What do you need to find, and what do you already know?
|
What is the best resource to make use of?
|
| I know what I'm looking for, and I can describe it with
some key words |
Google is always a good bet,
since it has the largest index. |
| Yahoo Search is useful if Google
doesn't do it for you. |
| MSN Search is getting better and
may provide results if the other two don't work. |
| I have an exact phrase that I want to search for |
Any of the above, with "double quotes" around the phrase
will do the trick. |
| I want a quick factual answer |
Microsoft
Encarta provides factual information to questions |
| Ask Jeeves can sometimes be worth
asking, if you tightly phrase your question |
| Brainboost is new, but seems
to work quite well. |
| Factbites is also new. Good
for very specific search terms |
| Answers.com Good standby. Viewed
by many as the resource for facts |
| I want to compare results from different search
engines |
Dogpile's missing pieces
Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves. NEW! |
| Thumbshots Ranking
compares results from Google, Yahoo, Alltheweb, AltaVista, MSN, Teoma,
Wisenut. |
| TurboScout allows you to type
in the search once, then run it across 23 different search engines. |
| Jux2 has now ceased operation unfortunately. |
| I want an overview of a subject. |
Yahoo Directory provides 14 main
categories |
| Google Directory provides
access to 16 main categories |
| The Open Directory Project provides
access to 16 main categories |
| I want some suggested categories to narrow my
search |
Clusty suggests narrower topics to
search under |
| Teoma suggests categories and
collections of resources by experts |
| Wisenut also has category
suggestions |
| I want a small collection of websites I can look at |
Any of the three engines above will give you access to websites,
rather than pages |
| I need recent additions to search engines |
GooFresh from
Research Buzz for new additions to Google |
| Exalead Advanced
Search to limit by time |
| AlltheWeb
Advanced Search has a date limiting function |
| I want to see thumbnails of pages before visiting
them |
Icerocket automatically
provides thumbnails |
| Exalead will
show thumbnails and loads the page locally for you to see it |
| ZapMeta has a quick view option |
| I want to do a comprehensive search across search
engines |
eZ2Find is a meta search engine with
access to 6 major engines |
| Ixquick has a nunber of UK based
engines in its collection |
| Fazzle gives you a percentage
result |
| I want to re-rank or re-order my results |
Exalead Advanced
re-ranks by date |
| MSN Search Builder re-orders
on update/popularity/accuracy |
| Google Personalized
will re-rank based on your interests |
| ZapMeta re-ranks on popularity,
title, source, domain |
| I want a more personalised search experience |
Personalised Google
Emphasis subject areas of importance |
| Eurekster is good for groups
of people |
| My Jeeves storage, access from
different computers |
| I don't know how to spell what I'm looking for |
Exalead Advanced
search allows you to search for approximate spelling or phonetic
spelling |
| The Reverse
Dictionary will suggest words based on your suggestions |
| Dictionary.com can suggest
correct spellings for you |
| I want a visual representation of my results |
Kartoo provides a visual
indication of importance of results and links between them |
| Mooter provides an initial visual
representation |
| WebBrain displays a visual
representation above, and links below |
| I need to search for different file formats |
Google
Advanced search for .pdf .ps .doc .xls .ppt .rtf |
| Exalead Advanced
for .txt .pdf .doc .xls .ppt .rtf .wpd .swf |
| I need to find websites that I can trust |
Pinakes
provides a list of Virtual Libraries with links to sites chosen by
experts |
| Librarians' Index to the Internet sites
are chosen by librarians |
| The World Wide Web Virtual Library
provides access to virtual libraries |
| I need access to academic resources |
Infomine for scholarly internet
resource collections |
| Scirus provides access to
scientific information |
| Google Scholar provides
access to scholarly articles |
| SMEALSearch for
Academic business information |
| I want to search geographically |
Country search engines
is my list of over 2,500 country search engines |
| Teoma Advanced has
a regional search option |
| Many search engines have regional versions - replace the .com with the
country code |
| I want to search the hidden web or the invisible
web |
Turbo10 searches over 700 deep web
search engines |
| Invisible Web is a small
collection of high quality resources |
| eZ2Find suggests appropriate
databases once a search has been run |
| ProFusion has access
to hundreds of specialised search engines |
| I need to find images |
Google Images has over 1
billion indexed |
| Yahoo
Search has over 1.5 billion images |
| Fagan Finder lists
several dozen good engines |
| I need to find moving images |
Yahoo! Video Search broad
search |
| Google Video Search for recent
television programmes |
| Blinkx TV video search |
| I need to find sounds |
FindSounds for sound effects
and musical instruments |
| I want to find out detailed information about a certain
site |
link:www.sitename.com in a search engine tells you who links to
it |
| The
Wayback machine may be able to show you an archived version of a
site |
| Better Whois shows ownership
for top level domains |
| Alexa provides traffic details and
related sites |
| I need search engines suitable for children |
Kids search tools wide
variety of useful resources |
| KidsClick! directory listings,
chosen by librarians |
| Yahooligans! for children
aged 7-12 |
| I want to find people |
Internet Address Finder US biased,
but still useful |
| 192 for UK individuals |
| British
Telecom Directory Enquiries |
| I want people's opinions on a subject |
Google Groups provides
access to newsgroups |
| Daypop searches weblog entries |
| Technorati searches weblogs
in more depth |
| I want current affairs and news information |
Google news over 4,000 news
resources |
| BBC it's the BBC - what else to
say? |
| MSN Newsbot,
wide variety of resources, slightly US biased |
| I want information on particular words |
Online Etymology Dictionary
Large and impressive collection |
| World Wide Words
International English from a UK viewpoint |
| Anagrams Very good
utility for finding anagrams. |
| Acronym Finder is
extremely good |
| What's new on the Internet? |
Neat New Stuff from an
American Librarian, Marylaine Block |
| Librarians Index to the Internet
new sites that have been discovered and listed |
| USA Today
web guide is fairly eclectic |
| I want local information (UK local) |
Google provides local
information by adding in a place |
| Streetmap for UK information
on places, streets and postcodes |
| UpMyStreet for UK information
on particular areas/regions |
| Google Maps for the UK |
| I want to share or view bookmarks |
FURL excellent for saving pages and
sharing them with others |
| SPURL is very similar to FURL |
| Del.icio.us for social bookmarking |
| Connotea online reference
management service for scientists from Nature |
| My Bookmarks is the one that
I've been using just for bookmarks. |
