How to search the web

Have you ever tried looking for a web site online, only to find that it takes forever, or you go to many sites that do not have the information you really need?  This page will give you quick and simple directions for how to effectively and easily search the web for whatever you're looking for.

 

Search engines

When you search the web for something, you will be using a "Search Engine".  A search engine works to find anything and everything you want to know about a specific topic, based on whatever words or phrase you give it.  The only problem is, if you don't give the search engine enough information, or the wrong information (if you misspell the word), it can't find the right sites for you.

Let's look at some good search engines.   A good web page that has a lot of search engines all listed together is at the University of California, Berkeley, web site.  Click on http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/Help/search.html to see that page.

 

Some of the better search engines include:

 

Google is one of the most popular search engines out there.  Try this one first. (http://www.google.com)

 

A new "up and comer" in the web search ring is "Alltheweb".  It's a good one. (http://www.alltheweb.com)

 

AltaVista is in connection with Alltheweb. (http://www.altavista.com)

 

Teoma lists search results on the number of other sites which link to a site you are searching. (http://www.teoma.com)

 

Vivisimo is what is known as a "meta-search" engine.  It will "query" (ask) other search engines for results about what you are searching for, and then give you the results for all. (http://www.vivisimo.com)

 

SurfWax is another meta-search engine.  (http://www.surfwax.com)

 

"About.com" lists over a million web pages. (http://www.about.com)

 

is a well known meta-search engine which has been around for some time. (http://www.dogpile.com)

 

"Ask Jeeves for Kids" is a unique search engine in which you ask a question, and "Jeeves" finds the answer for you. (http://www.ajkids.com)

 

Search engine tips

What the search engine does when you type in a query is list every "hit" with every word.  For example, if you typed George Rogers Clark in Google, you might get a lot of hits for George Rogers Clark, but you might also get a lot of hits for people named "George" or "Rogers" as well as George Rogers Clark. 

That makes for a lot of hits you don't need.

Here are some tips to make searching easier:

  1. Try putting the query in quotation marks.  For example, when you type George Rogers Clark in Google, it returns nearly 613,000 hits.  If you put the words "George Rogers Clark" in quotes, the number drops to only about 44,000.  That's still a lot, but the number still is only about 7% of the original number.

  2. Try using + or - (plus or minus) between words.  That tells some search engines to either link (add) the words together, or subtract them from the query.

  3. Try a "Boolean" search.  In a Boolean search, you would add the words AND, OR, NOT to the query.  For example, if you wanted to do a search on Tecumseh, but not get results for "Tecumseh High School" try typing "Tecumseh NOT High School".

  4. Sometimes you can get better results for complex queries by putting some of the words in parenthesis, for example, schools and (Vigo or Franklin) would bring up results with the words school and either Vigo or Franklin (or sometimes all three).

  5. Use "fields".  For example, if you want a page with a picture of a subject you might want to try image: Red Skelton, and that may bring up pictures of Red.  (Type image: Red Skelton) for that.  If you want to find pages that link to a subject, type link: subject (for example link: Red Skelton)  Type related: web page to find web pages related to a web site you're interested in (for example related: www.vcsc.k12.in.us)

  6. Many web search engines have their own little tricks and formats, so do some experimenting to find what works.

 

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