The Most Popular Search Engines and Directories

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Managing Your "Bookmarks" or "Favorites"

Browser Preference Setting for Netscape and Internet Explorer

Understanding How Search Engines and Directories Work

Developing Your Internet Searching Strategy

Hands-on Searching Using Major Search Engines, Directories, and Telnet

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The Most Popular Search Engines and Directories

Popular Search Engines

There are a number of popular web-based search engines which have a variety of unique features, as well as differences in the way they gather information and are used. We will now look at each of these in more detail. Just click on the names of the search engines below to learn more about them, and return to this page to move on to the next item on the list. There are suggested hands-on exercises on the pages describing each of these search engines. Use the search engines to search for the suggested terms, or any others you may be interested in researching. As you work through the suggested exercises, you may find it easier to search for the suggested terms if you use the following simple procedure:

Highlight the suggested search terms by clicking and dragging your mouse across them.
Copy them using the Copy option in your browser's Edit pulldown menu.
Paste them into the search terms field on the search engine screen, using the Paste option of the Edit pulldown menu.

AltaVista

Infoseek

Lycos

Excite

Below you will find a table which provides a brief comparison of these four search engines.

Search Engine	Boolean Operators	Other Interesting or Unique Features
AltaVista	AND (&), OR (\|), AND NOT (&!), NEAR (~), use of quotes (" ") for phrases, and nesting of Boolean operators within parentheses( ), use of * to perform searches using "word stems" (e.g. librar* will return results with the words library as well as libraries).	Ability to search in specified domains or locations within web pages using special functions (see AltaVista's Advanced Help document). Easy to link with related Usenet Newsgroup discussions from search results page.
Infoseek	Use of + before required search terms, use of - before search terms to be excluded, use of quotes (" ") for phrases.	Easy to refine search results using the "search only within these pages" feature. Attempt to make use of Boolean operators easier by various options in pulldown menus, used to build queries on the advanced search form.
Lycos	AND, OR, NOT, NEAR (within 25 words - NEAR5 would specify that the words should only be within 5 words of each other), FAR (25 or more words apart), BEFORE, ADJ (meaning adjacent, in any order - ADJ2 would specify that the "adjacent" words could be within 2 words of each other), ONEAR, OFAR, OADJ (O adds the functionality of BEFORE to these operators), use of + before required search terms, use of - before search terms to be excluded, use of quotes (" ") for phrases.	*Ability to use "natural language" (versus pure Boolean terminology). Indexes "gopher" and "ftp" servers on the Internet, reducing the need to learn how to use the more antiquated search tools known as "Veronica" (which indexes"gopher" sites), and "Archie" (which indexes "ftp" sites with downloadable software or files). Good ability to search for picture and sound files on the Internet! Easy to refine search results using the "search the search results" and other features (see Lycos' "Refine Your Search" document.
Excite	Excite's Help documentation still talks about the use of the following Boolean operators in their "Advanced Search" form, but this form appears to have been removed from service and replaced by the "Power Search" form, which explicitly disallows the use of these operators: AND, AND NOT, OR, use of + before required search terms, use of - before search terms to be excluded, use of quotes (" ") for phrases, and nesting of Boolean operators within parentheses( ). Boolean-style queries can still be built	*This is the search tool to use if you really feel uncomfortable using Boolean operators. Similar or equivalent functionality is built into various pulldown menus on fields of the "Power Search" form. Ability to search for ideas and concepts, not just keywords, using natural language queries. *Ability to recognize words as names when their first letters are capitalized - it then searches for occurrences of the words together. Relevance rating displayed by percent.

Popular Directories

We will now also look more detail at a couple of the most popular subject directories on the Internet. These two are very broad in their scope. The Nu Connexions Links Pages also provide links to a number of other directories more focussed on healthcare, nutrition or the food industry. Just click on the names of the directories below to learn more about them, and return to this page to move on to the next item on the list. There are suggested hands-on exercises on the pages describing each of these directories. Use the directories to search for the suggested terms, or any others you may be interested in researching.

Yahoo!

Magellan

Sites for Conducting Searches Using Multiple Engines or Directories

There are a number of sites known as "meta" searching tools listed on the Nu Connexions Links Pages, which can be used to perform "heavy duty" concurrent searches utilizing some of the most popular search engines and directories. Use their component search engines in the manner outlined for each of them above. Please note that due to the fact that these use multiple search engines and directories, their response times may be quite slow if one or more of the services they tap into is being heavily used at the time.

Accessing Library Catalogue Systems Through Internet Telnet Resources

A growing number of larger libraries around the world have their online catalogue systems available via telnet. Telnet allows remote users to actually login to the library's catalogue system as if they were using a terminal within the library itself. HyTelnet is an Internet site that allows you to easily locate such library catalogue systems and find out how to login to them. Click on the HyTelnet link above to learn more about it!