Intermediate Internet Searching
How to really find information on the Internet
Contents on this page
- Do's and Don'ts
- Boolean Search
- Keyword or Robot based
- Directory-based
- Annotated directory-based
- Meta indexes
- Specialized search engines
- Specialized sites
Some Hints on Selecting Search Strategies
Interpretation of Search Results
Tutorials on Searching and Search engines
Size of Internet/World Wide Web
- Most experts agree that search engines index about 10% of web and that 10 million web pages are being added each day.
- Size of search engine databases
- Google 20-60 billion
- Gigablast 1 billion
- MSN 5 billion
- Exalead 8 billion
- Yahoo 2 million catalogued (somewhere between 4.2 and 19 billion uncatalogued)
Search strategies
Do not
- Use search button
- Use a string of keywords without specifying Boolean properties
- Use upper case unless part of strategy
- Use NOT or - unless absolutely sure is necessary
- Elimination of unanticipated pages
- Format is not standardized
Do
- Consider what type of resource will best answer your question and search for that resource (eg. dictionary or certain type of web page)
- Think of a list of keywords that will narrow or broaden your search keeping in mind that with the Internet, narrowing your search is usually better
- Stick to a small list of search engines and learn the search syntax (searching rules) for the search engine you’re using
Boolean Search
- Developed by mathematician George Boole
- Or widens a search
- AND and AND NOT narrows a search
- Parentheses used to group operations that have to be done together (Public libraries OR bookstores) AND (Ottawa OR Nepean OR Gloucester OR Goulbourn OR Carp)
Boolean AND
Boolean NOT
Search Engines
Definition: A program or web site that permits users to search for keywords on web pages throughout the World Wide Web.
Types of search engines
- Keyword or robot based (builds a database)
- Directory based (categories indexed by people rather than computer)
- Annotated directory-based search engines
- Meta indexes (can combine searches or allow you to search a variety of engines individually)
- Specialized search engines
Keyword or Robot-based Search Engines
- Large database of web pages
- No human involvement and no quality control
- Can submit website or will find some on own
- Searches full text to certain level, does not search deep or invisible web
- Google http://www.google.com/
- MSN http://www.msn.com/
- Exalead www.exalead.com
Google (www.google.com/)
- Presently largest database (ca. 20-60 billion) )
- Very sophisticated placement of results particularly good for popular sites, company sites
- Advanced search can limit search to title of page or to URL
- Implied AND
- + for stop words
- If you want OR needs to be expressed in caps
- Not case sensitive
- No stemming or truncation (except on ad hoc basis controlled by Google)
- Description shows keywords in context
- Cached pages helpful for sites not working or to quickly view highlighted keywords. .
- Searches some formats not found in other search engines (eg. Adobe acrobat and postscript files, Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents and rich text files)
- Innovative in new features (eg. Ability to convert measurements, eg. 4 miles in km) See www.google.ca/help/features.html for a description of features.
Directory-based Search Engines
- Indexed by individuals so subject searches will be more accurate
- Smaller database than Robot engines
- Used mainly for finding a good site on a general topic
- Yahoo (www.yahoo.com or ca.yahoo.com)
- About (about.com)
- Looksmart (www.looksmart.com)
Yahoo (ca.dir.yahoo.com or ca.yahoo.com)
- Most popular of directory based search engines
- Many different versions (international have same pages as others but local options are supplied first)
- Has developed a new search robot which competes favourably with the top search engines
- Can search by categories and move up and down the category structure by clicking on category and looking at hierarchy
About (about.com)
- Another popular directory-based search engine
- Volunteer guides responsible for finding good websites on appropriate subjects
Annotated Directory-based Search Engines
- Because annotated, database is even smaller than Directory-based engine
- Quality of web pages is better
- Web pages often rated
- Librarian’s Index to the Internet (lii.org)
- Internet Public Library (www.ipl.org/)
Librarians Index to the Internet (lii.org)
- Topical list of high quality websites with abstracts and qualitative analysis
- Can willow down by topic or use search capability
- Only websites which meet standards of editors are included
- Provides date site was added to index as well as date the lii entry was last updated
Meta Indexes
- One site searches more than one search engine
- Results can be separated or combined
- Sometimes a problem in interpreting question for all search engines
- Used if not sure which search engine will give you best results and/or for obscure topics
Meta Indexes Examples
- Dogpile (www.dogpile.com)
- Metacrawler ( www.metacrawler.com/index.html)
- Surfwax (www.surfwax.com)
- Clusty (www.clusty.com)
Specialized Search Engines
- Geographic (www.altavistacanada.com/, www.ottawastart.com/, maps.google.com/, maps.live.com)
- Phone directories (canada411.sympatico.ca)
- Newsgroup searching (groups.google.com)
- News searching (news.google.ca)
- Search engines with results in different formats (www.gimpsy.com/, www.kartoo.com/ www.answer.com and www.ask.com)
Specialized Sites
- Ottawa Public Library (www.biblioottawalibrary.ca)
- Reference tools (see library reference sites, eg. lii.org , www.ipl.org/div/subject/browse/ref00.00.00)
- Encyclopedias, Columbia encyclopedia ( www.bartleby.com/65/), Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)
- Financial information for public companies (www.sedar.com/ for Canada and www.sec.gov/edgar.shtml for U.S.
- Canadian information (opl.virtualreferencelibrary.ca/), Canadian information by subject (http://www.collectionscanada.ca/caninfo/esub.htm), Canadian encyclopedia online
(www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/)
Some Hints on Selecting Search Strategies
- For any page on a general topic that you need an introduction to, try a Directory-based search engine. If do not need specific quality you can use an address bar search
- For the web page of a major company or organization, try Google or Yahoo
- For a specific web page that would not necessarily be popular try Yahoo or Google
- For health topics try a health website engine like www.medbroadcast.com/or the Canadian Health Network (www.canadian-health-network.ca/customtools/homee.html), or the library’s health databases or the health links listed in the Virtual Reference Library located at opl.virtualreferencelibrary.ca.
- For an answer to a specific question try Answers.com (http://www.answers.com/bb/ ) or Ask (www.ask.com).
- For very obscure topic topics try Google or Yahoo or one of the meta indexes (Also don’t forget our electronic databases)
- For the answer to a specific question try Brainboost (www.brainboost.com) or Ask (www.ask.com)
- For items in databases try to find the correct host or search a special site for invisible web sites (eg. infomine.ucr.edu)
Interpretation of search results
- Look at results and reformat search using things like searching within results, suggestions to narrow your search and adding new keywords
- Analytically choose which sites to look at in result list
- Anatomy of URL domain + type of name = name or organization followed by the type of organization.
Some popular suffixes are .com for commercial sites, .edu for universities (mainly American), .net for network infrastructure organizations, .org for non-profit organizations, .gov for American government sites. .gc.ca for Canadian federal government sites, .ca for Canadian sites and .on.ca for Ontario sites - Consider things like the authority of the author, the currency of the information, and the reason for creating the website (implications for bias)
- Do not look through pages and pages of results. If first three pages are not promising redo search (see the first point on interpreting results)
Some Useful Tutorials for Searching
- See “Learning to search” section of Collection of special search engines (www.leidenuniv.nl/ub/biv/specials.htm)
- Web searching tips (searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=facts)
- Net tutor (gateway.lib.ohio-state.edu/tutor/les5/)
- In the Virtual Reference Library referred to on our website (opl.virtualreferencelibrary.ca), look under the category Computers, Internet and Search Engines for World Wide Web and under that category for Learn to Use the Web.
To Find More Info on Search Engines
- Search Engine Watch (www.searchenginewatch.com)
- Search Engine Showdown (www.searchengineshowdown.com)
For More Help on Searching
- Contact the Reference Dept. of the Main Branch by dialing 613-580-2424, ext 32164 by email or by instant messaging.
- Consult this web page and other specialized web presentations on the library’s web page under the category Info in depth at http://www.biblioottawalibrary.ca/connect/online_resources/subject_e.cfm.