anyone know how to search craigslist nationwide?
 

it would be cool if you could search the entire craigslist database, instead of one county, city or state at a time. i bet there's a way to do that. any inside tips?

I would like to know also

Re: anyone know how to search craigslist nationwide?
 

I'd be happy to just know how to search one state at a time.

How do you do it?

I'd like to know, too.
I have Googled on "Craigslist blow-up doll", for example, :) and have gotten many hits nationwide. But not sure how to search directly.

Re: Re: anyone know how to search craigslist nationwide?
 

click on a state, and there you go. various cities or counties come up and you just click each one as you leave "911" in the search box, for instance, or "blow up doll'.

That's one way, but a bit of work to search a state that has a lot of cities, for example, a search on the Land of the 911, California:



bakersfield

chico

fresno

humboldt county

inland empire

los angeles

merced

modesto

monterey bay

orange county

palm springs, CA

redding

reno / tahoe

sacramento

san diego

san francisco bay area

san luis obispo

santa barbara

stockton/tracy/manteca/lodi

ventura county

some areas are way worse than others, and take a lot of time to go through. that's why the original question.

There have been various meta-search tools that have popped up, but CraigsList keeps asking them to shut down in the spirit of keeping the system localised.

Ah, I get it now (duh). I wasn't sure why their search function was set up the way it was.

They try to discourage it from being anything more than local, to keep fraud down. Cash and carry transactions.

regardless, there must be a clandestine way to do it. i do take secret messages on my email. you don't have to tell the world, just me.

Here is one

http://zimkiv.com/Default.aspx?q=porsche+&c=pts&submit=search&3=X&17 0=X&286=X&250=X&14=X&258=X&256=X&257=X&205=X

:)

now we're talkin'. keep 'em coming.

Myself, I took the concept one step further. I setup an automated 'trawler' that goes out several times a day and searches for various keywords on various CraigsList sites, it emails me the results, and keeps and index of the ads it's already seen.

I sure second that remark. It has to be the worse system to access that I have seen in years...

Thom,

How do you set up a system like you are talking about? Sounds interesting!

Joe

Perl, wget and cron...

But it gets loads of traffic and is free and FAST. Gotsta love CR.

Umm...I think it was Craig. :D

Seriously, though...as the previous poster mentioned, it is set up like this for a reason. Local & personalized, kinda like an on-line classified ad/Pennysaver.

I've used it a few times to post help-wanted ads. Received TONS of replies/resumes. The same ad in the local newspaper = $400!

Thanks Thom - great link.

Thom: Good tip here....Crazedlist.org used to do a worldwide search w/o entering having to check the boxes. Craig shut that down and this is there newest version. A lot more time consuming.

I've had some luck on google with:

"Porsche 911 for sale on craigslist"