A is to B as C is to D

You enter A, B and C, Google gives you D.

Wow, quite some awsome ideas. Forward them to Google. =P

o_O nice ideas but some are troublesome

"Chat with a Googler" is pretty funny given Google's rep for being very unreachable and non-communicative ... ;-)

Good list and well done Philipp – ditto previous comment that some good ones for Google to consider – I took the liberty of tossing into DIGG:
   http://digg.com/technology/Top-10_Google_Onebox_Results_We_Still_Need

MSN already has this for "french fries calories" http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=french%20fries%20calories

also Google has recipes, but they're not shown on serps, you get instead a onebox for Google Base

Oui mais bon! Je suis française mais les frites sont belges! BELGIAN FRIES bande de tordus!

In France we eat FRENCH fries too, even if they are belgian ;-)

Philipp, U really did a good post. I will dream about that, lol ^^

I would actually find the whois onebox really usefull Very nice list, and some brilliant ideas!

Very nice mockups. Your attention to detail on the design and execution of these is impressive.

Of course I liked the Google Answers one the best!

Yeah I like those ideas!! :-D
whois would be great!

Yeah, WHOIS would be great.

I'd also like to see programming / development reference OneBox results. i.e.:

   [css text-decoration] would return its possible values

   [javascript onload] would return which objects support the event, etc.

BTW, Google OneBox for Enterprise lets you have whatever you like!

http://www.google.com/enterprise/gsa/onebox.html

Here are some code examples:
http://code.google.com/enterprise/oneboxgallery.html

So why don't they let us develop our own? Or is that just Google Co-op...?

That is the question that no one answer Tony. Even now.

What is Google Co-op?

Even Google UK's sure that I meant to type something else... ;-)

   Did you mean: What is Google Co?

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=What+is+Google+Co%2dop%3f

And Google.com suggests I should ask the Google Answers researchers!

   Tip: Have a question? Ask the researchers at Google Answers.

http://www.google.com/search?q=What+is+Google+Co%2dop%3f

I wonder if a Whois search could be created with Co-op. The sample I tried consisted of a static XML file that I had to upload to Co-op, with no real dynamic data.

The problem would be in getting the actual data for .COM, .NET and .EDU domains as they're stored on 100s of different WHOIS servers.

I always use http://www.whois.sc (now known as DomainTools.com) as that does the hard work for me, plus you can just enter it after the domain – i.e. http://www.whois.sc/outer-court.com

And then people search for something, and the first page is filled with oneboxes.

WRT Whois: Google is a Registar ... so they have inside access ... and my understanding is they use this to help in their search engine results ... so I gotta believe it would be fairly simple for them to provide a quick-n-dirty whois if they wanted to.

Alek has a point there.. google is a registrar sevice, so they can actually whois anyone!!

> fairly simple for them to provide a quick-n-dirty whois if they wanted to.

Yeah, they actually once had this Whois onebox, I briefly mentioned this in the post. So I looked this up, here is the post:
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2004_01_09_index.html#107364096637982164

The list is rather awesome. Some very cool and nice ideas.
However I would like to add some more to them
1. Any games realtime score (as google is showing with football world cup)
2. For location of mp3's .After all mp3's are one of the most google items at google

I have just read, google show onebox results for time in a particaular area. e.g. check this out http://www.google.com/search?complete=1&hl=en&q=Local+time+in+new+delhi

Excellent list Philipp, I thoroughly enjoyed your thoughts.

Google's expansion into "onebox" results has me worried though. I mean its fun to watch Google poke at the big guys with spreadsheets and GBuy, but taking information from small-fry web sites and publishing that information without visitors having to actually go there, well I feel like they're pushing the little guys around too.

The first post about social networ search raises some questions on privacy,. See a blog post on http://mitanshu.blogspot.com/2006/06/orkut.html

> well I feel like they're pushing the little guys around too

It's fair use today, but what if in the future, the Google AI compiles new facts out of the texts it reads? Then we might end up becoming mere neurons in the Googlebrain, and we won't even get a backlink :)

I would like a Onebox result like this.

Google, please help, I have a problem X.

Google answers with a one box result.
Hi, don't look anyfurther, the solution to problem X is Y.

Examples:
-------------

Google, please help, I have a problem
'What is the meaning of life?'.

Hi don't look anyfurther, the solution to problem 'What is the meaning of life?' is 'There is no meaning at all!'.

---

Google, please help, I have a problem
'Can I drink an other glass of wine?'.

Hi don't look anyfurther, the solution to problem 'Can I drink an other glass of wine?' is 'Of course, please enjoy!'.

---

Google, please help, I have a problem
'Should I watch television, listen to the radio or read an other thread on Google Blogoscoped.'

Hi don't look anyfurther, the solution to problem 'Should I watch television, listen to the radio or read an other thread on Google Blogoscoped.' is 'Read an other thread on Google Blogoscoped of course.'

---

Etc.

Those are liberty fries you morons. Not Belgian or French, Freedom or Liberty Fries ;-D

Good ideas. But if u seriously want Google to pick them up then I'd recommend you release all rights to these ideas otherwise Google could get worried about it getting messy. you never know, they might send you a basket of muffins

They need a pr0n onebox for the images search with "related images." You search for images using "naked" and it comes back with a "you might be interested in 'donkey pics'" reply!

Joey J is right. These just get in the way of the web results. I want to go to an "expert" for my answers not be spoon fed less than I wanted to know.

How about a time box.

Enter a city or gps location on the planet, located by the word TIME or localtime

and get the precise time at that location on the planet.

I suggested this too google a few years back, but still no go. :(

TIme diffs would also rock.

7:23pm EST

would then return that timestamp translated to the timezone of the viewer.

Good ideas, nice mockups! And this wouldn't add much clutter: The Onebox would only show the most probably result; similar to "I'm feeling lucky" – so it's really just one box.

Another way of implementing these and similar features would be a pop-up/selector with all the "classic" options, which could also include the options we have over the search box right now. So you would select from this menu:

- Books about ...
- Definition of ... (<- Wikipedia)
- Excerpt from book ...
- Free (Creative Commons) image/text/audio file from/about ...
- Groups talking about ...
- Homepage of ...
- How to cook ...
- Images showing ...
- News on ...
- Quotes from ...
- Sites similar to ...
- Time in ...
- Weather in ...
- Where to buy ...
- Whois ...

Add your search term – done!

This would add one thing that is missing today: A bit of structure and semantics.

How about a QSL lookup?

Enter WS9GHV and get:
=====================
Callsign: WS9GHV Class: Advanced Codes: HAI USA
Name: Ima Nyrd
Addr: Anytown, AM
Country: USA
Effective: 11 Jan 2003 Expires: 12 Jan 2013
FRN: 0006145778
FCC: ULS Listing
=====================

As a matter of fact, Google Images used to have a link for each picture that could search for similar pictures, but that option disappeared after a while.

Personally, I REALLY wish they would bring it back, it was extremely useful for trying to "source" images. I suspect they dumped it because I'd assume it takes quite a bit of processing power to visually analyze all those pictures.

Lol.. i think i should read before watching the images and trying the queries in google lol! XD....

nice ideas... you should get the patent of them hehe...

Some good ideas there. I believe some of the ideas you raised help to link already existin parts of google with the main search listing.

> But if u seriously want Google to pick
> them up then I'd recommend you release
> all rights to these ideas otherwise Google
> could get worried about it getting messy.

I hereby declare the oneboxes proposed to be in the public domain, as far as I'm concerned anyway. :)

Erik: Indeed I realy needs a feature in which I can submit a bug and where I can find a reference article on it. (My house is full of it, real bugs I mean, not software bugs.)

And why not submit a sound & Google tells you which song it is. C.f. the tread on Google television. BTW there exists already a company who does that (i.e. you can submit your song by phone).

I don't understand why the onebox results for a zip code aren't the same as an area code.... seems to me they should go hand in hand.

To Martin:

They already do definitions with the define: operator and if you go to advanced search you can search for creative commons stuff and most of the other stuff you can do as well but I don't see the advantage of having a onebox for everything. I mean it saves time but Google shouldn't be the first and last destination for everything, because you can then argue about having every minute search item become a onebox.

I think the perfect search engine would answer every search query with a perfectly appropriate and exactly to the point "OneBox" result. Obviously they are starting with what is easy to do but building something to understand your query properly and to have a huge database of "OneBox" results for this service would be awesome.

I believe that ask.com is looking into this area ("SmartAnswers").

As we all know, in Firefox, if you enter a term into the URI box, ie: future progress
  
You will be directed to the 1st listing in Google for that search, in this case: www.futureprogress.net

Try it out...it is vanity fun...perhaps important to your business.

Now regarding all of these functions everyone is asking for, may I recommend RubNub for YubNub, a Command Toolbar for the Web [R.I.P. Address Bar]

rubnub.org (or simply rubnub in FF URI bar)
yubnub.org (same here)

If you do not use FF, then check out yubnub for alternative methods.

With RubNub and YubNub every wish on this list could be fufilled...not to mention the existing thousands of useful commands.

Enjoy!

>||;]

Oh yea....even analogist's logic wish is possible in RubNub for YubNub --

<<<<<<<<

analogist [PersonRank 0]


Monday, June 12, 2006
1 day ago • 1,190 views

A is to B as C is to D

You enter A, B and C, Google gives you D.

>>>>>>>>>

I love the World Cup onebox, gives you kick off times etc. instantly for [england trinidad and tobago] etc. Very handy.

I'd like to see real time public transport timetables and service updates. I type [train surbiton to waterloo] and I get the next 3 departure times etc.

Php.net function results would also be great.

> I'd like to see real time public transport timetables
> and service updates. I type [train surbiton to waterloo] and
> I get the next 3 departure times etc.

We have that at least in Germany. Enter [stuttgart münchen] and there's a onebox with a train icon. You still need to click on it though to get to the next 3 departure times.