Searching For A Place to Search
by Robyn Harton
You know you want to search for something on the web.
So
where is the best place to go to search? There are many
choices.
Search engines, directories and meta search engines are
the
three major types of places that you can search for things
on the web.
Search engines are sites like Google
where sites are gone over by automated robots called spiders.
The spider robots pull data from the sites it visits and
sort it out.
Directories are sites where humans have put together
a
directory of web sites, like The
Open Directory Project. The information in directories
is entered and categorized by humans instead of robots.
Meta search engines, such as Dogpile,
are search through several search engines and give you
the highest ranked search results from each.
If you're looking for general information, a meta search
engine or a search engine can be the best way for you
to go. This is because they have the broadest view of
the web because their spider robots can review each and
every page on a site.
For specific or categorized information, a directory
will probably be your best bet. This is because the sites
they have listed are categorized to make it easy for you
to find things.
These are some of the most popular places to search.
Directories:
The
Open Directory Project http://www.dmoz.org
Yahoo!
http://www.yahoo.com
Search Engines:
Google
http://www.google.com
Teoma
http://www.teoma.com
Altavista
http://www.altavista.com
Meta Search Engines:
Dogpile
http://www.dogpile.com
Mamma.com
http://www.mamma.com
With these, you should be able to find anything you need.