Metasearch Engines
Metasearch engines provide the functionality of several search engines on one convenient location. The following is a list of a variety of metasearch engines. Grokker allows users to search Yahoo, Wikipedia, and Amazon Books both independently and concurrently, providing a wide range of results. In addition, users have the option of viewing results in a list format, or in a relevance map, which can be exported or e-mailed. Ixquick translates your power search syntax across all of its targeted search engines, allowing for more precise searching. Also, Ixquick assigns simple star ratings to results that are in the top ten of any given search engine. Thus, any result with five stars was a top ten result on five different engines. Additionally, Ixquick allows the user to approve or reject clusters of results, thus narrowing their searches. Clusty takes its results from several search engines much like a regular meta search engine. What makes it different, however, is how that information is presented to the user; by grouping the results into easily navigable "clusters," the user is able to find the results most relevant to their search, while also discovering unexpected relationships and / or pages that would have otherwise been missed altogether. Sidekiq creates a collapsable tab on the side of the user's browser window and provides them with search options from an extremely wide variety of different search engines, from very general, to very specific, all by simply clicking on the type of search desired. (eg. Alexa visual search, or google images) Srchr allows users to compile groups of search engines from which to search by using a simple drag and drop interface. Users are also able to add sites to the search pool manually by URL. powered by Google, OiHoi uses a system of keywords to submit queries across a wide range of search engines, providing the user with a wide variety of results. The user has the option of submitting their own keywords, or browsing through OiHoi's comprehensive list of powerful keywords. Releton search uses a database of over 8 million commonly keywords, and has used statistical inference to relate those keywords to a much larger pool of over 500 million keywords, allowing Releton to scientifically narrow down searches through advanced studies in semantics. After being processed, searches are submitted to both Yahoo and Google, and the user is given the opportunity to decide the percentage of representation given to each search engine. Goyams allows the user to search Google, Yahoo, and MSN simultaneously, while controlling what percentage of the final result each search engine provides. Turboscout can generate results from over 90 different search engines, translating the user's query to be suitable for each one. The user simply chooses a category, enters their query, and then browses through results from different engines. Through an unobtrusive graphic interface, Ujiko allows users to submit searched across a wide variety of search engines, and to trim results based on relevance through the list of keywords in the centre of the display. As the user mouses over each keyword, the graphic display illustrates which of the displayed results is associated with that keyword. Url.com submits queries to Google, Yahoo, and MSN, and returns results based on the rankings given by those sites and its users. After navigating to a returned page, a small bar is displayed at the top of the user's browser, with which the user is asked to rate the returned site either positively or negatively. Metaglossary scans the web for sites and articles containing definitions of terms, words, and acronyms, and returns meaningful and concise definitions. Users can rate results based on their usefulness, thus improving the engine. Pronto.com is a meta search engine for shopping. By submitting its queries to over 65,000 online stores, Pronto allows its users to comparison shop like no other site does. Additionally, through its rating system, users provide feedback about the products returned by searches, helping to make future searches even more relevant. Mamma calls itself "the mother of all search engines," but is in fact an intelligent meta search engine that compiles, analizes, and trims results from several search engines, sorting for relevance and removing duplicates before returning responses to the user in a uniform output. Tagjag is a meta search engine that allows users to query an ever-expanding base of over 250 search engines. Results are arranged into categories, and are then further broken down into groupings according to their source search engines. Easily the most popular meta search engine on the internet, Dogpile searches 6 of the internet's biggest search engines in order to return more relevant and accurate results. Whonu seeks to provide the power and advantages of a myriad of different search engines all in one simple interface. Easily navigable, Whonu provides an excellent platform for becoming acquainted with new search engines and styles. Trexy generates results from over 4,000 search engines, and keeps track of the browsing behaviour of users when presented with results. The browsing patterns, known as trails, are stored and can be shared with other users to prevent them from having to follow the same logical process to arrive at a result that had already been achieved. Zapmeta pulls its results from 8 of the world's top search engines, and provides users with a simple interface with which to interact with the engine. Users have to option of searching either the web, or shopping. Zuula.com submits a user's query to eight of the top search engines on the internet, and displays the results from each in a separately navigable tab, allowing the user to actively cross-reference the lists of results and decide on each item's relevance for themselves. Omni Medical Search is a meta search engine that focuses entirely on medical issues.
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