#calishat — Public Fediverse posts

Calishat: Search by Year (1995+) and State News Sources: Peabody Search. “I made Peabody Search, named after Mr. Peabody and his Wayback Machine. He could set his time machine to go to a particular year and place, and that’s what this tool does as well (though it’s restricted to US states.) Peabody Search walks you through the process of setting the query, selecting the years, choosing a […]

Calishat: Search by Year (1995+) and State News Sources: Peabody Search. “I made Peabody Search, named after Mr. Peabody and his Wayback Machine. He could set his time machine to go to a particular year and place, and that’s what this tool does as well (though it’s restricted to US states.) Peabody Search walks you through the process of setting the query, selecting the years, choosing a […]

Calishat: Super Edu Search, Powered By Diffbot. “Super Edu Search 1.0 aggregated sets of domains and presented them as Google search URLs because I can’t afford Google’s search API and that was a free workaround. But Diffbot’s API is free and so I can integrate its search results into the tool…. Since this result integration seemed like it would be useful to researchers, I added the […]

Calishat: Super Edu Search, Powered By Diffbot. “Super Edu Search 1.0 aggregated sets of domains and presented them as Google search URLs because I can’t afford Google’s search API and that was a free workaround. But Diffbot’s API is free and so I can integrate its search results into the tool…. Since this result integration seemed like it would be useful to researchers, I added the […]

Calishat: New dataset of GLAM (Galleries / Libraries / Archives / Museums) RSS feeds available on GitHub. “RSS feeds aren’t dead! And to prove it I’ve started working on a new dataset of GLAM (Galleries / Libraries / Archives / Museums)-related RSS feeds. I’ve uploaded the initial version — 399 GLAM-related feeds, all human-verified, most updated this year (a couple dozen updated in […]

Calishat: New dataset of GLAM (Galleries / Libraries / Archives / Museums) RSS feeds available on GitHub. “RSS feeds aren’t dead! And to prove it I’ve started working on a new dataset of GLAM (Galleries / Libraries / Archives / Museums)-related RSS feeds. I’ve uploaded the initial version — 399 GLAM-related feeds, all human-verified, most updated this year (a couple dozen updated in […]

Calishat: Upgrading BlogHiking.com: More Results, Site Muting. “I spent some time over the weekend working on my blog search tool Blog Hiking. I’m happy to report it’s more powerful than before and has a couple of new features.”

Calishat: Upgrading BlogHiking.com: More Results, Site Muting. “I spent some time over the weekend working on my blog search tool Blog Hiking. I’m happy to report it’s more powerful than before and has a couple of new features.”

Calishat: Digging Out From The Deluge of AI News And Turning It Into Another Newsletter. “For the last few months assembling ResearchBuzz has been increasingly frustrating. AI news was crowding out most of the other categories and I felt like the newsletter itself was getting much too AI-heavy. Things finally came to a head when I found myself with a 6200-item RSS backlog and 50 articles in my […]

Calishat: Digging Out From The Deluge of AI News And Turning It Into Another Newsletter. “For the last few months assembling ResearchBuzz has been increasingly frustrating. AI news was crowding out most of the other categories and I felt like the newsletter itself was getting much too AI-heavy. Things finally came to a head when I found myself with a 6200-item RSS backlog and 50 articles in my […]

Calishat: Three Search Alternatives to Google’s Brave New AI World. “Google has made what I consider to be the terrible decision to go all-in on AI in search and there’s little I can do personally against that decision. Still, I can make alternatives. I can express my ideas in tools that I share with you. I can at least try to hold space for the idea that there are ways to perform queries and […]

Calishat: Three Search Alternatives to Google’s Brave New AI World. “Google has made what I consider to be the terrible decision to go all-in on AI in search and there’s little I can do personally against that decision. Still, I can make alternatives. I can express my ideas in tools that I share with you. I can at least try to hold space for the idea that there are ways to perform queries and […]

Calishat: Local Search America Adds Local News Feed, Articles From 1K+ Sources Around the US. “Local News Feed gathers RSS feed items from 1003 local news sources across America and aggregates them into one state-browsable, keyword-searchable bundle.”

Calishat: Local Search America Adds Local News Feed, Articles From 1K+ Sources Around the US. “Local News Feed gathers RSS feed items from 1003 local news sources across America and aggregates them into one state-browsable, keyword-searchable bundle.”

Calishat: Upgrading Wikipedia Seismograph. “Using Wikipedia Seismograph’s new zoom feature means you can explore over nine years’ worth of public interest data in any Wikipedia topic with one chart and easily turn it into date-bounded Google News searches.”

Calishat: Upgrading Wikipedia Seismograph. “Using Wikipedia Seismograph’s new zoom feature means you can explore over nine years’ worth of public interest data in any Wikipedia topic with one chart and easily turn it into date-bounded Google News searches.”

Calishat: Gift Article Gazette Upgraded. “Over the weekend I moved the aggregation part of GAG to a Google Sheet / Google Apps script where I can filter for duplicates and old articles. I also redid the display and added a bunch of sorting/filtering options. The URL is still https://mastogizmos.com/gag.html and it’s still free to use and free of ads.”

Calishat: Gift Article Gazette Upgraded. “Over the weekend I moved the aggregation part of GAG to a Google Sheet / Google Apps script where I can filter for duplicates and old articles. I also redid the display and added a bunch of sorting/filtering options. The URL is still https://mastogizmos.com/gag.html and it’s still free to use and free of ads.”

Calishat: The Calishat Jams of 2025: All Free, All Ad-Free. “When I first started creating search tools I thought I’d run out of ideas after a certain amount of time. That doesn’t appear to be the case. … Meet up here in 365 days and we’ll look at the Calishat Jams of 2026. In the meantime, check out these thirteen tools from 2025, presented in the order they were created. They’re all […]

Calishat: The Calishat Jams of 2025: All Free, All Ad-Free. “When I first started creating search tools I thought I’d run out of ideas after a certain amount of time. That doesn’t appear to be the case. … Meet up here in 365 days and we’ll look at the Calishat Jams of 2026. In the meantime, check out these thirteen tools from 2025, presented in the order they were created. They’re all […]

Calishat: Turning Wikipedia Into a Word Game: Wiki Stack Game. “Wiki Stack Game starts you off with a big handful of random words. Your objective is to add words to a Wikipedia search with the goal of making the query as long as possible while still getting results.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/11/20/turning-wikipedia-into-a-word-game-wiki-stack-game-calishat/

Calishat: Turning Wikipedia Into a Word Game: Wiki Stack Game. “Wiki Stack Game starts you off with a big handful of random words. Your objective is to add words to a Wikipedia search with the goal of making the query as long as possible while still getting results.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/11/20/turning-wikipedia-into-a-word-game-wiki-stack-game-calishat/

Calishat: Browsing and Searching Members of Congress: Congress Corral. “Congress Corral lets you browse members of Congress via a number of filters and provides a page of details of useful links for each one, but lots of political directories do that. The magic happens with the four other tabs on the detail page.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/10/30/browsing-and-searching-members-of-congress-congress-corral-calishat/

Calishat: Browsing and Searching Members of Congress: Congress Corral. “Congress Corral lets you browse members of Congress via a number of filters and provides a page of details of useful links for each one, but lots of political directories do that. The magic happens with the four other tabs on the detail page.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/10/30/browsing-and-searching-members-of-congress-congress-corral-calishat/

Calishat: Wikiween: Wikipedia Categories Become Spooky Cemeteries. “For the last few years I’ve tried to do a Halloween-themed Wikipedia tool. Finally, this year, on what I think is my third try, I got something I like! Check out Wikiween at https://wikitwister.com/wikiween/ .”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/10/23/wikiween-wikipedia-categories-become-spooky-cemeteries-calishat/

Calishat: Wiki-Guided Google Search II. “Wouldn’t it be great if you could take a Wikipedia article, break it down by headings, do a word-frequency analysis on each block of text, and then click and toggle the most frequent/unusual words into a search box to build Google queries for that topic? Well guess what!”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/10/09/calishat-wiki-guided-google-search-ii/

Calishat: Wiki-Guided Google Search II. “Wouldn’t it be great if you could take a Wikipedia article, break it down by headings, do a word-frequency analysis on each block of text, and then click and toggle the most frequent/unusual words into a search box to build Google queries for that topic? Well guess what!”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/10/09/calishat-wiki-guided-google-search-ii/

Calishat: Exploring “War-Torn” Portland With Local Search America. “Local Search America is free to use and free of advertising. In this article I’m going to walk you through its three tools to find local TV stations, government agencies, and institutions of higher learning near Portland and search their Web sites.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/09/28/calishat-exploring-war-torn-portland-with-local-search-america/

Calishat: Researching Public Figures in the Epstein Birthday Book, Part I: MiniGladys. “MiniGladys is a collection of four research tools to use Wikipedia data. For this article I’ll use the example of Leon Black, who appears in the Epstein birthday book but is not on the public stage as much as someone like Alan Deshowitz. In the time it takes to click a few times and read a few news […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/09/12/researching-public-figures-in-the-epstein-birthday-book-part-i-minigladys-calishat/

Calishat: QueryAnvil: AI As Search Sidekick Instead of Main Character. “I was staring in frustration at a particularly annoying page of search results when I thought to myself, ‘Man, I wish I had some way of marking which of these results are useful and which aren’t, and then have an AI analyze the different sets for language use and give me suggestions for how I can revise my search to get […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/09/09/queryanvil-ai-as-search-sidekick-instead-of-main-character-calishat/

Calishat: QueryAnvil: AI As Search Sidekick Instead of Main Character. “I was staring in frustration at a particularly annoying page of search results when I thought to myself, ‘Man, I wish I had some way of marking which of these results are useful and which aren’t, and then have an AI analyze the different sets for language use and give me suggestions for how I can revise my search to get […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/09/09/queryanvil-ai-as-search-sidekick-instead-of-main-character-calishat/

Calishat: Blaugust: Four Tools for Easier Date-Based Searching. “Do your Internet research tasks include a lot of date-based searching? I find that date-based searching helps a lot when searching historical (and man do I feel weird saying that about stuff that happened just a couple decades ago) events, companies, people and information. The results you’ll find when searching for something in […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/08/19/blaugust-four-tools-for-easier-date-based-searching-calishat/

Calishat: Echo Chambers No, Everything Chambers Yes: Three Tools For Nook-and-Cranny Searching. “Yesterday I wrote about making search spaces and got accused of making echo chambers. So today I’ll show you how to get into the EVERYTHING CHAMBER with 3 tools for randomish and nook-and-cranny searching.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/08/16/echo-chambers-no-everything-chambers-yes-three-tools-for-nook-and-cranny-searching-calishat/

Calishat: Blaugust: Heard about Google’s “Preferred Sources”? Here are 4 Other Ways to Find Specific News Outlets. “In the last few years I’ve been working on tools to let you create lists of sites to search in Google. Unlike Google’s ‘Preferred Sources’ setting, my tools use external sources to show you news and media sites you may know nothing about. You can even find them by US […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/08/14/blaugust-heard-about-googles-preferred-sources-here-are-4-other-ways-to-find-specific-news-outlets-calishat/

Calishat: Analyze Overlapping Public Interest Via Wikipedia With Attention Junction. “Attention Junction, what’s your function? To analyze the views of two Wikipedia pages, identify spans of public interest, find overlaps, and turn them into Google / Google News searches. All while being free to use and free of ads.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/07/23/calishat-analyze-overlapping-public-interest-via-wikipedia-with-attention-junction/

Calishat: Temporary Obsessions RSS Feed Reader Updated and Now Available. “The Temporary Obsessions RSS Feed Reader is a Google Sheets-based tool that lets you schedule your RSS feeds and give them expiration dates. I have used TOFR for monitoring breaking news topics over the short-term, scheduling feeds in advance for a known business-/stock- related deadline, and to ‘audition’ keywords I […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/07/12/calishat-temporary-obsessions-rss-feed-reader-updated-and-now-available/

Calishat: Temporary Obsessions RSS Feed Reader Updated and Now Available. “The Temporary Obsessions RSS Feed Reader is a Google Sheets-based tool that lets you schedule your RSS feeds and give them expiration dates. I have used TOFR for monitoring breaking news topics over the short-term, scheduling feeds in advance for a known business-/stock- related deadline, and to ‘audition’ keywords I […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/07/12/calishat-temporary-obsessions-rss-feed-reader-updated-and-now-available/

Calishat: Local Search America: Search the Web by DMA. “Today I finished creating Local Search America, a new way to create specific search spaces for authoritative institutions in American DMAs… Enter a city and state and Local Search America identifies the television stations and government agencies which serve that area as well as the institutions of higher education in that area. Up to […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/07/06/local-search-america-search-the-web-by-dma-calishat/

Calishat: ResearchBuzz Firehose Turns 10. “I started ResearchBuzz in 1998 after finishing the 2nd edition of Official Netscape Guide to Internet Research. As time went by I started feeling the lack of organization. I was linking to and looking at lots and lots of resources, but I was posting them in aggregate newsletters which made specific resources tough to find. I spent some time thinking […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/06/22/calishat-researchbuzz-firehose-turns-10/

Calishat: VibesMasto Gets an Overhaul and a Web Version. “Saturday I dug out the VibesMasto News Monitor so I could monitor news about the protests around the country. It was very useful but it also made me cringe. I first made this tool about two years ago when I knew a lot less about JavaScript, and its code is CRUSTY. Uncrusting it became yesterday’s priority. Now there’s a overhauled […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/21/calishat-vibesmasto-gets-an-overhaul-and-a-web-version/

Calishat: VibesMasto Gets an Overhaul and a Web Version. “Saturday I dug out the VibesMasto News Monitor so I could monitor news about the protests around the country. It was very useful but it also made me cringe. I first made this tool about two years ago when I knew a lot less about JavaScript, and its code is CRUSTY. Uncrusting it became yesterday’s priority. Now there’s a overhauled […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/04/21/calishat-vibesmasto-gets-an-overhaul-and-a-web-version/

Calishat: SearchTweaks.com Updated – 16 Free Tools for Better Web Search. “I learned so much overhauling WikiTwister that I immediately came up with several ideas for improving SearchTweaks, my collection of 16 web-based tools for making your web search better/easier/more interesting. After a very busy few days I have uploaded the new version and I’m delighted to share it with you. […]

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/03/03/calishat-searchtweaks-com-updated-16-free-tools-for-better-web-search/