Internet Research
The Internet is
a wonderful place, but it hasn't made libraries obsolete! If you
want to research on the Internet, follow similar guidelines for
researching in the library: know what questions you are asking,
and be aware that different resources are better suited for
answering some questions than others.
Know How Information is
Indexed and Searchable on the Web
There are several kinds of sites that will help you make your way through
the massive amounts of information available on the web. Some of
these sites are indexes (rather like a library catalog), put together by
people who have looked at lots of web sites and then organized them.
Other sites are actual search devices, which use various paths to wander
through the web searching for the particular key words you've entered in
the search form. Different sites are good for search different things,
and you're wise to try your search in more than one place. You also need
to
critically analyze what you find on the web.
Here is an annotated list of some generally useful places to start web
searching:
Yahoo
Is a indexed site, good for a broad general search. You can navigate
your way through Yahoo's menu to find information you want. It links to
millions of
web sites, using an organizational structure developed by Yahoo employees
who look
for quality web sites and then index them. Remember that just because the
Yahoo employee
liked the site, it doesn't mean that the sites here are good for you.
Evaluate what you find.
Here is a list of some actual search sites, that use software to crawl
through the web looking for information relevant to your search terms.
Such sites
will often return more information than a Yahoo search--which can be
overwhelming, if you
have not refined your search well, but which can be helpful, if Yahoo
didn't give
back much help.
Hotbot
Alta Vista
Infoseek
Lycos
Lycos offers a service that ranks the best of the web sites.It's
one of the oldest search engines.
If you're nervous about formulating searches, try looking at
Ask Jeeves
a site that will ask you questions that will help narrow your search!
The sites listed below are Metacrawlers, which means they send searches
to several other search engines at once, returning to you the results of
all the searches, categorized and indexed.
Metacrawler
The original metacrawler
Dogpile
Uses search engines, and you can customize it to add other sites for
searching
Metafind
Much like dogpile, but uses only search engines
A
Good Summary of
Search Tipsfrom the NY Times
Search
Engine Watch, a comprehensive guide to all the search engines you can
think of--and then some!
Comments or Questions?
sharrin@iupui.edu
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