_SearchLight_
Welcome to your search assistant, SearchLight, designed
by Professor Wayne Hayes of
Ramapo College as part of
ProfWork, my ongoing effort to bring
instructional technology to my teaching and your learning.
I designed SearchLight for all--especially my students--to find
what they need on the sprawling, anarchic, voluminous World Wide Web. I know
from experience how frustrating but rewarding a search can be, so I put
together this page to help pass my insights along to you. I hope you are happy
with it. Kindly tell me what worked and
what did not. Happy hunting.
For an overview on faculty using the web in their work, see my
Faculty Develoment
Center on the site of the New Jersey
Virtual University. If you want a short, crisp, thorough overview of
searching, the Fondren
Library at Rice University stands out.
The Major Search Engines
These are among the leading search engines as of Fall, 1999. Expect
changes, but I will update periodically. My order and comments reflect my study
and experience, but also see Rice University's Library for an authoritative
overview.
- Google! enjoys a rep for
results and is my favorite for a simple, effective
search.
- AltaVista, the search
engine of choice in advanced mode, has changed its format and design to
compete with Yahoo as a portal. Users
need training, however, to get results here. This is a powerful tool,
but the advanced features and Boolean searching must be mastered. For example,
using the search command "domain:edu" to get strictly academic sites screens
out much junk. Setting a recent date isolates up-to-date sources.
- A simple place to start, and get quick results, is
Ask Jeeves, a very intelligent gateway
to search engines.
- Some meta-search pre-search tools structure your keywords,
then send them to a series of search engines. Gateways to try:
Ask Jeeves,
DogPile, and
WebCrawler.
- HotBot has the largest
database of any search engine (AltaVista is next) and is probably easier to use
than AltaVista. However, Boolean searches must be learned, so I still advocate
AltaVista.
- Lycos, the legendary spider,
has full Boolean capacity, a large database, and is user-friendly. Lycos
aspires to a future as a Yahoo-like portal.
- A Norwegian newcomer, Fast
offers astonishing speed accessing an enormous database. My last search
gathered 862,348 drops in .6 seconds. The user has little control over the
selection of search criteria, however.
- Some on-line services, such as AOL, use the very simple
concept search method of
Excite, which is good for rookies but
bad for serious research. Excite indexes less than half the number of
pages as does AltaVista or HotBot. Excite permits searching their selected or
best sites and does allow the serious searcher to narrow down the list
of hits.
- NorthernLight simple
search page is perhaps the best of the rest, also try the
Northern Light power search
page. Although now well known, this search engine should be near the top.
Try it.
- A quick way to build a bibliography is to search
(or browse) Amazon.com. No kidding, this
is a fast way to locate books in print around topics of interest.
Browsing
Browsing means to drill
down into categories and subtopics, branching into a more detailed topic
definitions. Information professionals have screened all the sites listed and
the payoff can be higher than a broad-based search. Here are some
browsing tools:
- Yahoo is the industry standard for browsing, with the most elaborate and
up-to-date collection of categories, including some really nifty stuff.
Browse Yahoo frequently. Many savvy users set Yahoo as their
customized portal, or start page, to the Web. Consider it.
- Visit WebGems
a highly selective, more academic and professional, alternative to
Yahoo.
- The Argus
Clearinghouse came out of a library science program, went commercial, and
is loaded with gems. Their highly selected sites are rated and reviewed. You
can learn a whole lot of good practices by simply browsing the sites listed in
this relatively unknown research tool.
- Keep in mind that the search engines above will almost
always provide categories for browsing and may eventually catch up to Yahoo.
Not soon, though.
You should consult reviews and
tutorials to provide valuable tips on how to use what search or browse
tools.
ProfWork, by Wayne Hayes, Ph.D.
profwork@yahoo.com
March 13, 2001
