Introduction

One of the most difficult aspects of web research is finding things. The next most difficult is determining if the things you find are worth anything!

Like a great many people, one of my favorite general search sites is Google.

Other, specialized search engines may help you find relevant information more quickly. But there is a lot of "clutter" out there.

Updated: 12-Jan-2008

Tips

Here are some things that I have found helpful when searching the Internet. They are presented in no particular order.

Choose your search terms carefully

Search terms need to be precise enough to get the results you need, but not so precise as to eliminate the one site that might help you. Search engines work on full text indexing of various parts of a web page or document. Sometimes including a term can be helpful, while other times, including a particular term might cause the search engine to exclude a valuable site because the term you used isn't mentioned.

Start moderately broad

Select a set of terms or a single term which will give you a reasonable set of results. This way you don't get zero results and may even find something which is of interest to you, but may have been missed had you narrowed your search terms.

Refine your Terms

Look at your results. If, in the first pages, you got more than you thought or too broad a set of results, add terms to your existing search. On the other hand, if you received fewer results than you thought you should have, remove or broaden terms in your search.

Learn Your Search Engine

Most search engines work about the same. But you should take the time to look at how search terms are entered. For example, you might be searching for a phrase (e.g. "sarch engine"). You might be able to look for the separate words (e.g. enter just the words, but don't make them a phrase). This could give you more results than you want or could give you the one site which you need because it doesn't use the terms as a phrase.

Updated: 12-Jan-2008

Kids

Searching the Internet can be especially problematic for kids. There are LOTS of sites out there which are, to put it mildly, not appropriate for kids. Using a generalized search engine can lead to trouble. Fortunately, there are other resources which are appropriate for kids.

I believe that young kids should always be supervised when they are on the web. But especially when they are searching for something. Even the most inocuous term can lead to porn sites or worse. Safety from Internet preditors is an important consideration for kids. Here are some resources to help you in that respect.

Updated: 16-Aug-2004

Promoted Results

Some search engines allow users to promote results. The promotion might place results at the top of your search for reasons other than giving you good results -- like the profit of the search engine.

Most search engines identify sponsored results (see below), but not sites which have paid to have their entries moved up in the results.

Updated: 12-Jan-2008

Sponsored Results

Look out for sponsored results. Some search engines allow companies to sponsor their entries. This guarantees that their entries appear at the top of the search list. Just because they are sponsored doesn't mean that the results are the best for your search. Generally, search engines should state that the result is sponsored.

Updated: 26-Feb-2006