To begin with, DDG isn't really a search engine. Or rather, not a search engine at all, but a sort of aggregator of responses from different search engines. In his work, he uses search results from Yahoo, Bing, Yummly, Yandex, Wikipedia, and hundreds of other "reliable" sources.
This feature makes DDG very accurate if the sources contain information for this particular query. It easily provides comprehensive responses to queries like "linux df", "long happy life", "Java InterruptedException" or even "is it raining". But as soon as you enter something more complex, something that doesn't appear in the DDG sources, the results will look sad, especially in comparison with Google.
Nevertheless, it is the sources of information, or rather the more complex mechanism built on their basis called Instant Answers (instant answers), that is one of the main features of DDG, with which it is worth starting a story about this unusual service.
Instant Answers
What DuckDuckGo calls Instant Answers is actually very similar to how Google prompts work: if a user has entered a specific query and the search engine knows the exact answer, it will display it on the screen without forcing the user to click again.
The only difference here is that Instant Answers follows simple, well-known rules and can be extended by users. DuckDuckGo's catalog of instant responses DuckDuckGohas about 1,200 recipes that allow the search engine to provide information in response to a wide variety of mostly technical queries.
DuckDuckGo is able to show a brief help on Linux commands in response to the request linux cheat sheet, find the necessary Debian packages (e.g. debian version of vim), display information about your location (where am i), to show the instructions on how to remove yourself from the various services (delete my facebook account), to tell who is now in orbit (peaple in space), decrypt values of smiles ((
)) and even show jokes about Chuck Norris (chuck norris jokes).From a technical point of view, this is a rather primitive system, which often does not work if you slightly change the search query. But in the right hands, DDG is capable of many things and turns into a full-fledged command line.
The real command line
Among DuckDuckGo's instant responses, you can find many that have little relevance to the search. One example is the same cheat sheets like linux cheat sheet, javascript cheat sheet, vim cheat sheet, and many others. In fact, they are hardcoded in the search engine, so it doesn't even need to go anywhere to show them.
But there are also much more interesting examples.
IP addresses, URLs, DNS records, and mail address validation
Probably, the simplest request to DDG will look like this:1 ip
It displays your IP address, location, and even your zip code. Simple information that you don't need to go to third-party sites for.
More complex query:
1 dns records carder.market
It will show DNS records that relate to the domain xakep.ru. Simple and tasteful.
If desired carder.market you can also ping:
1 is carder.market down
Get information about our Twitter account:
1 @carderuk
Or check the validity of the email address of one of its editors:
1 validate [email protected]
Do you want to shorten a long link to one of the articles xakep.ru? No problems:
1 shorten https://xakep.ru/2017/02/23/bitlocker-hacking/
Turn it around? Easy:
1 expand https://is.gd/8TIGsL
You can even generate a QR code to quickly open the link on your phone:
1 qr https://is.gd/8TIGsL
And all this without going to third-party websites and having to install browser extensions. Simple and clear.
Password and Hash Generator
DuckDuckGo will help you if you need a strong password of a certain length:
1 password 10
It can even generate a passphrase:
1 random passphrase
Or encode the data using the Base64 algorithm:
1 base64 encode <text>
Need a hash? There is nothing easier. Choose one:
1 md5 < text > ;
2 sha & lt; text & gt;
If the hash already exists, but you don't know what algorithm generated it, then this is also not a problem:
1hash <hash>;
Programming
DuckDuckGo's programmer-oriented features are not limited to cheat sheets and automatic response display with Stack Overflow. There are other tools as well.
Do you want to find the necessary Python module in the PyPI repository? Easy:
1 python pyhub
Need information about one of the jQuery methods? And it is possible:
1 jquery .ajaxsuccess
Not sure if I wrote the regular expression correctly? Check it out:
1 regex /(?x: (w+) s (w+) )/ hacker magazine
What about complex equations? Google can also calculate how much two times two is, but it's definitely not up to it.:
1 compute Integral Of X^2 Dx Solve X+2>3x
In fact, you can even write a script without leaving the DDG homepage:
1 python syntax highlighter
Send this request, and you'll see a full-fledged editor with Python code highlighting. It's just a pity that you won't be able to launch the app.
HTML codes, colors, and CSS
DuckDuckGo is friendly not only to programmers, but also to web developers and designers. They have a color table at their disposal (to be fair: a bad 16-bit color table):
1 color codes
CSS Color Table:
1 css colors
And the HTML character table:
1 html chars
With the ability to search for the desired symbol:
1 html dollar
Other nice features
DuckDuckGo can not only handle formulas, search for packages, and generate passwords and hash sums. There are a huge number of other types of requests that it knows the answer to. It can find information about the file extension:
1 file .txt
Decrypt the numeric representation of UNIX-like OS access rights:
1 chmod 755
Convert lowercase letters to uppercase and vice versa:
1 uppercase carder.market
2 lowercase CARDER.UK
There is a built-in calendar:
1 calendar
Timer:
1 countdown 10m
And a stopwatch:
1 stopwatch
There is even a function for creating banners from ASCII characters:
1 figlet carder.market
Bang requests
All these functions are implemented within the same Instant Answers mechanism. You enter a query and immediately get a response right on the search page. But what if you need not one specific answer, but several options at once; it is not a fact, for example, that the "best" answer from Stack Overflow will suit you. For such cases, DDG has a mechanism for bang requests.
Bang queries are one of the most well-known and frequently used features of DuckDuckGo. Its meaning is very simple: if you want to find information on a particular site, you don't have to go to it and look for the search box. You can do this:
1 !so Java InterruptedException
And DuckDuckGo will send you to the Stack Overflow response page. You can also search on Twitter (!twitter), eBay (!ebay), YouTube (!yt), Facebook (!facebook) and on 9 thousand other websites.
By the way, about the same feature is available in Chrome: you enter the site name, press the space bar and enter the search query. But Chrome requires you to visit this site at least once before the feature works. And bang requests will work even if you use a browser that doesn't store data about your actions (for example, Tor Browser or Brave), or, say, download Tails.
Operators
Like Google, DuckDuckGo supports operators that allow you to refine your query. They can be used, for example, to search for a string only on the specified site:
1 gentoo kernel panic site:linux.org.ru
Or find only certain file types:
1 android security report f:.pdf
Or search by page titles without considering their content:
1 intitle:"iphone 12"
You can immediately exclude words that don't interest you from the query:
1 intitle:"iphone 12" -android
And of course, there are the operators "and" and "and/or":
1 (apple)AND((macos)OR("os x"))
This query will find all pages that contain either apple macos or apple os x.
Settings
DuckDuckGo has another important advantage - a well-developed system of settings that allows you to change many different parameters, from the appearance of the search box (six themes are offered and you can make your own) and the choice of the default mapping service to HTTPS settings (enabled by default) and ad serving (yes, ads can be disabled by standard means).
Hotkeys
- Down/Up - go to the next / previous search result;
- left/right - navigate through quick responses;
- / or h - go to the search bar;
- t - go to the top of the page;
- o-open the selected result;
- Ctrl + Enter or Cmd + Enter-open the selected result in the background tab;
- d-search for a phrase on the site of the selected result.
