google logo are the trademarks of Google Inc. My Ubuntu Search Engine is not affiliated with Google Inc.


11 Responses to “Ubuntu Search Engine”

  1. Michael Wood wrote,

    That's pretty cool.

    Thought of an addition you could make: After you've done a search, when it shows the results there are two radio buttons: Ubuntu search engine and web search. You could include another radio button for search all linux and then the results could come from www.google.com/linux

  2. Philip wrote,

    @Michael: That would be cool, unfortunately as the results pages are hosted by Google there is no way of adding this :( Great idea though — maybe I could add a link on the front page instead?

  3. Habtish wrote,

    Great Work. One advantage this one has over uboontu is the fact that you are not searching LP domains. It was frustrating to type something in uboontu, and finding an array of bugs listed in the results…. good work!

  4. Philip wrote,

    @Habtish: Good point. I like Launchpad and use it often but I decided not to include it for the reasons you stated.

  5. Jason Liquorish wrote,

    Nice work, you have been busy lately haven't. I would like to see some sort of submission of websites to be including into the search engine. It would be nice for people to submit their ubuntu related domains for your moderation, just my input.

    Keep up the good work!

  6. Philip wrote,

    @Jason: Good point and I should really get this sorted. In the meantime, please contact me with domains for inclusion. Thanks Jason.

  7. Marck wrote,

    Instructions to add it to Firefox search box do not work. I never get option "Add Ubuntu Search Engine" Instructions wrong? Or does not work under Ubuntu/Firefox?….

  8. Philip wrote,

    @Marck: What combination/version of Ubuntu and Firefox are you using?

  9. Floyd Bufkin wrote,

    Could you add kubuntuforums.net?

  10. Philip wrote,

    @Floyd Bufkin: Consider it done :)

  11. 222fbj wrote,

    Thanks.

    Your site does not show up in Gooogle CSE search…

    http://base.google.com/base/s2?a_n0=Google+Custom+Search+Engines&a_y0=9&q=Ubuntu

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