Google adds punctuation support to search engine

Google has expanded the capabilities of its search engine with support for punctuation marks. Among other things, this makes it easier to enter searches related to computer science. Previously, punctuation marks were filtered out of the search.

Social media specialist Henk van Ess heard of the change “through Google HQ” and shared a statement to that effect on its Twitter page. His source brings as an example that it is now possible to search for the difference between ‘==’ and ‘===’ in Javascript. Also, different results are displayed when a user enters a search query with braces and parentheses. A short test shows that the search engine does indeed support punctuation marks.

Until now, all punctuation marks in a search query were filtered, with the exception of characters that activated advanced functions in the search engine, such as quotes and the asterisk. This occasionally irritated programmers, especially when punctuation marks were an integral part of their search. Not all punctuation marks have been added yet; the tilde and slash, among others, do not seem to produce any abnormal results.