A weird thing about Google search results?

[samurai]

If you enter "minutes ago" site:answers.yahoo.com to Google regular search box, you will get this message:
Results 1 - 10 of about 15,800,000 from answers.yahoo.com for "minutes ago".
This is the hyperlink:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&newwindow=1&safe=off&q=%22minutes+ago%22+site%3Aanswers.yahoo.com&btnG=Search
While you type site:answers.yahoo.com into Google regular search box, you will get this message:
Results 1 - 10 of about 9,120,000 from answers.yahoo.com.
This is the hyperlink:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&newwindow=1&safe=off&q=+site%3Aanswers.yahoo.com&btnG=Search


Since the first search term is more restrictive than the second, how can it generate many more results? That is 15,800,000 vs. 9,120,000.
Read my question carefully before answering it. Click both hyperlinks if you don't mind.
There are so many idiots. All the first five answers are out of focus.
memetrader, Google has removed the label "Supplemental Result" from our search result pages.

Google's technology has improved over time, and now she is able to crawl and index sites with greater frequency. With our entire web index fresher and more up to date, the "Supplemental Results" label outlived its usefulness.
Google has removed the label "Supplemental Result" from her search result pages.

Google's technology has improved over time, and now she is able to crawl and index sites with greater frequency. With her entire web index fresher and more up to date, the "Supplemental Results" label outlived its usefulness.

[memetrader]

Greetings samurai in Hangzhou!

You are right that "There are so many idiots" here and for that reason it is probably not best place to ask SEO questions :(

However we are not all idiots! So here is the answer to your question.

Google has two indexes, the main index and the supplemental index. You can read about the supplemental index here http://groups.google.com/group/Google_Webmaster_Help-Indexing/msg/6e4c733aa7f18098

When you search

site:domain.com

you are searching the main index. When you search

search term site:domain.com

you are searching the main index and the supplemental index.

Every large site will normally have many more pages in the supplemental index than the main index.

That's it!

- Meme

[coachfolds]

Google has a stupid feature of prioritizing your search terms then searching for all the terms.

So it looks first for the exact terms then looks for any of the terms.

So in the first example you gave it more possible words to search for so it is less restrictive under their system, but on the other hand your results should be more relevant at the front end.

[artistagent116]

Where did you get the idea that "minutes ago" is more restrictive than "site:answers.yahoo.com"?

It obviously isn't.

Typing in "minutes ago" brings up any and all web pages with the words "minutes" and "ago".

Typing in "site:answers.yahoo.com" only brings up web pages with THOSE words in them.

Simple lesson in how search engines work.

[Level 3 Starbucks]

it is very difficult to figure out your question. but i think it is because google is a better search engine. with best regard.

[John P]

actually the second searched term is more restrictive than the first, that is why you get these results

site:www.website.com is taken as a special command in Google. Go to Google webmaster and read so you can clarify yourself

plus, you should keep in mind that this is not a professional forum or something like that, and people try to give you their answers...suggestion: don't post they are "idiots"

[Barkley Hound]

I get 69,200,000 on the second search.
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