Takeaway: If you’re a DDG fanatic, you might enjoy using these tips to enhance your search experience.
The number of words in this article: 2496, the reading time is about 3 minutes
Some search engine alternatives respect privacy more than the ubiquitous Google 
itsfoss.com
, and DuckDuckGo is one of them.
Recently, this search engine has improved a lot, and searching general web pages is very smooth. It’s nowhere near as good as Google when it comes to searching for local places.
However, DuckDuckGo (or DDG for short) has some cool features that most users haven’t noticed yet. If you’re a DDG fanatic, you might enjoy using these tips to enhance your search experience.
1. Jump to a specific webpage
Type ! before the name of your favorite website to go directly to that website. It’s similar to Google’s “good luck” feature, but in DDG’s words, it’s called “exclamation mark search.”
Some sites have abbreviated forms that prompt you when you start typing.
duckduckgo bang feature
Entering a search term after a website name will take you directly to the search results for that website.
2. Text to ASCII
Figlet is an interesting Linux command itsfoss.com
, which can convert any text into a nice ASCII drawing format.
Typing figlet before any search term displays ASCII output. No need to open a terminal.
Figlet in DDG
3. Check the status of social media
Putting @ in front of someone’s Twitter name will show the TA’s status (followers, etc.).
Itsfoss Twitter
4. Generate strong passwords
Enter password and add the required number of characters to generate a unique strong password.
Generating password in DuckDuckGo
5. Generate a random passphrase
Enter random passphrase to generate a passphrase, usually 4 words in length.
Random Passphrase
6. Get a cheat sheet
Type cheatsheet after the search term you want to see a cheat sheet. If there is a cheat sheet for something you are searching for, it will appear on the search page immediately.
Vim Cheatsheet
7. Get color by color code
Enter color and add the hexadecimal code of the color you want to check to display this color.
Color
8. Generate random numbers
Searching for random number will output a random number between 0 and 1.
Random Number
You can also specify the desired range.
Random Number between 1 and 1000
9. Convert to binary and other forms
Enter a binary number and add binary to convert it from binary to decimal.
Binary to Decimal
Similarly, it can be used for hex and octal, but I don’t know the logic of their processing.
10. Find rhymes
Type what rhymes with the words you want to find rhymes for. Poetry has grown stronger, right?
What rhymes with rain
11. Obtain constants such as Ramanujan number and pi
Type in the name of the constant you want to get the value for and you will see it in the search results.
Ramanujan Number
12. Find out who is in space now
Type people in space to get a list of people currently in space. It also shows how long they lived in space.
People in Space
13. Check whether the webpage is inaccessible
If you want to know if a site is down for you, or for everyone, just type is xyz.com down in the search term.
Is it down?
14. Get famous quotes on specific topics
Type a word with quotes , and quotes related to that word will be displayed.
Get quotes in DDG
15. Get placeholder text
Search for lorem ipsum to get 5 paragraphs of placeholder text. Should be useful to web developers.
Lorem ipsum
16. Get the calendar of any month
Type calendar after the year, month, and day, and an interactive calendar for that month will be displayed for you.
Calendar
17. Generate QR code
Enter qr after the text, link, etc., and the corresponding QR code will be generated.
QRCode
18. Get some CSS animations
Search css animations for some CSS animation examples.
CSS Animations
19. Expand Short Links
If you have a Bitly link or other short link and you’re not sure where it leads, instead of jumping to a page full of spam, just expand the short link to see the real URL.
Enter the keyword expand after the short link, and the real target URL will be displayed.
Expand Link
20. Get the HTML code of special characters
Search for html chars to get a long list of HTML entities and their descriptions, which when pressed will show more information in the results.
HTML Chars
21. What am I using this thing for?
This function is useless. If you type why should I use this? , it will show cause it's awesome at the top of the search results. Apparently, DuckDuckGo is talking about himself.
Why should I use this?
22. Convert case
Both upper and lower case can be converted. lowercase <大写搜索词> will display lowercase results
Lowercase
uppercase <小写搜索词> will display results in uppercase.
Uppercase
23. Encode URLs
Searching for encode and adding the URL will give the encoded result
URL Encode
24. Motherboard
Search Motherboard and you’ll see the DuckDuckGo logo on the left has changed. It will display several random logos selected.
Motherboard
25. Get HTML color code
Search for color codes to get a color table. Again, this feature is mostly used by web developers and designers.
Color Codes
and many others…
My buddy Sreenath came up with the idea for this post. He said there are many “Easter Eggs” in DuckDuckGo, which I think is right. But there are many inconveniences in listing them all.
If you know more interesting DDG search features like this, please share in the comments. If you find another search feature you like, please bring it up as well.
The text and pictures in this article are from Linux China
This article is reprinted from https://www.techug.com/post/hide-function-here-are-25-interesting-things-you-can-do-in-the-duckduckgo-search-engine/
This site is for inclusion only, and the copyright belongs to the original author.