There’s a lot you can do with Google if you can take advantage of it’s advanced search features.
Expanding on this tip which shows you how to find music in open directories, here’s a step-by-step walkthrough on how to use Firefox Smart Keyword searches to speed up the process.
All you need to do is:
- Create a bookmark in Firefox
- Use the URLs in this text file as the bookmark location in your Firefox bookmarks (like in the pic above)
- Assign a keyword to it – eg. music
- Type the keyword (eg. music) followed by the search term (eg. beatles) directly into the address bar (NOT the search box). For example… type in music beatles , and Google will search open directories for Beatles music files that you can download.
You can modify the code in the text file to change file extensions, which opens a whole window for you. For example, you can even change it to PDF and DOC to look to e-books, or AVI and MPG to look for movies.
By the way, I’m assuming you already own the media you will be downloading …
Bonus Tips:
- The feature above only works for Firefox. If you’re NOT on Firefox yet, try it now
- If you want to create basic smart keywords to search any web page, here’s how.
- Here’s a useful advanced features cheat sheet from Google
- If you don’t find the files on Google, you can try the best bittorrent search engine ever.
[tags]music, free music, music downloads[/tags]
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October 17th, 2006 at 7:40 pm
Great tip & tool, thanks for sharing :)
October 18th, 2006 at 1:28 pm
have been looking for this tutorial. Thanks James for the tips.
October 19th, 2006 at 8:03 am
My pleasure guys :)
October 31st, 2006 at 4:04 am
this was a easier way to find the things i was looking for. Thanks a lot
November 3rd, 2006 at 5:27 am
Hello, yes, firefox+google= music. But what music? I like classics, do you have it? Or just plain junk?
Thanks for telling me.
November 3rd, 2006 at 6:23 am
Hi GFranco, not quite sure what you’re getting at here, what you find depends on what you search for and what files are placed on open directories.
November 3rd, 2006 at 11:35 am
great tip. thanks for this.
November 3rd, 2006 at 8:03 pm
You can use http://www.goofile.be to easily find music using google search.
November 3rd, 2006 at 8:35 pm
add *.chm for e-books searching.
November 4th, 2006 at 12:16 am
Works ok, but I find most on del.icio.us:
Go to delicious, add a keyword (del for me) then “del luckmsiths mp3″ finds bookmarks mp3s of the Lucksmiths.
Some are old though, and links broken.
November 4th, 2006 at 12:28 am
Davey, Sasha and LudWikc: Great tips ! Thanks for contributing those cool ideas.
Brian : Glad you liked it :)
November 4th, 2006 at 1:22 am
this works in ie6 as well
November 4th, 2006 at 2:01 am
I’ve been using this since 3 weeks now: http://g2p.org/, Just Google It!
November 4th, 2006 at 3:57 am
as a newly minted firefox junkie, I thank you
November 4th, 2006 at 4:49 am
Pando is a great private p2p option. I set up a Pando group at last.fm:
http://www.last.fm/group/Club+Pando
http://www.pando.com/
November 4th, 2006 at 8:54 am
This is awesome, thank you!
November 4th, 2006 at 6:47 pm
I’ve read a similar tutorial somewhere off the net but yours beat it in terms of simplicity and clarity. Great job (:
November 4th, 2006 at 9:01 pm
fantastic stuff!
November 5th, 2006 at 12:21 am
Scott, how does it work in IE6? It doesn’t support smart keywords.
Kal: That’s a really neat site which implements almost the same thing quite nicely :)
MonkMojo: I’m not a big Pando fan, but I recognize it’s usefulness if you have a group of users already familiar with the software.
Admirer, Demo, Maggot, Vare2: Thanks, stop by the site next time for more tips :)
November 5th, 2006 at 9:37 pm
Wow! Ingenious! At last I found what I would have never found without this trick! Thank you!
November 6th, 2006 at 8:41 am
Help! Does anyone know how to use this gem when you have delicious installed on firefox? any help would be appreciated!
November 6th, 2006 at 9:01 am
jj: Not sure what you mean here… but if you mean how to use del.icio.us as the search engine rather than Google… refer to Davey’s excellent tip in comment #11 of this post.
No worries Aiedail. Glad you found it useful.
November 7th, 2006 at 1:01 pm
Loved this article. I actually DO own the music I searched for, but was unable to figure out how to download from the search sites. I was given the option of linking to the sites, but not downloading. Any help would be appreciated! :-)
November 7th, 2006 at 1:21 pm
Laura: Some of the links may a bit old, depending on Google’s crawling habits, and may thus be broken.
Try exploring a few other links, and you should be able to find what you need if it’s in an open directory
November 7th, 2006 at 4:45 pm
I’ll echo the thanks for the simplicity of this. I’ve been using this method for over a year now based on the article below. Keeping the main search page open and following many of the directories links in separate tabs, it’s SO easy to find what you’re looking for and SOOOO much more! ;-) The web is a fun place. Also, using the extension Downthemall, you can get mucho music/docs/ or whatever you’re getting. Firefox ROCKS absolutely!
http://www.googletutor.com/2005/04/15/voyeur-heaven/
November 7th, 2006 at 10:05 pm
Thanks, James! I’ll keep trying. It IS a great tip and your sharing is very much appreciated.
November 7th, 2006 at 10:41 pm
WOW thx this is great, finally found a track I’ve been looking for since ages!
November 9th, 2006 at 9:59 am
Nice Site!
November 18th, 2006 at 5:10 pm
good one.thnx a milln
November 20th, 2006 at 2:24 pm
I apologize to ask this, but when I followed the steps and type music into the address bar followed by a musician, I get a website for some odd reason. I understand the concept of keywords, however was i suppose to add something beside the url supplied by the text?
November 20th, 2006 at 2:38 pm
MARC: I would check the keyword and the target URL in the bookmark. From what you’ve described. it sounds like it didn’t pickup the keyword and Firefox is making an intelligent guess as to what you’re looking for.
November 22nd, 2006 at 9:53 am
How safe is this method from getting caught though?
November 22nd, 2006 at 11:04 am
kk: It’s a grey situation. The responsibility usually lies with the file sharers, not the downloaders, but in this case, anyone would probably have the right to store whatever they want in an open web directory, as it’s hard to prove the intent of sharing publicly.
November 29th, 2006 at 9:33 am
Hi James,
Is there a better way for a musician to make it easier for people to find their free mp3`s via Google in FF, apart from the normal metatags?
Take care,
Mandyleigh
November 29th, 2006 at 9:48 am
Hi Mandyleigh. Getting people to link to your page where the song can be downloaded from would help. Writing about the song on the page would help too (lyrics, etc). Make it easier for Google to index it.
Personally I think the net offers some better alteratives than a Google listing to get noticed. Try putting it up on MySpace and MP3.com for example.
November 29th, 2006 at 10:03 am
Hi James,
well the site is http://www.mandyleigh.com, so if you have any suggestions on how to get it noticed more or be friendlier for the search terms you wrote about, they`d be appreciated. I`ll try and get started on a myspace account, but don`t you think I`d be lost in the masses of myspace? So many more people/artists are on there already and well established. Will check into mp3.com as well.
Take care,
Mandyleigh
November 30th, 2006 at 5:37 am
Mandy: There’s a debate about how well javascript pop-ups are indexed by Google, so you might want to have your lyrics as normal pages instead.
There are quite a number of free music blogs out there. You can try submitting your work there as well.
You can check this link if you want a quick list…
http://www.friedbeef.com/2006/11/16/the-best-free-music-downloads-top-5-legal-ways-to-get-it/
Putting up YouTube videos of yourself is good exposure as well. Yes there is a mass of musicians out there on Myspace and MP3.com, but if you’re active in the community, good karma normally follows.
Think about it this way – you’d get lost in a mass of website on Google anyhow :)
December 3rd, 2006 at 12:55 pm
THX
December 5th, 2006 at 7:47 am
It can work on Operat too, with custom search option.
December 21st, 2006 at 8:34 am
I want to be able to download music with no charge
December 25th, 2006 at 10:27 am
I nide mp3 miusic
January 7th, 2007 at 3:40 pm
Hi James.jus asking.how do u create a bookmarkin Firefox n get to that URL in the 1st step?
heehee
January 7th, 2007 at 8:02 pm
Hi Andrea, you could try bookmarking any page and just modifying the bookmark properties :)
January 13th, 2007 at 5:18 am
GOOD
January 21st, 2007 at 6:50 am
Really Really great tip thanx
February 1st, 2007 at 7:00 pm
KICK ASS!!!!!!!!
February 16th, 2007 at 9:24 am
I have been using this trick and it seems to be quite effective, I do however have a request.
I have noticed that the unofficial format for television shows is S##E## in which it is Season# Episode#. How can i make a search url to find a keyword and include that i am looking for files that are named like that?
would http://www.google.com/search?q=-inurl%3A(htm%7Chtml%7Cphp)+intitle%3A%22index+of%22+%2B%22last+modified%22+%2B%22parent+directory%22+%2Bdescription+%2Bsize+%2B(avi%7Cwmv)+ E01..10S01..10 + “%s%”
work?
March 1st, 2007 at 1:26 pm
i wish i could find a site that would give me free down loads of music… please help
March 3rd, 2007 at 5:46 am
Shannon : Check this link out
http://www.friedbeef.com/2006/11/16/the-best-free-music-downloads-top-5-legal-ways-to-get-it/
March 7th, 2007 at 4:57 am
I’m new at Internet stuff including Google, and you made it easy, like a step by step, like butter on fire. Thanx a Mil. James
March 10th, 2007 at 12:36 am
thats great
April 1st, 2007 at 11:43 pm
i want this
April 11th, 2007 at 9:04 am
were is the michael jackson he is fine and hhhhhhhhhhhhooooooooootttttttttttttttttttt!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
April 12th, 2007 at 6:46 am
i want free music
April 12th, 2007 at 6:47 am
help me get free music
April 30th, 2007 at 9:45 pm
w00t you are 1337 haX…lol….no nice tip….did you sit down and write that all?
May 10th, 2007 at 9:29 pm
Ðаакну-ка ребÑтки голоÑуем!!!
ПризнавайцтеÑÑŒ проказники и владплльцы аÑйта http://www.friedbeef.com ))))
ЧТО вы буыдетеп делать Ñтим летом?!
May 15th, 2007 at 8:41 am
oy i have a mac and for some reason i cant dl anything. I didnt have any problems when i had my pc. google is computer racist! hahaha
May 30th, 2007 at 4:28 am
I use this great tool to find mp3 with google:
http://index-of.blogspot.com/
Works great for me!
June 2nd, 2007 at 2:34 pm
i want free music arabic
June 3rd, 2007 at 2:54 am
what’s up man ?
June 29th, 2007 at 9:16 am
this might help too …
add jimmyr.com/mp3 to your firefox search engine list via “add to search bar” firefox addon. then a search using that “engine” will show you google search results with lists of open directories and other media!
July 5th, 2007 at 12:57 pm
i want to get firefox so i can download tagalog musicfor free and yet there can also download movies?….but how
July 17th, 2007 at 4:55 pm
THANK YOU, Geek!
July 17th, 2007 at 8:14 pm
ok
July 20th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Papaiti does a really good job of simplifying this and you can search for two strings at a time eg. artist and song.
July 24th, 2007 at 6:13 pm
im sure its great but i don’t know how to make create a bookmark?
July 30th, 2007 at 8:03 am
Santos: Glad it helped :)
Giles, Rdvh, Sindhu: Thanks for the excellent tip
lykadudz: Just add tagalog to the keyword or just type in the name of the song in tagalog – you may have some luck there
Sarah: Just bookmark any page – then modify from there
August 2nd, 2007 at 5:44 am
ME ENCANTA ESTA BIEN COMPLETO
August 2nd, 2007 at 5:45 am
ME GUSTA ESTA BUENASO
August 14th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
splendid!
August 17th, 2007 at 4:06 am
Absolutely fantastic ! Godbless you, your wife and your kids
August 17th, 2007 at 6:29 am
F
A
NTASTIC! THANK YOU!
August 24th, 2007 at 5:10 am
pentru toti romanii care citesc aceste randuri …. Ce faceti mah ? :)))
August 26th, 2007 at 10:07 am
a great source for free mp3 downloads and podcasts is
free old time radio downlaods
August 26th, 2007 at 1:53 pm
Great info thanks for sharing.
August 26th, 2007 at 5:15 pm
ddddddddssc
August 26th, 2007 at 11:56 pm
Another Really great site for mp3 old time radio show downloads is
free otr downloads
August 27th, 2007 at 12:07 am
nice one :)
opens up an entire new world of music :)
August 31st, 2007 at 12:36 am
Or if you like
music of the 1960’s This is a brand new free mp3 download site.
September 4th, 2007 at 12:10 pm
Muy buen aporte, desde hace mucho tiempo atrás que vengo utilizando este truco, no solo para buscar mp3, sino que tambien documentos que me interesan muchisimo.
saludos.
September 9th, 2007 at 11:31 am
this is good
September 13th, 2007 at 1:08 am
Okay. That was a really good video. Thanks for starting out my day in a good way.
-Zencat
giant mp3 collections
September 25th, 2007 at 9:43 pm
music
October 2nd, 2007 at 6:08 am
the first two things i looked for it couldn’t find.
October 3rd, 2007 at 10:53 am
Yes, I knew this method quite sometimes back but I think I don’t have free time go and search music. It is kind time consuming.
First you need to search for particular song.
Then you need to download the best format (they always suggest you many url download).
Next you need to organise it.
That’s not end, you need to burn to CD if you want to listen in the car or CD/DVD player.
Last but not least, you have to worry about domestic minister staffs to go after you and catch you for owning illegal products.
Finally …. you fill in yourself
:)
October 5th, 2007 at 4:43 am
I’ve got an Amazon gift certificate burning holes in my pocket,
and I want to get the most bang for my buck.
Enter the Secret Amazon Web Pages:
http://tinyurl.com/38sojf
This is where you’re going to find the “latest sales, rebates, and limited-time offers” from
Amazon, and you can score some pretty deep discounts if you’re a savvy shopper.
Next, there’s the special Sale link. This is open every Friday, and ONLY on Fridays.
You can find the same good discounts here as you would in hidden Deals, although some
Fridays you can really get lucky and make off like an Amazon bandit – I’ve seen discounts
there as low as 75% off sticker price.
October 23rd, 2007 at 9:29 pm
I want to share this tip:
I know there is someone out there like me that tried and failed to download movies and http://how-to-burn-dvd.com – Burn DVD’s from the internet that play on a regular DVD player.
Thanks,
October 27th, 2007 at 7:35 pm
If you are interested in cars, then this information is useful to you o So car speakers er
October 27th, 2007 at 10:39 pm
I like your site so much I thought I’d share this valuable infomation: If you are a huge http://downloadlost.tv – lost fan like myself you can download all the episodes, new and old, Free.
As a matter of fact, you can download any tv shows here – http://downloadlost.tv – Lost
Thanks
October 28th, 2007 at 7:01 am
I want to share this tip:
I know there is someone out there like me that tried and failed to http://downloadmovies-now.com – download movies and burn DVD’s that play on a regular DVD player. What do you guys think of http://downloadmovies-now.com – downloading movies and file-sharing in general?
Thanks
November 28th, 2007 at 2:04 am
i’d like to have a try with this please send me a free tril
December 2nd, 2007 at 8:47 pm
free pinoy music downloads
December 4th, 2007 at 2:42 pm
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December 8th, 2007 at 7:26 pm
i like this site…hehehe..
December 31st, 2007 at 1:56 am
this site is kinky
January 3rd, 2008 at 6:53 am
Nice trick.
if you want to have the same feature in the search box of firefox (or ie7) and without having to type “music” try this : http://lebesnec.free.fr/?page_id=11
and then click on “add to your Firefox / IE7 toolbar”
March 25th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
this site is awsome because i get to look at food it is really radical!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
March 26th, 2008 at 10:41 pm
iobqMW great work man thx http://peace.com
April 1st, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Desperately wanted this. Thank You
May 15th, 2008 at 9:07 am
no coment
May 25th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
check mp3rat.com, this is best free downloads and listen mp3
July 4th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
How surprising! Never in my entire “internet life” did I think that I can download music for free using certain Google services and a Firefox web browser. Thanks for this info and I’m looking forward for more.
Let’s see if this can impress me.
July 21st, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Nice Post….
August 26th, 2008 at 11:27 am
mix it up with the ipod, yeahh
September 30th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
hey i came across this ( code? ) one day that allowed me to search for specific music files….it was awesome….so now im trying to find it…anyone know wtf im talkin about? AIM = LetsGoSnipePpl
September 30th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
(( stole the following off the internet ))
People leave music files in unprotected directories all of the time. Here’s how to get to them. Come get your free mp3s.
We all need music. If you properly query google, you can find open indexes of music files easily. Here are some hints to get you started.
Google: -inurl:htm -inurl:html intitle:”index of” “Last modified” mp3
Using this string we are using the “index of” and the inurl commands to attempt to isolate directories only. The mp3 tag on the end tells google to look for mp3s in these open directories. You can change this to wma or ogg if you wish.
You can add additional search criteria to focus your search more.
Google: -inurl:htm -inurl:html intitle:”index of” mp3 “pearl jam”
This command will find open directories with mp3 files with Pearl Jam. Obviously you can change the band name or file type to better define your search.
October 4th, 2008 at 2:32 am
Thanks for this tutorial. I was wondering on how to do this as i saw it blogged elsewhere, but thankfully, you actually explained it here.
October 11th, 2008 at 8:50 pm
That is awesomely cool, i will make sure to try on music i actually own the cd for.
October 12th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Thanks for the tutorial, it helps to find music easier
October 12th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
Thanks for this tutorial. I was wondering on how to do this as i saw it blogged elsewhere, but thankfully, you actually explained it here.
October 25th, 2008 at 8:38 pm
no coment
October 26th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
Incredible hack, very useful, thank you very much for sharing, you rock.
November 2nd, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Great info thanks
November 8th, 2008 at 9:48 am
I’ve been doing these searches for years!
November 9th, 2008 at 9:44 am
Brilliant tip, i wonder how well this actually works…hmm
November 26th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
verry good hope u liked it
December 5th, 2008 at 11:57 am
If you all want to find music, then check out http://www.googlemusicsearch.com/ it does very good searches. Also http://www.g2p.org/
& If you use firefox, then you should add an ad-on by the name of ( downthemall )this will allow you to like if you get to a mp3 directory & it has 100 mp3’s in it, then this firefox ad-on let’s you right click & then you select DownThemAll & then you set the settings once & then bingo you can download all the mp3’s at once. But I usualy go in the addon under tool menu & I go into the options for ( downthemall )& I set my directory & you can even add different filters & that is to add different formats if they do not have the extention in there like if you were looking for .swf (shock wave) then you just add swf to the filters area & also if you want to add more then one then all you have to do is add like ( swf,wav,wmv,avi,wma,asx,mov,mp3,jpg,bmp,tiff ) I hope you all get it. Oh & the (Save File In ) folder at the top of the options for (downthemall) that is the folder where you are saving them & I tend to choose my music folder in the my documents folder.
Also checkout Imeem.com to just listen to music, they have everything, but only to listen for free & you can buy the music, but listen for free,(still cool to me) because they have a giant selection of music to listen to.
Also check Out http://www.listen77.com/
to listen to music, just type in what you want & it will take you to the music to listen to for free, but you cannot download.Enjoy!
January 20th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
great read!
February 3rd, 2009 at 2:19 am
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February 23rd, 2009 at 6:03 am
Enjoyed the read, will bookmark.
April 15th, 2009 at 9:38 pm
would like to find some videos of alan jackson
May 16th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
3000-4500
May 16th, 2009 at 9:42 pm
comment1
May 30th, 2009 at 6:39 pm
try http://www.limewire.com
it’s really cool !
June 15th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
i like the twitter button, i followed you, good articles. :-)
August 9th, 2009 at 2:58 am
Thanks for the tip. I will try it out in a few mins.