Customised Search Engines

More than four years ago I explained the secrets of LP and AH in a Google CSE query parameter cof=FORID:0%3BAH:center%3BLP:0. The percent-encoded hex. %3B is a semicolon separating FORID:0, AH:center, and LP:0 in this example going back to Google's ancient free site search.

This undocumented cruft is now seriously dead, or rather, AH:center and LP:0 now have no visible effect. Maybe the cof= parameter was removed while some new CSE features were introduced since June, see an entry on the Custom Search Blog — I've no idea what the Element might be, and the officially deprecated features didn't mention any undocumented cruft, but there, it's dead, and the new layout for CSE search results hosted by Google works fine for the xyzzy CSE. Fortunately I modified it to work on the CSE layout test page some months ago, and as it happens that is now apparently good enough for new search result pages without AH:center and LP:0.

I'll remove any remaining obsolete cof= parameters where I find them, it might be hidden in obscure places such as the template for this blog, persistent URL (PURL) redirections, rel="search" link relations in the header of my web pages, and a tiny CSE googlet (PURL of XML source).

BTW, if you were always looking for an IETF-related search engine test the xyzzy CSE as shown near the bottom of all web pages for this blog. I still update this CSE when I find new promising sites, one of the last additions was a site tracking link relation registration requests. I added it after the registration of link relation rel="canonical" on the corresponding IETF expert review mailing list.

And if you were always looking for a REXX-related search engine check out my second (and last) REXX CSE — I rarely use it, but fix it when I stumble over broken links on my KEXX page. For a recipe to convert CSEs given by their cx= ID to OpenSearch Description Documents see another four years old entry on this blog, or just adopt one of the OSDDs on my googlet page.