Searching The Internet

Other Pages Related to Search Engines : Education Search Engines Specialist Search Engines The Internet

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• Search Engines are designed to help find material on the web - whether specific information, a specific site, or a group of related sites.
• However, with the size of the web [more than 1 billion pages], and the methods of listing pages on search engines, a simple request could gain a huge result. Many will be of little use.
• For example : entering ‘Alexander the Great’ gives you about 61 000 000 pages on :
• Alexander the Great [the person]
• hotels
• calypso players
• an award
• a knitting circle
• movies
• bookshops
• … ?
• Be as specific as possible when making a request.
• For example : if you want to know about breeding Angus beef cattle, typing Cattle is a bad choice. Do you mean :
• beef cattle
• dairy cattle
• cattle sales
• pictures of cattle
• special breeds
• cattle breeding
• cattle properties
• cattle exports
• … ?
• Beef Cattle is better. It narrows the search but still leaves some of the above choices.
• Angus Beef Cattle is better, but still leaves choices.
• Breeding Angus Beef Cattle is the best choice. It makes the most specific pages available.
• Try a number of Techniques to help narrow your search. For example :
• use Inverted Commas around any phrase, e.g. “Breeding Angus Beef Cattle”. This will make sure the search is for all of the words and they will be adjacent on the site.
• Boolean Searches : By using ‘+’ or ‘and’, you make sure the search looks for linked words. Using ‘-’ or ‘not’, excludes those. Or gives you either word.
• Other options are covered on the help sites.
• Use Help sites for chosen search engines [usually clearly indicated on the site and noted where possible with the listings below]. Some have ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ providing instant help. Also use specific help sites such as those listed at the end of this section.
• Try Specialist search engines. A ‘general’ engine will give you ‘general’ results. A specialist engine automatically narrows the choice. A ‘specialist’ engine is one such as EdNA, which looks for educational information only. They can be found on the Specialist Search Engines and the Education Search Engine pages.
• Search Engine Help Sites :
• A Guide to Search Tools
  From the Palomar College Library.
• Bare Bones 101
  A Basic Tutorial on Searching the Web.
• ‘Beginner’s Central’
• Building a Better Query
  Google Help.
• Charles Sturt University/HSC Online
  From ‘What is a Search Engine ?’ to ‘Topic Specific Search Engines’.
• Finding Information on the Internet
  [Table of Contents]
  Tutorial which includes use of search engines.
• How Internet Search Engines Work
  ‘A top search engine will index hundreds of millions of pages, and respond to tens of millions of queries per day. In this article, we’ll tell you how these major tasks are performed, and how Internet search engines put the pieces together in order to let you find the information you need on the Web.’
• How Search Engines Work
• KidsClick !
  Interactive method for youngsters to learn to search effectively.
• Power Searching
• Research Beyond Google
  ‘Do you think your local or university librarian uses Google ? Sure, but certainly not exclusively. In order to start researching like a librarian, you’ll need to explore more authoritative resources, many of which are invisible.’ Find more than 100 options here.
• Search Engine Showdown
  Discover new search strategies.
• SearchEngineWatch
• Search The Invisible Web
  [With An Invisible Web Directory]
  Information about the Invisible Web including well-annotated specific links.
• Search Tips from the Internet Coach
  Search tutorial.
• The Extreme Searcher’s Web Page
  Extensive tutorial.
• Web Searching, Sleuthing and Sniffing
  A range of tips.

These cover Australian [and New Zealand] sites in particular and are recognised world wide for this. They include both general and specialised sites.
• Access New Zealand
• Altavista Australia
  Allows ‘bulk’ searching.
• Ansearch
  Search Australia or The World. Find news, images, etc.. Also links to other Ansearch country search engines.
• Anzwers
  Allows fine tuning.
• Ask for Kids
  Suited to children under 14.
• AussieSeek
• Australian Search Engines [Rob’s]
  A single site with search engines, metasearches, directories, search portals and more.
• City Search
  Major city information.
• Domain
  Housing.
• Fossick
  Australian and New Zealand Internet Resources.
• Google Australia
• Mooter - Web Search
  Personalise your search.
• MySearch.com.au
  Australia’s Fastest Growing Independent Search Engine.
• NineMSN Search
• OzSearch
  24 000+ sites to check. Now requires password to access.
• Search66
  Meta search engine.
• Search New Zealand
• Sensei
  ‘Focused on helping primary and secondary teachers teach their students about the internet and how to use the internet to research their school work and assignments.’
• Sensis
  Replaces Looksmart and Websearch.
• WebWombat
• Yahoo Australia

• abcItaly [Italian]
• Alice [French]
• AllSearch
  International Search Engines and Foreign Search Engines. A good collection.
• Ayna, Welcome to [Arabic]
  Also in English.
• Aport [Russian]
• Baidu [Chinese]
• EuroSeek [European]
  Multilingual.
• Fireball [German]
• Heuréka [Hungarian]
• Onet - Polski Portal [Polish]
• SearchDesk [Japanese]
• Tapuz [Israeli]
• Terra [Spanish]
• Web.De [German]
• Weblink - Linkgyüjtemény [Hungary]
• WideWeb.hu Hungarian Link Directory
  ‘Multilingual resources for non-Hungarian speakers about Hungary, Hungarians and the Hungarian web.’

Best used when needing specifics but you want a wide-ranging search.
• accoona
  ‘A search engine with interactive tools that provides users with better web, business and news results.’
• All the Web
• Altavista
• Altavista Help Site
• new !AltSearchEngines
  This opens to the Top 100 page, where you can access the latest listing. Go to that page and you will able to download the list in either .pdf or Excel format. The list is updated monthly. Interesting inclusions, as well as some regular contenders.
• Ask
  Popular, ‘expert’, and topic group links.
• Copernic
  Also a desktop search engine that is very good.
• DaGama
• ‘Environmentally Friendly’ Search Engines - designed to reduce the amount of energy used [will probably only work with CRT monitors because of the colours]. Uses Google custom search :
• Blackle
  ‘Blackle was created to remind us all of the need to take small steps in our everyday lives to save energy. Blackle searches are powered by Google Custom Search.’
• Jabago
  ‘Jabago.com is a black Google custom search portal designed to reduce eye strain and save energy while conducting Google searches.’
• Ninja
  Similar to the above.
• Excite
• Excite Help Site
• Fast
• Google
  Possibly the best
• Google Earth
  ‘A 3D interface to the planet.’ Broadband required to use this.
• Google Earth Community
  A bulletin board listing already existing ‘earth’ views that you can use and store.
• Google for Mac
• Google for Linux
• Google Help Centre
• Google Help Site : Advanced Search Help
• Google Language Tools
• Google Scholar
• Google Scholar Help Site
• Google Services
  A range of services offered by Google can be found here.
• Google Talk
  Now you can talk to each other using Google.
• Google Video
  Now you can share videos with each other using Google.
• Print Google
  ‘Search the full text of books [and discover new ones].’
• new !Hakia
  ‘Hakia is focused on bringing quality results via its semantic search technology. Today’s search engines bring popular results via statistical ranking methods. Popular results are not always quality results, and the searchers suffer in many ways ranging from wasted search time to using misleading information.’
• Lasoo
• Lycos
• Mahalo
  ‘Mahalo is a human-powered search engine. We create organized, comprehensive, and spam free search results for the most popular search terms. Our search results only include great links.’ More than just a search engine, it also has directories you can drill down through, to specific topics.
• My Live Search
  ‘World’s first live search engine. You’re in control.’ Be aware you need to add a plu-in for either IE or Firefox for this to operate. Looks really ninteresting.
• Natural Language Search Engines :
• Lexxe
  ‘A third generation Internet search engine with advanced Natural Language Processing technologies.’
• Powerset
  ‘A transformative consumer search engine based on natural language processing. By making search more natural and intuitive, Powerset is fundamentally changing how we search the web, and delivering higher quality results.’ Still in the process of development.
• Preview Seek
  Presently in Beta form only, but looking worthwhile.
• Raging [Altavista]
• Snap
  ‘While Snap isn’t complicated, it is a different way of searching.’
• Soople
  ‘Soople is an early English dialect, which means ‘to soften, make supple’. That’s exactly what I envisioned for this site; a site that softens all the fantastic advanced functions Google offers. This site is meant for all those who are not yet familiar with all the possibilities of Google and all the required syntaxes.’
• Surfwax
• Turboscout
  Access a range of the best engines without having to retype your query.
• Welcome to Search Wikia Labs
  ‘A platform for the development of a new Free/open source search engine with user-editable search results.’ Still in the development process.
• Wisenut
  Bare bones search engine.
• Yahoo
• Yahoo [Australia] Help Central
• Yahoo ! Search
• Yahoo ! Shortcuts
  Features designed to find answers quickly.

When you want a general search and are not sure exactly what you want. Also useful if you want limited responses.
• About
• Answers
  Multi-directory search engine.
• Ask.com
• Alexa Web Search
  Web directories.
• Bighub.com
• Biotechnology Information Directory
• Digital Librarian
  ‘A librarian’s choice of the best of the Web.’
• DMOZ - Open Directory Project
• GoGuides.Org Directory & Search
• Hitch Hikers Guide to the Internet
• Intute
  Previously Resource Discovery Network. Now subsumed by Intute.
• ISYS 8
  Multi-faceted search suite.
• JoeAnt
• Librarians’ Index to the Internet
  Web directories.
• Mamma
• PINAKES, A Subject Launchpad
  Gateway to directories.
• RingSurf
  Subject ‘rings’ and directories.
• Super Searcher’s Web Pages
  Subject specific resources.
• The Internet Oracle
• Virtual Reference Shelf [Library of Congress]
  Directories, practical material.
• WebRing
  Web directories.
• Welcome to Net-Trace

Useful when you want to access multiple search engines at the one time. They provide broad searches. Many list results in priority order.
• Better Brain’s Metasearch
• Clusty
  ‘Clusty queries several top search engines, combines the results, and generates an ordered list based on comparative ranking … our search engine groups similar results together into clusters. Clusters help you see your search results by topic so you can zero in on exactly what you’re looking for or discover unexpected relationships between items.’
• Dogpile
• Fazzle
• FirstStop WebSearch Free
  ‘An incredibly fast and easy to use software that uses multiple search engines to search a myriad of web sites simultaneously for a more comprehensive Internet experience.’ Downloadable software.
• Gigablast
• Ithaki Metasearch
  ‘Power and Innovation.’
• Ixquick
  Probably the best.
• Ixquick Help Site
• Jux2
  ‘We created the jux2 meta search engine as a comparative research tool.’
• KartOO Visual Meta Search Engine
  Very good ‘interlinked’ sets of responses to queries which allow for further searching.
• Langenberg
  ‘Search and Get There Faster.’
• Metacrawler
• Power Search
• Quick Browse
  Single result page.
• Search.com
• SearchWolf
• The Info Com
  Metasearches of specialised engines.
• Vivisimo
• VROOSH ! [Canadian]
  Metacrawler and webcrawler.
• Webcrawler
• WebFerret
• Wormhole to the Rest of the Internet
  Not one engine, but access to a range of engines, metasearches, specialist searches and more.

The following provide help in finding a range of search engines. The first is probably the best.
• All Search Engines
• Beaucoup
  Also in 6 languages.
• Find Spot
• FinderSeeker
• ‘Invisible Web’ Search Engines
• Pandia
  All about Search Engines, Searching, Ranking and Optimisation.
• Search Engine Colossus
  Engines from 149 countries.
• Search Engine Guide
  1 000s of engines.
• Search Engines : Refdesk.com
• new !Search Engines & Specialized Directories
  Quite a huge listing, grouped under topic and other headings.
• Search Engines Worldwide
  From more than 100 countries.
• Special Search Engines
• The Big Hub
• The Invisible Web
  10 000+ in categories.