Unit 3: Applied Searching
Techniques
Think and choose your search tool carefully!
- Read the on-screen directions and help information
- Type in lower case unless you need an exact match -- "moulin rouge"
- Insert most important words first -- "orphan train riders"
- Avoid using stop words which search tools ignore, such as the, a, web,
- Group search phrases using double quotation marks --
"Earth Liberation Front" - Use specific, simple, unique search terms -- "Navajo code talkers"
- Require or eliminate terms or domains using +, - symbols; Boolean operators And, OR -- +"roller coaster" +physics
- Limit by domain or file type -- "falun gong" +.org
- Perform your search using more than one search tool --
a directory - Librarian's Index to the Internet or DMOZ or Yahoo
a search engine - AltaVista or Teoma or AlltheWeb or Google
a metasearch engine - Dogpile or Vivisimo or Mamma
Seven Stupid Searching Mistakes - Search Day , March 27, 02 (proxy required)
Are you a good Googler (Google search engine tips) Yahoo! Internet Life 6/1/02 (proxy required)
For information contact jegan@nvcc.edu
Last revision August 24, 2002