How to use Alta Vista

Go to Alta Vista

Quick Search Form:
	Input
	Sort On
In Brief: The AltaVista search engine, developed by Digital Corp., is one of the most powerful and flexibile of the major global WWW search engines on the Net today. The AltaVista indexes are updated on a daily basis. Database entries are gathered by a web crawler styled "Scooter" which enters a WWW site and thoroughly indexes the page contents. The frequencies and proximities of significant words are tallied and form the basis of the order of display in search results from the engine. AltaVista claims the largest Web index with over 31 million entries to WWW pages on over 620,000 servers worldwide. It also indexes approximately 4 million articles posted to 14,000 Usenet newsgroups daily and maintains them for several weeks. The site is accessed for searches over 30 million times every week day. The search engine permits the use of proximity operators as well as Boolean operators. Term truncation and nesting are permitted. Uniquely, AltaVista also allows the user to designate terms on which to sort search output. This helps to place sites and articles of the most interest at the top of the output listing.

How to use Excite!

Go to Excite!

Quick Search Form:
	Input
In Brief: The Excite! search engine developed by Excite Inc. uses a web crawler to build its indexes to WWW sites. It also offers Web Reviews of more than 60,000 of the highest rated sites on the Net in a variety of categories. Displayed on the home page are current headlines from its News Tracker service. Excite claims to be the most comprehensive search tool on the Net with over 50 million Web sites indexed. The Excite search engine uses artificial intelligence technology styled "ICE" (Intelligent Concept Extraction) to establish relationships among the terms its web crawler finds on indexed pages. The search engine handles entered phrases and finds the closest matches using fuzzy logic. This makes Excite particularly easy for novices to use since it partially compensates for poorly formed queries. Search results in the output listing are sorted by relevance. The search engine establishes a relative relevance for closeness of fit to the query. Excite allows the user to find sites similar to any on the output listing using pattern matching techniques with its "More Like This" option. This is a particularly useful feature. Search results can be sorted by site which makes reviewing results easier. The search engine supports standard Boolean operators and nesting. Proximity searching is accomplished using bound phrases in quotes. Advanced search options allow searchers to require or disallow terms using + and - prefixes.

How to use HotBot

Go to HotBot

Quick Search Form:
	Input
In Brief: HotBot is a relative newcomer to the array of global WWW search engines. It was developed by Inktomi Corp., formerly part of the Network of Workstations (NOW) Project at the University of California Berkeley. The Inktomi search engine is no more. HotBot, which styles itself "The Wired Search Engine" and claims to have the "largest and most complete index of world wide web document contents in the world," replaces the old Inktomi search engine entirely. The new search engine uses a web crawler called "Slurp," incorporating Inktomi's "SmartCrawl" technology to visit sites and index their content for the search engine. The webcralwer uses artificial intelligence features to record geographic information, urls and domain names, file names and file types found, page features such as Java scripts, VRML, embeds, etc. This information is accessible through HotBot's search control panel. The power of the control panel features adds significant value to this global search engine. Searches can be honed to a very sharp edge but this may require some advanced knowledge of the Net. HotBot's help pages provide a good basic understanding of many advanced Net features accessible through the search engine's control panel.

How to use Infoseek

Go to Infoseek

Quick Search Form:
	Input
In Brief: The Infoseek search engine is produced by Infoseek Corporation. The search engine made its debut in 1994. Infoseek's indexes are generated by a web crawler, like other top-ranked engines. Infoseek boasts that it maintains the Web's largest organized directory of sites. A wide variety of starting point categories are displayed on the search page. Windows 95 and NT Net users can add Infoseek's search capability to the location bar of their high end (> 3.0) browser by downloading Quickseek software. Infoseek supports standard Boolean operators and nested logic. Proximity searching is permitted through entry of bound phrases in quotes. Proper names are indicated to the engine through capitalization of terms. Advanced search features allow terms to be required or excluded. Fielded searches can be performed on all indexed fields. This is an extremely powerful feature shared only by the now defunct Open Text index. The Infoseek search engine ranked consistently among the top three search engines on the tests reported here.

How to use Lycos

Go to Lycos

Quick Search Form:
	Input
Match: Loose Fair Good Close Strong
In Brief: The Lycos search engine was developed at Carnegie Mellon University but is now independent. It was one of the first engines developed for the Net. Lycos styles itself "Your Personal Guide to the Internet" and claims to have "the most complete catalog of website addresses available today." That statement is questionable. In addition to its search engine, Lycos also provides 18 topical guides accessible from its search form pages. These are produced and updated by an editorial team which also provides reviews of the Top 5% Sites. Lycos provides two directory services: A2Z and Point. The distinction between these services is not clear. The engine does not permit the use of Boolean operators or nested search logic and has no mechanism for direct proximity searching using bound phrases or proximity operators. This places the search engine at a significant disadvantage relative to others because it is considerably less precise. The construction of the power search form is arcane. One of the good features of the engine is that is allows the user to govern the closeness of fit among the terms entered. This, in part, makes up for lack of direct proximity searching and Boolean constructions.

How to use WebCrawler

Go to WebCrawler

Quick Search Form:
	Input
In Brief: WebCrawler was begun in 1994 at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington. It was the very first full text search engine available on the Net. WebCrawler was purchased by America Online in 1995 and became part of Excite Corp. in 1997. The WebCrawler indexes are built both by user submissions and by "Spidey" the web crawler, featured on the very inviting search interfaces. WebCrawler searches employ artificial intelligence technologies from Personal Library Software (PLS). Boolean operators, nested logic, proximity operators and bound phrases are all supported in search queries but it is not possible to disengage or override the PLS fuzzy logic capability which purports to allow natural language searching. WebCrawler displays maps interactively when the logic detects a geographic reference. A formless search option is available. There is extensive online help for general searching and advanced search techniques. WebCrawler allows users with high end browsers that support cookies to set search preferences.

How to use Web Search

Go to Web Search

Quick Search Form:
	Input
In Brief: Web Search   is the only meta search engine at which you can submit your listings directly to its database.  Web Search also designs and sells customized search engines and forms for individuals and businesses.  It is simple to maintain even a very large search database on the Internet using Web Search's tab-delimited text database format (which can be opened and edited in any spreadsheet program).  The search is run entirely through the interaction and integration of a form and CGI script.  The search output is completely customizable.  Since Web Search's engine is run by a script, certain variables or input can be customized as well, including number of results per page, or display characteristics.  Any data in the database can be included or excluded from a search by altering form input.

How to use Yahoo!

Go to Yahoo!

Quick Search Form:
	Input
In Brief: Yahoo!'s general search engine is powered by OpenText but most advanced search features are not engaged. The search indexes are built primarily by user submissions and supplemented with a web crawler that searches unspecified sources for new page announcements. In addition to the general search engine Yahoo! presents a highly structured, hierarchical subject directory to "tens of thousands" of WWW sites. The user browses through a series of cascading menus in the branching subject hierarchies to locate the desired site listings. Yahoo!'s directory is an outgrowth one of the earliest attempts at categorizing information found on the Internet at Stanford Univerisity and is still considered a superb starting point, especially for novice users. Searches can be performed on only the Yahoo! directory or the whole Internet, including Usenet newsgroups and e-mail addresses. The search engine uses standard Boolean operators and supports nested logic. Proximity searches can be done on bound phrases. Prefixes allow search terms to be spedifically required or excluded from the result. There is no option to limit or enhance search results.