CCPLS - Searching the Internet

Searching the Internet

The Major Search Engines
Directories	Metacrawlers and Metasearchers
Children's Search Engines	Specialty Search Engines

Major Search Engines:

Also called "spiders" or "crawlers," search engines constantly visit web sites on the Internet in order to create catalogs of web pages. Because they run automatically and index so many web pages, search engines may often find information not listed in directories.

Alta Vista	large number of hits use quotes"" for a phrase relevancy rating good help section
Google	advanced searching personalizable can limit by language image searching
HotBot	can limit by date and/or geographically "More Options" button allows you to further narrow your search updated frequently
Go	reviews and recommends some sites searches much the same as Alta Vista, only simpler
Ask	allows you to ask a question in plain English

Directories:

Unlike search engines, directories are created by humans. Sites must be submitted, then they are assigned to an appropriate category or categories. Because of the human role, directories can often provide better results than search engines.

Yahoo	the oldest, largest major web site directory
About.com	a powerful network of 500 Guides - smart, passionate, accomplished people who are experts in their field
Go	runs a directory separate from its search engine
LookSmart	Reader's Digest-backed closest rival to Yahoo in terms of a human-compiled directory
Excite	features yellow pages, email lookup, people find

Metacrawlers and Metasearchers:

Unlike search engines, metacrawlers don't crawl the web themselves to build listings. Instead, they allow searches to be sent to several search engines all at once. The results are then blended together onto one page. Below are some of the major metacrawlers.

MetaCrawler	a good general searching tool, but limits the number of "hits" per search engine
Dogpile	customizable list of 25 search engines, directories and specialty search sites without limiting number of "hits" can be overwhelming if you are not looking for something obscure.
Excite Metasearch	Search Wizard automatically suggests words you may want to add to your search relevancy rating good help section

Children's Search Engines & Directories

The search engines and directories below are designed primarily to serve the needs of children, either in focus, or by filtering out sites that some parents and teachers might find inappropriate for kids. Most are actually directories to make searching easier.

KidsClick!	Over 2,000 sites in various categories
Ask For Kids	answers questions in simple English
Yahoo Kids	designed for ages 7 to 12 sites appropriate for children oldest directory for children
Education World	searchable by grade level
IPL Kidspace	designed for kids ages 4 to 14 sites are arranged by subject.
KidsKonnect	quality sites in an array of topic areas

Specialty Search Engines

Froogle	Smart shopping through Google.
Google Catalogs	Search and browse mail-order catalogs online
Google Groups	contains the entire archive of Usenet discussion groups dating back to 1981
Google Image Search	The most comprehensive image search on the web

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