Friends,

How do you get a search engine to search in the UK ONLY!

I have tried 3 this evening and none of them stuck to the UK! (Google, Yahoo, Lycos all say something like uk near the search box)

I have added UK into the search but it doesn't appear to matter!

Any assistance would be appreciated?

Peter.

In google, enter your search, hit enter, there is a list of drop downs below the search box, on the right is one called Search Tools, click on it and another set of drop downs appear, on the left of which is one called Any country, click it and select UK

Be aware that the results are frequently useless if you do so. A lot of "UK" sites are not in the UK because its still generally cheaper to host your website abroad, plus there are some legal advantages to doing so because UK law is so backwards on the subject.

If you want .uk sites (which is also not a complete answer as many UK sites are not '.uk') then you can do

                            searchkeywords  site:.uk

or be even more specific if wanted eg

                         bad jokes  site:ngaugeforum.co.uk

I use google chrome and I want my home page to be google uk but every time I try to change it to google it always goes back to yahoo does anyone else have this problem?

I have been round all the blocks with this.  Used to be able to get UK results, but not these past 2/3 years, I used to swear by yahoo, now I reluctantly use google (they do turn up different results). Yahoo is still my home page though and quite happy with it.  Few folk I know who have their own websites listed told me a few listing secrets.  I don't find google that bad now that I have all the tracking denied -but I did demonstrate a strange quirk to someone once:  The more times you look for something on google and open a link -the less times it appeared on subsequent searches (like they thought it wasn't what you were looking for so didn't list it again after xx searches).  Lesson: if you find something bookmark it, don't trust a search engine.

Quote from: Geoff on January 17, 2014, 09:13:38 PM
I use google chrome and I want my home page to be google uk but every time I try to change it to google it always goes back to yahoo does anyone else have this problem?

If this is Windows do you have any of the various yahoo toolbars or other crap loaded. Some of those extensions like to mess with your start/home page ?

Quote from: Geoff on January 17, 2014, 09:13:38 PM
I use google chrome and I want my home page to be google uk but every time I try to change it to google it always goes back to yahoo does anyone else have this problem?

Click on the little 3 bar icon in the top right corner of Google, choose Settings-Manage search engines, hover over the ones you don't want and click the X.

Quote from: EtchedPixels on January 17, 2014, 10:38:26 PM

Quote from: Geoff on January 17, 2014, 09:13:38 PM
I use google chrome and I want my home page to be google uk but every time I try to change it to google it always goes back to yahoo does anyone else have this problem?

If this is Windows do you have any of the various yahoo toolbars or other crap loaded. Some of those extensions like to mess with your start/home page ?

Yep I have all the tool bars taken away and have even looked in programs through the C drive to see if it has all gone.

Quote from: oscar on January 17, 2014, 10:44:52 PM

Quote from: Geoff on January 17, 2014, 09:13:38 PM
I use google chrome and I want my home page to be google uk but every time I try to change it to google it always goes back to yahoo does anyone else have this problem?

Click on the little 3 bar icon in the top right corner of Google, choose Settings-Manage search engines, hover over the ones you don't want and click the X.

Done that and when you think you are shut of it, by restarting the laptop back it comes, just like a virus, I have been told to go into regedit and see if there is anything in there to take out.

Quote from: Lawrence on January 17, 2014, 07:21:54 PM
In google, enter your search, hit enter, there is a list of drop downs below the search box, on the right is one called Search Tools, click on it and another set of drop downs appear, on the left of which is one called Any country, click it and select UK

Lawrence,  Thankyou very much for the advice, unfortunately the piece "Search Tools" does not do anything! 

I can click on it to my hearts content but it does nothing!

Any ideas?

Peter.

Since writing the initial thread I have discovered that a different URL is required for UK searches with Google.

http://www.google.co.uk/webhp?cr=countryUK

You HAVE to have another link in your favourites just for the UK>

Apparently Google in their wisdom have removed the country selection from later versions of the Google search engine!!!

Regards, Peter.

Quote from: petercharlesfagg on January 18, 2014, 09:40:31 AM
Since writing the initial thread I have discovered that a different URL is required for UK searches with Google.

http://www.google.co.uk/webhp?cr=countryUK

You HAVE to have another link in your favourites just for the UK>

Apparently Google in their wisdom have removed the country selection from later versions of the Google search engine!!!

Regards, Peter.

As EtchedPixels said early on it's nowadays a fairly pointless restriction anyway. When Google throws back it's initial list of Finds then the Johnny Foreigner sites mostly have giveaway expressions like $ or â,¬ or foreign places in the first couple of lines and are easy to skip. In any case the world is getting so small that items can arrive from continental Europe faster than from Britain sometimes.

Quotehttp://www.google.co.uk/webhp?cr=countryUK

....LoL that won't mean it's just a UK search!!!!!