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Effective Internet Searching. Why use the Internet. Search for a question Research a topic Current research Variety of sources, a click away What other non-online resources? Encyclopedia, book, dictionary, Atlas, World Almanac. Search Engines.
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Why use the Internet • Search for a question • Research a topic • Current research • Variety of sources, a click away • What other non-online resources? • Encyclopedia, book, dictionary, Atlas, World Almanac
Search Engines • Collects copies of web pages from various host servers • Assembled into a data base • Displayed according to relevancy and rank • Search engines use a program to search and retrieve web sites; spiders/crawl the web thru links • Algorithm to determine rank; company ‘trade secret’ • Google, Ask Jeeves, AOL Search, AltaVista, MSN Search
Internet Guides • Index or directory of websites • Classified by subject categories • Organized by humans and not computer programs/algorithms • Yahoo, Librarian’s Internet Index. EBSCO host, libraries
Four Search Strategies • Keyword Searching • Boolean • Question • Advanced
Keyword Searching • Enter terms to search • Use quotation marks to search as a phrase and keep the words linked together • Common words are ignored (that, to, which, a, the, …) • + and – can be used to include or exclude a word
Boolean Searching - AND • Enter words connect with AND - it will include sites where both words are found • Uses: joining different topics (ie. “global warming” AND California president Washington
Boolean Searching - OR • Enter words connect with OR - requires at least one of the terms is found • Uses: join similar or synonymous topics (ie. “global warming” OR “greenhouse effect”) dogs cats
Boolean Searching - NOT • Enter words connect with NOT – searches for the first term and excludes sites that have the second term • Uses: join similar or synonymous topics (ie. Washington NOT school) Washington school
Boolean – (Nesting) and Near • In a string of searching, terms placed in parentheses are searched first • Parentheses must be used to group items if there is another Boolean operator being used • NEAR may be used to require words to be found within 16 words of each other in the pages returned
Question Searching • A question may be entered in the search field of a search engine. • Ask Jeeves is a search engine that encourages the use of question searching
Advanced Searching • Advanced search features are offered on many engines by going to an “Advanced Search” page and making selections • This is effective in narrowing search returns to a specific topic or phrase Google Advanced Search
Getting’ it – Do you? • What is the difference between a Search Engine and an Internet Guide? • Why do search engines return different results for the same search query?
Getting’ it – Do you? • Which Boolean search term broadens a search? • Which Boolean search term narrows a search? • What built-in tool in most search engines is helpful in narrowing a search?