2. What are search engines?
S It is basically a type of program that uses keywords to
search for documents that relate to these keywords and
then puts the results found in the order of relevance to
the topic that was searched for.
S Examples :
- Google
- Alta Vista
3. Importance of search engines
S Search engines are important because with over 8 billion
web pages available, it would be impossible to search for
the information that is specifically needed. This is why
search engines are used to filter the information that is on
the internet and transform it into results that each
individual can easily access and use within the matter of
seconds.
4. Types of search engines
S Crawler based search engines
S Directories
S Specialty search engines
S Hybrid search engines
S Meta search engines
5. Crawler based search engines
S Are search engines that use software programs that are called,
“Spiders”, “crawlers”, “Robots”, “Bots”. These programs can
access the webpages to categorize and analyze them and
then add them in the search engine data base, where any user
can find them when searching. The Crawler based search
engines are constantly updated with new webpage that would
be available in their database.
S Examples:
- Google
- Yahoo
- Ask.com
6. Google
S Google began in January 1996 as a research project.
S Founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
S Most popular search engine.
S Google's homepage includes a button labeled "I'm Feeling Lucky". When
a user types in a search and clicks on the button the user will be taken
directly to the first search result.
S Besides the main search-engine feature of searching for text, Google
Search has more than 22 "special features” like: weather, unit conversion,
currency conversion, time, calculator, maps, and sports scores.
7. Yahoo!
S In January 1994, Jerry Yang and David Filo, Stanford
University graduates, created a website called “David and
Jerry’s Guide to the World Wide Web”, in Sunnyvale, California.
S In April 1994, “David and Jerry’s Guide to the World Wide Web”
was renamed to “Yahoo!”
S Yahoo! provides Internet communication services such as
Yahoo! Messenger and Yahoo! Mail.
S Yahoo! Offers social networking services such as My Web,
Yahoo! Personals, and Flickr.
8. Ask.com
S a question and answer focused search engine.
S Founded in 1998 by Garrett Gruener and David Warthen
in Berkeley, California.
9. Directories
S Are websites sectioned in specific categories by human
editors and are then place in the “Directories” database.
S Examples:
- Yahoo Directory (www.Yahoo.com)
- Open directory (www.dmoz.org)
10. Specialty search engines
S They help the user search in different areas in specific
types of lists that are specialized in specific topic that
would be beneficial for narrowing down the searching
process.
S Examples:
- Askjeeves (Question and answer search engine)
- Medhunt (Provides only medical information)
11. Hybrid search engines
S Are search engines that use both crawler based
searches and directory searches to obtain their results.
S Example:
- Yahoo.com
- Google.com
12. Meta search engines
S Are search engines that combine all the results from
other search engines into one big list.
S Examples:
- Metacrawler
- Dogpile
13. How to use search engines
1) Be specific:
When searching on a search engine be more specific in wording, such as using school
science fair projects instead of science projects.
2) Use the + symbol and - symbol:
If you want to use two words in a search, you can use the + symbol before each word so
that only web pages that have both words appear. Example: +fruits +vegetables. On the
other hand you can use the – symbol if you are looking for a topic such as Shakespeare
and just want to search for his sonnets you can search for it as – Shakespeare –
sonnets. The result will have only information that you need and no info that is irrelevant
to the topic.
3) Use Quotation marks:
The quotation marks are used if you want to search for specific phrases. Example: “Mark
Krikorian biography”
4) Combining symbols: you can combine all the symbols explained above to do the
search your own way.
14. Boolean searches
S Boolean searches use the “Boolean operators” (And, Or,
Not and Near) to combine words and make the search
topic more specific and limited for the user.
15. Boolean Operators
S And is equal to the + symbol
S Not is equal to the – symbol
S OR means that the search engines automatically return
to the words that you type in.
S Near is equal to putting quotes for a specific phrase such
as “Shakespeare sonnets”
16. Sources
S Kidz World. (n.d.). Kidz World. Retrieved November 21, 2011, from
www.kidzworld.com/article/1900-search-engine-tutorial
S Inestasia. (n.d.). inestasia. Retrieved November 14, 2011, from
www.inetasia.com/NewsandEvents/importance-of-search-engine.html
S websearch. (n.d.). websearch. Retrieved November 14, 2011, from
websearch.about.com/od/2/g/boolean.htm
S Webopedia. (n.d.). webopedia. Retrieved November 14, 2011, from
http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/S/se
S zeald. (n.d.). zeald. Retrieved November 14, 2011, from
www.zeald.com/Blog/x_post/types-of-search-engines.html
