This document discusses search engines and provides information on their definition, history, importance, types and how to use them. It describes how search engines work by using automated software programs called spiders or crawlers to travel the web and index pages to create a searchable database. The first search tools were Archie in 1990 and Veronica and Jughead in 1991. Search engines are important because they allow users to easily find needed information from the vast web. The main types are crawler-based like Google and Yahoo, directory-based which rely on human editors, hybrid which use both, and meta search engines that search multiple databases at once. Examples are provided of search engine features and how to perform advanced searches using operators.