Searching the WWWSearching the WWW

Chapter 5

Search Engines

Software that lets a user specify search terms. The search engine then finds sites that contain those terms.

Over time a search engine builds a database of searchable terms that can be matched to web sites.

Search Engines (continued)

Examples: (pg. 202)– www.lycos.com– www.google.com

• PC World ranks as best

– www.altavista.com

Query

Terms entered into a form of a search engine’s web page.

Not necessarily phrased as a question since words such as “what”, “a”, “is” etc. would be ignored.

Enter specific keywords. Make sure your spelling is correct.

Terms

Hit (match)– URL returned by a search engine

Relevancy score– Value indicating how close of a match it

was to your query.

Not all search engines are the same.

Entering the same search query using different search engines will not produce the same list of sites.

Each search engine uses a different method when it comes to doing a search.

Not all search engines are the same. (continued)

As a result, you should use more than one search engine in order to do a thorough search.

Read the search rules of an individual search engine.

Methods of searching

Use more than one word. Use quotes Use boolean queries Use + sign or - sign Use * (wild card)

Boolean Query

AND, OR, NOT A AND B

– results in sites containing both A and B

A OR B – results in sites containing A or B, or both

A and B

A AND NOT B– results in sites containing A and excludes

sites containing both A and B.

+ sign or - sign

Use + in order to include a word “A”, “and” or “the” -- such words are

usually ignored by the search engine. To include, use +.

Use - in order to exclude a word

Stemming

Some search engines will return results that include variations on the endings of words.

computer computers computed

Wild Card *

Some search engines use the asterisk as a wild card to include variations on a word.

kayak* would search for kayaks, kayaking, kayaker.

Examples of possible search entries:

shelf ice– Results in URLs of pages containing the

words shelf and ice, or just the word “shelf” or just the word “ice”.

– Results in many hits

Using quotes

“shelf ice”– results in URLs of pages containing the

exact string “shelf ice”.

Using boolean queries

shelf AND ice– results in URLs of pages containing the word

“shelf” and the word “ice” (in any order). shelf OR ice

– Results in URLs of pages containing the words “shelf” and ”ice”, or just the word “shelf” or just the word “ice”.

computers NOT notebook– Results in URLs of pages containing the word

“computers” but not containing the word “notebook”.

More examples:

Elizabeth I– The “I” could be ignored.

Elizabeth +I– The “I” would be included.

Examples (continued)

Using Google– notebook computers = ? results– “notebook computers” = ? results– notebook AND computers = ? results– notebook OR computers = ? results

Metasearch Engines

Performs a search by using more than one search engine to do the search.– www.metasearch.com– www.metacrawler.com– www.dogpile.com– www.infind.com

• Pg 206

White Pages

Used for finding individuals (pg. 207)– www.bigfoot.com– www.four11.com– www.whowhere.com

Yellow Pages

Used for finding businesses– http://www.superpages.com/

Specialty Search Engines

Used for specific topics– News, shopping, travel ...– MySimon.com -- comparison shopping– MoreOver.com -- news– Travelocity.com -- airfares

Too Few Hits

Eliminate one or more keywords Try more general keywords Use a metasearch engine

Too many hits

Add more keywords May want to use “AND” and/or “NOT” May want to use + or - Capitalize proper nouns. Some search engines allow you to do a

search within a search.

4 Types of Links

1. Text Hyperlink

2. Image Hyperlink

3. Mailto Hyperlink – launches a mailer

4. Intra-document Link (Internal link) - links to another location within the same page.

Helpful Tip #1 !

To quickly find what you are looking for within a web page, you can do a search for a word or words within the page by doing the following:

To search for a word or words within a document

Go to: Edit Find in Page Enter the word or words you are

searching for. Click on “Find Next”.

Helpful Tip #2 !

You can open a web page in a separate browser window in order to continue viewing the original web page, while that page loads.

To open a web page in a new browser window.

Right-mouse click on the link of interest and then select “Open in new window”.

Click on the original browser window on the task bar below in order to continue viewing the original web page while that page loads.

This speeds up your search since you can view one page while another is loading.

To assist you in learning HTML, you can view other’s

HTML.

Right mouse-click on a web page (not on a link)

Click on “View Source”