Note: Many thanks to Bruce Palmer for his original work ( http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~bwp2/isearch.html ) from which I took most of the information on these pages.
 

The Internet

The Internet is not simply one entity. It is comprised of many different networks (such as newsgroups, gopher servers, ftp sites, web pages, images, and sounds) linked together for the purpose of sharing information. It is only with the advent of the World Wide Web portion of the Internet, or even more specifically -- a graphical interface to the World Wide Web -- that the general public is able to easily and voraciously participate in the Internet's enormous growth over the last few years.

How do we make sense of all the Internet has to offer? There are many tools that can help.
 

Internet Directories

• Designed for browsing through a list of topics to locate resources on the internet.
• Generally a hierarchical subject listing of internet resources.
• Often hand-crafted as resources are regularly selected for inclusion..
• Generalized. Broad coverage of a variety of resources on the Net, like Yahoo, or ...
• Specialized. Focusing on deep coverage of one subject area, like FINWeb
• Great for providing a sense of what is available on the internet and for SURFING!

Internet Search Engines

• Designed to locate specific information on the Internet with a word search.
• Collect and index internet resources to enable later retrieval through word searching.
• Regularly scan the Internet for new resources and place the URL into a database along with the words associated with that URL. Scanning is generally an automated process performed by software known as robots, crawlers, or spiders.
• Words indexed can be just those appearing in Web Page titles or include all words taken from the text of the       document.
• Search Web Pages. Some also cover the Usenet. Some search for computer files at FTP sites.
• A search of a database is NOT a "live" search of the Internet. Merely a search of the search engine's database.

Criteria for Evaluating Search Engines

• Depth of indexing. Range from just web page titles to every word in the document.
• Size of database. Can vary from few thousand to millions of web pages indexed.
• Speed. How long does it take to retrieve information?
• Frequency at which the internet is scanned for new information. Varies from daily to less frequently.
• Frequency at which outdated or nonexistent information is "purged" from the database.
• Interface. Is it easy to use?
• Accuracy.
• Relevance.
• Efficiency.

Different methods are used to build Search Engine indexes and therefore results will vary
considerably from one engine to another. It's best to become familiar with more than one Search
Engine and perform searches through multiple engines to ensure solid and satisfactory results.

A list of some general search engines are listed below. Try some out and evaluate them using the above criteria.

| AltaVista | InfoSeek | excite | OpenText | Lycos | Webcrawler |

Do they offer both simple and advanced searching?
Do they offer a ranking of web sites? By what criteria do they rank?
How are boolean operators handled? Is they implicit or explicit?
What is the coverage of the search engine in terms of what portions of the Internet do they search? Years of coverage? Number of web sites?
What sort of "help" do they provide for end users?
 

MetaSearching

Search Engines designed to send queries to multiple search engines.

Savvy Search
MetaCrawler
Internet Sleuth

         Most of these MetaSearch Engines recommend that you visit individual search engine
         sites if you wish to take advantage of special search features unique to the search
         engine.
 

Searching Tips

• Think about the topic. Is the internet the best place to find information on this topic?
• Sometimes a standard magazine or newspaper index will provide what you are after. An encyclopedia is a great source of information.
• Formulate a sentence describing the topic. Identify keywords (along with synonyms).
• Read the Search Engine instructions. Each Search Engine generally has a unique set of searching rules. Familiarity with these rules will increase the chances of success in retrieving relevant information.
• Be SPECIFIC on the first search. Broaden the search in conceptual increments as necessary. (e.g. volkswagen to car to motor vehicle to transportation).
• Use relevant results to find more relevant results. Use the terms found in a relevant document to further refine your search.
• Use as few words as possible in searching. Avoid common words that are likely to appear frequently in the database.
• Use more than one search engine. Results don't overlap as often as you might think.
• Try a specialized site. Think about where information on your topic might be likely to appear.
• Try an Internet Directory.
• Be prepared for more browsing. Although search results are generally ranked with the most relevant documents first, you may still want to browse through to first 15 to 20 documents to check the validity of your search.

Finding Search Engines on the Web

Yahoo's "Searching the Net" page offers a good list of search engines. Try your hand and find your favorites.
 

Assignment:
Answer the following questions by attempting to find relevant web sites. Use your knowledge of creating a search strategy to assist you.

Can you find a site or an article on the Internet that reviews or compares different Search Engines? Can you find one that is less than a year old?