If we ever need the answer to anything, we do not ask our parents, and we not ask our tutors.

We ask Google billions of questions every day, and they have the answers to as much as any one single repository (other than the Hitchhicker’s Guide To The Galaxy) of knowledge. From discovering the meaning of supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, to building an AJAX based framework for an online image gallery widget; Google has the answers. The real question is, are you asking the correct questions?

Dumb Little Man has some valuable tips:

Either/or. Google normally searches for pages that contain all the words you type in the search box, but if you want pages that have one term or another (or both), use the OR operator — or use the “|” symbol (pipe symbol) to save you a keystroke. [dumb | little | man]

Quotes. If you want to search for an exact phrase, use quotes. ["dumb little man"] will only find that exact phrase. [dumb "little man"] will find pages that contain the word dumb and the exact phrase “little man”.

Not. If you don’t want a term or phrase, use the “-” symbol. [-dumb little man] will return pages that contain “little” and “man” but that don’t contain “dumb”.

Similar terms. Use the “~” symbol to return similar terms. [~dumb little man -dumb] will get you pages that contain “funny little man” and “stupid little man” but not “dumb little man”.

Wildcard. The “*” symbol is a wildcard. This is useful if you’re trying to find the lyrics to a song, but can’t remember the exact lyrics. [can't * me love lyrics] will return the Beatles song you’re looking for.