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Alternative search engines
Monday, April 23rd, 2007
While we often turn to Google to search the web, there are many other search engines out there, some of which offer specialized and advanced features. At the Computers in Libraries conference last week, Mary Ellen Bates provided an overview of alternative and customized search engines. Below are some of the search engines that she discussed. We invite you to try them out!
The strength of Exalead is in the examples that it provides for building your search. Click on the “Advanced Search” button and Exalead will show you how to search by exact phrase, approximate spelling, phonetic spelling, and adjacent words. You can specify where to search, limiting your search for example by country, language, or by file type. You can customize your Exalead search page by adding links to your favorite or most-used web pages.
Quintura has a neat data visualization tool which provides a “tag cloud” showing your search term and other, related terms. This can be helpful when you’re searching an unfamiliar topic or when you don’t know how to narrow your search. Clicking on other terms adds them to your search.
Kosmix provides an “intelligent” search in limited subject areas (currently including health, video games, finance, travel, U.S. politics, and autos). Pick a subject area and enter your search terms. Results are clustered in a way that makes sense for the subject area. For example, when you search in U.S. politics, results are grouped into liberal and conservative sites.
crossEngine lets you search many search engines at once. Enter your search terms and use the buttons at the top to compare results by search engine (i.e., Google, Yahoo, AOL) or to compare results by type of search (i.e., audio, video, images, blogs, news).
With Rollyo, you can create a customized search and share it with other people. To browse available searchrolls, go to http://www.rollyo.com/explore.html.
Here are a few more search engines to explore:
This story was contributed by Ellen Bahr.