Web Search Tools
Search Engines
Subject Starters
Metasearch Engines
Related Links
Search Engines
Search engines are tools that enable you to search a large database using keywords. The database is made up of web pages found by automated web "spiders." The spiders automatically and continually collect links, titles and text from millions of Internet sites and compile them into the database. Search engines are especially useful for finding names, institutions, associations as well as very specific topics. Here is a list of popular engines, as well as up and coming ones:
Subject Starters
Subject starters (aka subject directories or subject guides) are lists of hand-picked web resources organized by topic. The resources are chosen by humans (often librarians!) as are the organizational schemes (subject hierarchies or taxonomies). Use subject starters to find good quality links to resources, and they make a good starting point for broad searches.
Metasearch Engines
Search engine that sends your request to several other search engines and returns results from each one.
Pro-Fusion
Clusty
Dogpile
Related Links
Search Engine Watch
Danny Sullivan, editor
Search Engine Show Down
Greg R. Notess, Reference Librarian & Professor, Montana State University
Toolkit for the Expert Web Searcher
Library & Information Technology Association of the American Library Association
Internet Search Strategies
University of California Berkeley Library
MetaSearch Engine guide
University of California Berkeley Library
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