How to search the web for pages containing certain source code?

Question

I wanted to find the origin page of a CSS file that somebody once included in a project I'm working on. Unfortunately, the guy that included it didn't write where from it came and has only a vague memory that 'somebody' sent the source file to him.

I wanted to search the web for pages with this css rule #loginNemId .inner { ... }

but nothing showed up on a google search for #loginNemId. Same reult when searching for id="loginNemId" as part of the page's source code. For completeness sake, I also searched for an included background image "bgLoginNemId.png", but that was also unsuccessful.

I really would like to know:

what is the best way to search for text in HTML files source code?
is there a way to search for content in CSS files or blocks within the HTML?

You can look at the source of the web page and search where the css is located can't you — Joshua Partogi, Oct 01 '09 at 08:15
@jpartogi: No, I'm searching the web for other references to the same code. The difference is that I am too lazy to manually view source on 20 billion web pages — Jesper Rønn-Jensen, Oct 01 '09 at 13:58
I remember before I started designing my own sites, I used to buy premium templates. And (I don't remember _why_) tried searching for id names and element names that were unique to my site, on Google. And it showed up. A search for "JTVSearchQueryTextBox" returned a few of my website's pages that included that textbox on the page. I don't see why it's not working out for you. Maybe the terms you are using are too generic? Or maybe SE's just haven't indexed that information. — Arrow, Aug 02 '12 at 15:45

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 06 '09 at 08:11

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To sum up the other answers, it seems there is currently no way to search for text in HTML source code.

There is one exception ot this rule: if the code you search for is open-source and indexed by Google Code Search.

answered Oct 06 '09 at 08:11

Jesper Rønn-Jensen

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This isn't (or atleast not when I found my own element names in Google) entirely correct. See comment beneath question. – Arrow Aug 02 '12 at 15:48
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http://nerdydata.com - check it out! – d-_-b Jan 31 '14 at 04:38

MTVS · Answer 2 · 2012-07-24T13:27:39.690

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globalogiq.com/codesearch.htm

you have to login, the registration is free

edited Jul 24 '12 at 13:27

answered Jul 23 '12 at 22:28

MTVS

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score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 01 '09 at 08:16

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Have you tried http://www.google.com/codesearch ?

Unfortunately for you, mainstream search engines go to a lot of effort to remove all that html/css/javascript gubbins as they want their search results to be based on what a normal user sees.

answered Oct 01 '09 at 08:16

wefwfwefwe

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I wasn't aware of codesearch.thanks for pointing me to it. But unfortunately, it does not return any results for #loginNemId or similar – Jesper Rønn-Jensen Oct 01 '09 at 09:08
I suspect that unless there's any other distinctive user-visible text in the component then your SOL. – wefwfwefwe Oct 02 '09 at 14:35
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Just an update, `codesearch` has been shut down as of Fall 2011. – Hyperbole Nov 26 '12 at 21:14

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Oct 01 '09 at 08:17

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Although google does index CSS files it only does this to check that content on the page is not being hidden for spamming purposes. It does not include the contents of the CSS file in the searchable results for websites.

answered Oct 01 '09 at 08:17

Richard

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How to search the web for pages containing certain source code?

4 Answers4