[jon_richards]

I think it’s primarily for people copying and pasting something like an error message, which may have user-specific data in quotes. That should be what “not many results for...” is for, but Google is always trying to optimize away those clicks. Maybe they could add a “programatic” search feature with documented syntax for power users.

[hwillis]

A moderate-length string of quoted words (>5?) used to return zero or near zero results and a suggestion to try without quotes- imo ideal

[echelon]

Power users aren't where the money is.

[mcswell]

Maybe they should go back to +

[hoseja]

Add? They used to have one and actively removed it.

[rozab]

I am always surprised that these systems are not more friendly to engineers, since they were built by them. You'd think for their own sakes they'd stick in a system like xkcd.com/806/