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SEARCH ENGINES:
AllTheWeb.com (FAST Search)
http://www.alltheweb.com
AllTheWeb.com (also known as FAST Search) consistently has one of the largest indexes of the web. FAST
also offers large multimedia and mobile/wireless web indexes, available from its
site. The site, also known as AllTheWeb.com, is a showcase for FAST's search
technologies. FAST's results are provided to numerous portals, including those
run by Terra Lycos. FAST Search launched in May 1999.
AltaVista
http://www.altavista.com
AltaVista is one of the oldest crawler-based search engines on the web. It
has a large index of web pages and a wide range of power searching commands. It
also offers news search, shopping search and multimedia search. AltaVista opened
in December 1995. It was owned by Digital, then run by Compaq (which purchased
Digital in 1998), then spun off into a separate company which is now controlled
by CMGI.
AOL Search
http://search.aol.com/
AOL Search allows its members to search across the web and AOL's own content
from one place. The "external" version, listed above, does not list AOL content.
The main listings for categories and web sites come from the Open Directory (see
below). Inktomi (see below) also provides crawler-based results, as backup to
the directory information.
Ask Jeeves
http://www.askjeeves.com
Ask Jeeves is a human-powered search service that aims to direct you to the
exact page that answers your question.
Google
http://www.google.com
Google is a top choice for web searchers. It offers the largest collection of
web pages of any crawler-based search engine. Google makes heavy use of link
analysis as a primary way to rank these pages. This can be especially helpful in
finding good sites in response to general searches such as "cars" and "travel,"
because users across the web have in essence voted for good sites by linking to
them. The system works so well that Google has gained wide-spread praise for its
high relevancy. Google provides web page search results to a variety of
partners, including Yahoo and Netscape Search (see below). Google also provides
the ability to search for images, through Usenet discussions and its own version
of the Open Directory (see below).
HotBot
http://www.hotbot.com
In most cases, HotBot's first page of results comes from the Direct Hit
service (see above), and then secondary results come from the Inktomi search
engine, which is also used by other services. It gets its directory information
from the Open Directory project (see below). HotBot launched in May 1996 as
Wired Digital's entry into the search engine market. Lycos purchased Wired
Digital in October 1998 and continues to run HotBot as a separate search
service.
iWon
http://www.iwon.com
iWon's results come from both Overture & Inktomi.
iWon gives away daily, weekly and monthly prizes in a marketing model
unique among the major services. It launched in Fall 1999.
Inktomi
http://www.inktomi.com
Originally, there was an Inktomi
search engine at UC Berkeley. The creators then formed their own company with
the same name and created a new Inktomi index, which was first used to power
HotBot. Now the Inktomi index also powers several other services. All of them
tap into the same index, though results may be slightly different. This is
because Inktomi provides ways for its partners to use a common index yet
distinguish themselves. There is no way to query the Inktomi index directly, as
it is only made available through Inktomi's partners with whatever filters and
ranking tweaks they may apply.
LookSmart
http://www.looksmart.com
LookSmart is a human-compiled directory of web sites. In addition to being a
stand-alone service, LookSmart provides directory results to MSN Search, Excite
and many other partners. Inktomi provides LookSmart with search results when a
search fails to find a match from among LookSmart's reviews. LookSmart launched
independently in October 1996, was backed by Reader's Digest for about a year,
and then company executives bought back control of the service.
Lycos
http://www.lycos.com
Lycos started out as a search engine, depending on listings that came from
spidering the web. In April 1999, it shifted to a directory model similar to
Yahoo. Its main listings come from AllTheWeb.com with some
results from the Open Directory project. In October 1998, Lycos acquired
the competing HotBot search service, which continues to be run separately.
MSN Search
http://search.msn.com
Microsoft's MSN Search service is a LookSmart-powered directory of web sites,
with secondary results that come from Inktomi. Direct Hit data is also made
available.
Netscape Search
http://search.netscape.com
Netscape Search's results come primarily from the Open Directory and
Netscape's own "Smart Browsing" database, which does an excellent job of listing
"official" web sites. Secondary results come from Google. At the Netscape
Netcenter portal site, other search
engines are also featured.
Open Directory
http://dmoz.org/
The Open Directory uses volunteer editors to catalog the web. Formerly known
as NewHoo, it was launched in June 1998. It was acquired by Netscape in November
1998, and the company pledged that anyone would be able to use information from
the directory through an open license arrangement. Netscape itself was the first
licensee. Netscape-owner AOL also uses Open Directory information, as does
Google and Lycos.
Yahoo
http://www.yahoo.com
Yahoo is the web's most popular search service and has a well-deserved
reputation for helping people find information easily. The secret to Yahoo's
success is human beings. It is the largest human-compiled guide to the web,
employing about 150 editors in an effort to categorize the web. Yahoo has well
over 1 million sites listed. Yahoo also supplements its results with those from
Google. If a search fails to find a match within Yahoo's own listings, then
matches from Google are displayed. Google matches also appear after all Yahoo
matches have first been shown. Yahoo is the oldest major web site directory,
having launched in late 1994.
Looking for more? Consider these options:
Other Global Search Engines
Other
services that cover the world. They may not be as popular or well-known as the
services above, but they may still be helpful
Guides To Search Engines
Lists places
that themselves list hundreds of search engines worldwide.
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