Hack 27. Get Random Results (on Purpose)

Surfing random pages can turn up some brilliant finds.

Why would any researcher worth her salt be interested in random pages? While surfing random pages isn't what one might call a focused search, you'd be surprised at some of the brilliant finds that you'd never have come across otherwise. I've loved random page generators associated with search engines ever since discovering Random Yahoo! Link (http://random.yahoo.com/bin/ryl, although no longer working at the time of this writing). It made me think that creating such a thing to work with the Google API might prove interesting, useful even.

2.9.1. The Code

This code searches for a random number between 0 and 99999 (yes, you can search for 0 with Google) in addition to a modifier pulled from the @modifiers array. To generate the random page, you don't, strictly speaking, need something from the modifer array. However, it helps make the page selection even more random.

With the combination of a number between 0 and 99999 and a modifier from the @modifiers array, Google will get a list of search results, and from that list you'll get a "random" page. You could go higher with the numbers if you wanted, but I wasn't sure that this hack would consistently find numbers higher than 99999. (Zip Codes are five digits, so I knew a five-digit search would find results more often than not.)

Save the code as a CGI script named goorandom.cgi. The only change you need to make is to replace insert key here with your Google API key.

#!/usr/local/bin/perl

# goorandom.cgi

# Creates a random Google query and redirects the browser to

# the top/first result.

# goorandom.cgi is called as a CGI without any form input

     

# Your Google API developer's key.

my $google_key='insert key here';

     

# Location of the GoogleSearch WSDL file.

my $google_wdsl = "./GoogleSearch.wsdl";

     

use strict;

     

use SOAP::Lite;

     

# A list of search modifiers to be randomly chosen amongst for

# inclusion in the query.

my @modifiers = ( "-site:com", "-site:edu", "-site:net",

                  "-site:org", "-site:uk", "-filetype:pdf", );

     

# Picking a random number and modifier combination.

my $random_number  = int( rand(99999) );

my $random_modifier = $modifiers[int( rand( scalar(@modifiers) ) )];

     

# Create a new SOAP object.

my $google_search  = SOAP::Lite->service("file:$google_wdsl");

     

# Query Google.

my $results = $google_search -> 

  doGoogleSearch(

    $google_key, "$random_number $random_modifier",

    0, 1, "false", "",  "false", "", "latin1", "latin1"

  );

     

# redirect the browser to the URL of the top/first result

print "Location: $results->{resultElements}->[0]->{URL}\n\n";

2.9.2. Running the Hack

This hack runs as a CGI script ["How to Run the Hacks" in the Preface]. Point your web browser at goorandom.cgi.

2.9.3. Hacking the Hack

There are a couple of ways to hack this hack.

2.9.3.1 Modifying the modifiers

You'll notice each modifier in the @modifier array is preceded by a negative (which means "exclude this"). You can, of course, add anything you wish, but it's highly recommended that you keep to the negative theme; including something like "computers" in the list gives you a chance—a slight chance, but a chance nevertheless—of coming up with no search results at all. The hack randomly excludes domains; here are a few more possibilities:

 -intitle:queryword

 -inurl:www

 -inurl:queryword

 -internet

 -yahoo

 -intitle:the

If you want to, you could create modifiers that use OR (|) instead of negatives, and then slant them to a particular topic. For example, you could create an array with a medical slant that looks like this:

(medicine | treatment | therapy)

(cancer | chemotherapy | drug) 

(symptoms | "side effects") 

(medical | research | hospital) 

(inurl:edu | inurl:gov )

Using the OR modifier does not guarantee finding a search result like using a negative does, so don't narrow your possible results by restricting your search to the page's title or URL.

2.9.3.2 Adding a touch more randomness

The hack, as it stands, always picks the first result. While it's already highly unlikely that you'll ever see the same random page twice, you can achieve a touch more randomness by choosing a random returned result. Take a gander at the actual search itself in the hack's code:

my $results = $google_search -> 

  doGoogleSearch(

    $google_key, "$random_number $random_modifier",

    0, 1, "false", "",  "false", "", "latin1", "latin1"

  );

You see that 0 at the beginning of the fourth line? That's the offset: the number of the first result to return. Change that number to anything between 0 and 999, and you'll shift the results returned by that number—assuming, of course, that the number you choose is smaller than the number of results for the query at hand. For the sake of just about guaranteeing a result, it's probably best to stick to numbers between 0 and 10. How about randomizing the offset? Simply alter the code as follows (changes in bold):

...

# picking a random number, modifier, and offset combination

my $random_number  = int( rand(99999) );

my $random_modifier = $modifiers[int( rand( scalar(@modifiers) ) )];

my $random_offset = int( rand(10) );

...

my $results = $google_search -> 

  doGoogleSearch(

    $google_key, "$random_number $random_modifier",

    $random_offset, 1, "false", "",  "false", "", "latin1", "latin1"

  );

  

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