Internet Research: More that Google

Online Research:
There's more to Google than you think . . .

and there's more to online research than Google.

Tip #1:	Spending ten minutes planning a search strategy can save hours in the long run. (Just typing search terms in Google without a plan is about as effective as wandering around in the book stacks of the library hoping your eye will fall on the correct book.)
Tip #2:	Just about anybody with marginal computer skills can find a way to put a web site on the Internet. Just because you found a relevant site, don't assume that you can trust the contents. Here are some great guides to analyzing web sites for credibility: Valparaiso University Site UC-Berkley Site
Tip #3:	Spending five minutes looking over the features of your search tool will allow you to focus your search more effectively. Search engines and subject directories typically have a link on the opening page called something link advanced features. Search tools offer a variety of ways to combine search terms. These may be Boolean indicators such as AND, OR, NOT, or + , -. Other tools call these search options exact phrase, all of these words, any of these words, or none of these words . Many sites offer the option of searching only sites with certain domain names (extensions in the address such as .org, .gov or .edu) . These are education, government or nonprofit organization sites, which may be more reliable than business locations such as .com or .net sites.

Search Engines

Search Engines*: sites that perform general Internet searches. Search engines gather sites using programs called spiders or crawlers that search the web. Web designers influence the ranking of their site by adding metatags (subject headings) in the code and by submitting their sites to the search engines directly. Some also pay to have their sites added, though these sites appear in separate sections of the results and are marked as advertisements. For more information, check the comparison table.

	Google	www.google.com
	Best features:	As the big guy on the block, you can expect frequent new features at Google. A new noteworthy feature is Google Scholar which allows access to many peer-reviewed books and articles that would not come up in typical Google search. To be peer-reviewed means that experts in the field have evaluated the materials. A free sign-up form is required to access the books in Google Scholar. The Google Images option is also useful for finding illustrations. Be sure to cite the sources of images that are not clip art. Google News is a good source for current news stories.
	Cautions:	Google's results are based on the popularity of the site (the numbers game), not the reliability. Users choose Google based on popularity as well. It is a good search engine, but it may not be the best choice for your particular search.
	Ask	www.ask.com
	Best features:	The Ask search engine ranks sites, not just by popularity among all users, but by popularity among sites that represent experts in the field of the search. This different way of calculating popularity may provide more reliable sites in your results list. (Even with this extra help, be sure to critique your search results for yourself. See Tip #2) One of the most useful features of Ask.com appears after you have entered a term and clicked search; on the right side of the screen is a list of options for narrowing and widening your search. These lists help direct your search to exactly the right focus out of the millions of possibilities on the web.
	Cautions:	The site has advanced search features, but the link is on the results screen, not the opening screen. Items at the top of the results list are sponsored (or paid) links. These sites may be useful, but you may also want to treat them as advertising.

*For more search engines, see http://www.20search.com/

Tip #4:

If your topic is obscure, searching more than one search engine at once may be helpful.

Multi-search Engines*: a few of the sites that search multiple search engines at once, also called metasearch engines

	Dogpile	www.dogpile.com
	Best features:	Dogpile searches Google, Ask, About, LookSmart, MSN Search, Yahoo! Search, MIVA, Topix, Fox News, ABC News, and other sources. The results page suggests possibilities for related search directions on the right side of the screen as well as a list of your recent searches. Advanced search allows searching several domain names (.org, .edu) at once. Many search engines (including Google) only allow one domain name choice at a time.
	Yippy	yippy.com/
	Best feature:	Yippy groups (or clusters) results into subtopics (listed on the left side of the results screen). This list can help you decide which of the results are relevant to your search and also suggests directions for the research. You might have seen this site previously under the names vivisimo or clusty.
	Cautions:	The opening page looks like an ad for a paid service. Use the search box anyway; it's free. The number of search engines that Vivisimo draws its results from is smaller than many other metasearch engines and several of those sources included focus on paid sources as opposed to free ones.

*For more multi-search engines, see http://www.virtualfreesites.com/search.multi.html

Tip 5:

If your search terms are yielding results that are not relevant to your research focus or if you are still uncertain what you are looking for in your search, try an Internet Subject Directory.

Internet Subject Directories*: sites developed by people selecting web sites by category . (For more information about subject directories, check the comparison table. )

	Open Directory	dmoz.org
	Best features:	Open Directory is a general directory organized by topics and subtopics selected by people instead of software. Directories are more browsable than searchable; in other words, you browse down through a series of subtopics rather than using keyword searches. The result is a very different group of combinations than you will find in a search engine results list. The layers of subtopics are effective in suggesting ideas in the early stages of research when your ideas may not yet be clearly defined. Some subject directories accept pay from sites which gives those sites better positioning on the results pages, but Open Directory does not do this.
	Cautions:	Directories do not contain the volume of information found in the average search engine. Sometimes directory sites are not set up to handle high volumes of users, so you may receive a message to return later. Only the first page of a site may be included in a subject directory, as opposed to many levels of pages in a search engine.
	Librarians' Index to the Internet	lii.org
	Best features:	As the name suggests, this site is a directory compiled by librarians. Results pages include a summary of what is in the site, a list of subtopics in the site, and the date the site was last updated (much more information about the sites than a search engine offers). The stemming feature allows all forms of words to be searched as the same term. Some subject directories accept pay from sites which gives those sites better positioning on the results pages, but lii does not do this.
	Caution:	Items in a keyword search are listed by relevance, but subject lists are in alphabetical order, not by any type of relevance ranking.
	The Internet Public Library	www.ipl.org
	Best features:	If you are not sure of your research direction, IPL can be browsed by Subject Collections (in the left column) and subtopics. The site also offers quick reference sources (almanacs, calendars, dictionaries), general reading (books, magazines, newspapers), and special collections (literary criticism and blogs). Searching Tools includes Frequently Asked Research Questions. Some subject directories accept pay from sites which gives those sites better positioning on the results pages, but ipl does not do this.
	Infomine	infomine.ucr.edu/
	Best features:	Infomine is "a group of Scholarly Internet Resource Collections" maintained by university librarians across the country. This is a valuable tool for any level of scholarly research.
	Caution:	As with many subject directories, the number of articles included is much smaller than would be found by a search engine. Number may not be an issue if the results are what the research project requires.

*For more directories, see http://www.academicinfo.net/refdirectories.html or the WWW Virtual Library

Tip #6:

A specialized search site can lead you to information that you won't find in a general search engine.

Specialized Search Sites*: sites with a narrower focus that a general directory

	First Gov	firstgov.gov for government sites
	Best features:	First Gov refers to itself as " the official U.S. gateway to all government information." Tabs at the top of the screen divide the site into such areas for citizens, organizations, and employees. The left sidebar offers divisions into organizations within the government, statistics, laws, and government libraries.
	Caution:	It would be easy to assume that a directory of government sites created by the government would be a reliable source, but the site also has a disclaimer that it does not "control or guarantee the accuracy, relevance, timeliness or completeness of information contained on a linked web site." This is a common type of disclaimer but a good warning that all sites and information should be evaluated.
	Complete Planet	completeplanet.com
	Best features:	Complete Planet includes many links to resources that are considered parts of the deep web, areas that are not being picked up by search engines. This part of the Internet was once called the invisible web, but these sites are not invisible, they are just more difficult to find. In other words, this site offers access to materials that cannot be found on other more familiar sites. Sites are part of the deep web for several reasons: (1) the page is not accessed frequently enough to appear on the first few screens of search engine results lists, (2) search engines don't yet know that the page exists, (3) the page is too deep in a large web site, (4) coding in the page requests that it not be included in the indexes, (5) the page is passcoded, or (6) the page requires technology that the search engine can't process. For more about the deep web, check http://aip.completeplanet.com/aip-engines/help/help_deepwebfaqs.jsp#Anchor_dwfaq1
	Cautions:	The site often takes the researcher to the opening page of a site, not straight to information on the terms typed into the Complete Planet search box. This adds the extra step of typing (or copy/pasting) into the search box on the new page.
	The Wayback Machine	www.archive.org/web/web.php for web pages from the past
	Best features:	The Wayback machine is an archive of web pages from the past. This search engine makes it possible to find earlier forms of pages that have been updated or are no longer available on the Web. The Wayback Machine archives pages from the past for future study.
	Caution:	Currently only site names, web addresses, and dates can be searched. There are plans for full text search capabilities in the future.

Tip #7:

For researching stories that are currently in the news, the best source may be a news aggregation site.

News Aggregators*: sites that gather current articles from many news sources

	Topix	www.topix.net
	Best features:	Topix collects news from 10,000 sources 24 hours a day. Articles are listed in time order, from a few minutes to a few weeks old. For major stories, one click leads to recent stories on the same topic from multiple publications. Stories come from a variety of media including newspapers, radio and TV stations, magazines and journals, and blogs. Audio and video feeds are available as well. Adding a zip code focuses the site on collecting information about a specific area. The site can be personalized to the user's interests.
	Caution:	News typically rotates off after 30 days.
	World News Network	www.wn.com
	Best features:	World News, as the name suggests, has a stronger focus on international news than some aggregators. Current top stories appear toward the top of the screen. Subtopics relevant to the stories are posted under the photographs for the stores. The left sidebar lists source publications. News is grouped into regions on the lower portion of the opening page.
	Cautions:	News rotates off after 60 days. It is more difficult to tell exactly when the individual articles were posted on this site than on Topix.

* Many search engines, such as Google, Altavista and Yahoo!, have news sites with large numbers of sources and fast coverage of breaking news.

Tip #8:

A portal or jump site combines links from many different sources into one page without having to shift from one type of site to another.

Portals*:

	Yahoo!	www.yahoo.com
	Best features:	Yahoo is a variety of tools in one, a subject directory, a search engine, a tool for current news, weather, e-mail, chat, and more. The advantage to using a site like Yahoo! for searches is that it offers so many options. Yahoo! allows the user to personalize, the appearance of the page as well as the search functions.
	Caution:	The page is so full of competing features that you might lose focus on the research task at hand.
	Refdesk	www.refdesk.com
	Best features:	Refdesk is one of the more reliable and thorough collections of links on the web. All links are to free sites, which are grouped by type on a single page. The site includes search engines, print and broadcast news, weather, popular magazines, dictionaries, fact books, driving directions, puzzles, and much more.
	Cautions:	The page has a cluttered, confusing appearance. The page is so long that it requires quite a bit of scrolling to see all that it offers. Sifting through the materials on the opening page that are irrelevant to the search may take a little extra time.

* For more information about portals, see http://www.traffick.com/article.asp?aID=9#what%20

Tip #9:

Even in the age of the Internet, books are still a good form of information for research and many are online and searchable.

Books Online*: sites that include online full text books

	Project Gutenburg	www.promo.net/pg
	Best features:	There are currently 18,000 books available on this web site to read and search. Books are in plain text files which means that they can be downloaded easily. All kinds of books in fiction and nonfiction are included in English and many other languages. One of the main focuses is the classics.
	Caution:	Due to copyright laws, books in this tool are limited to works published prior to 1923 or works included with the author's permission.
	Project Bartleby	www.bartleby.com
	Best features:	The Bartleby web site is smaller than Gutenburg. Included here are books of quotations, and different types of reference books, as well as works of literature.
	Caution:	Due to copyright laws, books in this tool are limited to works published prior to 1923 or works included with the author's permission.
	Online Books Page	digital.library.upenn.edu/books
	Best features:	The Online Books Page includes over 25,000 books and includes many serial books. This tool provides links and search capabilities for works that are already available online from sources that do not charge readers. Books are limited to full text books in English that appear on library lists as significant works. Books are in familiar formats such as .html and .pdf.
	Cautions:	Books available are limited by copyright laws. Using .html files and .pdf files means that the files will not be small like those in Project Gutenburg and downloading may not be practical.

Tip #10:

Sometimes students wait to compile their reference materials until well into the project. Working on this all along allows you to be more careful with the various sources and keeps you from having to look up the cite again later to get information for your citation.

MLA Documentation Sites: sources for proper documentation information.

	MLA Formatting and Style Guide	owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/557/01/
	Best features:	The site is detailed, accurate, easy to understand and well formatted. The site is a very easy source to use online. The Purdue University OWL (online writing
	Caution:	This site is not very suitable for printing out information because it divides the rules into types of sources spread over multiple pages in a database.
	MLA Formatting and Style Guide	http://citationmachine.net/
	Best features:	This site can format citiations for you for your Works Cited list and your in-text citations in MLA style (or in APA, Turabian or Chicago style for courses in other disciplines). The site is a very easy to use and takes some of the guess work out of documentation.
	Caution:	The student is still responsible for making sure that the citation is correct. Some information may be missing or incorrect in the form and this will result in an inaccurate citation. Citations from Citation Machine are not double spaced.
	MLA FAQ	www.mla.org/style_faq
	Best features:	This is the web site for the MLA (Modern Language Association), so the information is guaranteed to be accurate. The FAQ format it easy to use.
	Caution:	The information provided is limited. (MLA prefers to sell books rather than give information away.)

For information about online databases available through NCLIVE, SIRS Researcher, etc., see the ACC Learning Resources Center web page. Passwords are available to use NCLIVE off-campus for Alamance Community College students from the ACC Learning Resources Center. Passwords are also available through university libraries and public libraries as well.

For more information on Internet Research, refer to the web site http://www.extremesearcher.com/handbooklinks.html or the book by the same title by Randolph Hock.

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