Metasearch and Specialised Search
According to a study last year by the nec Research Institute, search engines not only cover just a fraction of the indexable Web, but their coverage also provides a low amount of overlap. That's where metasearch engines come in. By running your query on several search engines simultaneously, these tools can provide a much broader range of information more quickly. The best ones add value by combining hits, weeding out the duplicates, and ranking results by relevance, rather than just giving you lists of hits from each search engine. A good metasearch engine also shows which engines are being queried and make it easy for you to change the lineup.
Power searchers should remember that these tools may have trouble translating complex searches into the syntax of each engine. If you want to go beyond simple keyword searches, stick with common syntaxes, enclosing the terms searched in quotes or using plus and minus signs to include and exclude keywords.
In contrast to metasearch engines' broadcast-style searching, specialised search services zero in on relevant information by crawling only subject-specific Web sites. For example, if you are looking for documents related to a company's corporate earnings and don't want to spend hours sifting through ads for its products, you'd go to a site specialised in the subject, such as CorporateInformation.com. Also referred to as vertical or industry-specific search engines, specialised search services are becoming increasingly important.
Metasearch
Despite the silly name, Infozoid (www.infozoid.com) is a serious contender among metasearch engines. Fast and flexible, it does well with complex queries, automatically forwarding advanced syntax such as Boolean operators and wildcards to the engines that support them. Our only gripe: it doesn't search Northern Light, one of the highest scorers in our search engine roundup.
Dataware Query Server (queryserver.dataware.com/general.htm) is another good choice. It covers all the major search engines and lets you choose which to query. Like Infozoid, it translates complex queries into the appropriate syntax for each engine. Dataware lets you sort results by relevance, subject content, or site.
Though it's one of the oldest metasearch engines MetaCrawler (www.metacrawler.com) remains a strong player. It covers most major search engines and offers an impressive selection of query-customisation options, though you'll need to go to the power-search page to use them. We like the way it handles results, giving you the option to sort by relevance, site, or search engine. It even suggests related searches.
Metor (www.metor.com) is also worth a look. Unlike MetaCrawler, it lets you to customise queries and choose which engines to search right from the main screen. Metor also offers a large collection of specialised searches, including technology, business, and news.
Specialised search
A good place to start with these more focused engines is Danny Sullivan's Search Engine Watch (www.searchenginewatch.com/links/Specialty_Search_Engines), which gives you a list of specialised engines. We found ourselves regularly heading to several specialised engines. EoExchange has developed three specialised search engines focused on e-business and technology topics: the b2b Research Center (www.eoenabled.com/b2b), the Business & Technology Research Center (www.eoenabled.com/bandt), and the it Professional Research Center (www.eoenabled.com/itpro). For company or stock information, try CorporateInformation.com, justquotes.com or TradingDay.com.
Government Web sites can be a rich informational resource: the recently unveiled FirstGov (www.firstgov.gov) is the US government's search engine for its vast network of sites.
It's important to remember that search engines can't reach much of the information on the Internet. Often referred to as "the invisible Web", this information is hidden in Web databases that search engine crawlers don't index. Much of the invisible Web consists of topic-specific databases with specialised content, such as technical papers, company information, census data, government documents, reference works, library catalogues, and more. Low on glitz and high on content, Direct Search (http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~gprice/direct.htm) is one of the best resources for finding Web databases. Other useful sites are Lycos' Directory of Searchable Databases (http://dir.lycos.com/Reference/Searchable_Databases) and WebData.com. --NS
13%
1%
The Correct address for Matilda is
http://www.matildasearch.com
Is theee any chance you coulds replace your content with a simple link?
Keith