Google's "define: " through an API?

Question

I want to get the result of searches that use special features in Google, like "define: [phrase]" and I can't seem to find relevant information about this.

Does anyone knows where I can get the data in JSON format (like the rest of Google's APIs) without scraping the results page manually?

Thanks, Eli

Answer 1

I wish I had not set a bounty for this, because I stumbled upon the answer a few days later and it is really simple.

Here is URL to call if you want a definition to love:

http://www.google.com/dictionary/json?callback=a&sl=en&tl=en&q=love

You will get a response stream containing JSONP, with the following contents ("prettified" for learning purposes, API returns all in one line):

a(     {        "query":"love",        "sourceLanguage":"en",        "targetLanguage":"en",        "primaries":[           {              "type":"headword",              "terms":[                 {                    "type":"text",                    "text":"love",                    "language":"en",                    "labels":[                       {                          "text":"Noun",                          "title":"Part-of-speech"                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"phonetic",                    "text":"/ləv/",                    "language":"und"                 },                 {                    "type":"sound",                    "text":"http://www.gstatic.com/dictionary/static/sounds/de/0/love.mp3",                    "language":"und"                 }              ],              "entries":[                 {                    "type":"related",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"loves",                          "language":"und",                          "labels":[                             {                                "text":"plural"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"An intense feeling of deep affection",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"babies fill parents with intense feelings of \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"their \x3cb\x3e\x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e for\x3c/b\x3e their country",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"A deep romantic or sexual attachment to someone",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"it was \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e at first sight",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"they were both \x3cb\x3ein \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e with\x3c/b\x3e her",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"we were slowly \x3cb\x3efalling in \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e\x3c/b\x3e",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"A personified figure of \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e, often represented as Cupid",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"A great interest and pleasure in something",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"his \x3cb\x3e\x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e for\x3c/b\x3e football",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"we share a \x3cb\x3e\x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e of\x3c/b\x3e music",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"Affectionate greetings conveyed to someone on one\x27s behalf",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"A formula for ending an affectionate letter",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"take care, lots of \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e, Judy",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"A person or thing that one \x3cem\x3eloves\x3c/em\x3e",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"she was \x3cb\x3ethe \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e of his life\x3c/b\x3e",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"their two great \x3cem\x3eloves\x3c/em\x3e are tobacco and whiskey",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"A friendly form of address",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"it\x27s all right, \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"Used to express affectionate approval for someone",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"don\x27t fret, there\x27s a \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"(in tennis, squash, and some other sports) A score of zero; nil",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"\x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e fifteen",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"he was down two sets to \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 }              ]           },           {              "type":"headword",              "terms":[                 {                    "type":"text",                    "text":"love",                    "language":"en",                    "labels":[                       {                          "text":"Verb",                          "title":"Part-of-speech"                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"phonetic",                    "text":"/ləv/",                    "language":"und"                 },                 {                    "type":"sound",                    "text":"http://www.gstatic.com/dictionary/static/sounds/de/0/love.mp3",                    "language":"und"                 }              ],              "entries":[                 {                    "type":"related",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"loved",                          "language":"und",                          "labels":[                             {                                "text":"past participle"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"loves",                          "language":"und",                          "labels":[                             {                                "text":"3rd person singular present"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"loving",                          "language":"und",                          "labels":[                             {                                "text":"present participle"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"loved",                          "language":"und",                          "labels":[                             {                                "text":"past tense"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"Feel a deep romantic or sexual attachment to (someone)",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"do you \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e me?",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 },                 {                    "type":"meaning",                    "terms":[                       {                          "type":"text",                          "text":"Like very much; find pleasure in",                          "language":"en"                       }                    ],                    "entries":[                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"I\x27d \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e a cup of tea, thanks",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"I just \x3cem\x3elove\x3c/em\x3e dancing",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       },                       {                          "type":"example",                          "terms":[                             {                                "type":"text",                                "text":"a fun-\x3cem\x3eloving\x3c/em\x3e girl",                                "language":"en"                             }                          ]                       }                    ]                 }              ]           }        ]     } ,200,null) 

Google Dictionary API returns in the form of a callback function (JSONP). Before you can process the JSON within the function call, you have to strip out the callback function data.

That means removing everything before the first { and everything after the last }.

After this you are done! That's all information you need and it's basically the same (actually a little more!) information when you search Google for define love.

Answer 2

from bs4 import BeautifulSoup import  requests word = "democracy" url = 'https://www.google.co.in/search?q=define%20' + word + '#cns=1' response = requests.get(url, headers={"user-agent":"Mozilla/5.0(Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.12; rv:49.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/49.0"}) html = response.content final_soup = BeautifulSoup(html,"html5lib") everyThing = final_soup.select("div._Jig") for line in everyThing:     print("-",line.text) 

I wrote this script to get the definition of a word from google. Hope it helps but its not using any API.