Previously
we looked at Curiosity with its
dangers and promises. This time, we'll look at where our curiosity
takes us and we'll examine how our questions lead us to explore and
make discoveries.
Questions
alone often don't lead anywhere. If the person you ask doesn't have
the answer, or can evade the question, or give a misleading answer, or
ridicule you for asking the question, you don't get anywhere with your
curiosity.
Think
of the times, for instance, that young children ask their parents
where they came from. The answers they've had range from "the
stork brought you" to "I'll tell you when you're old enough
to understand."
Reflect,
too, on how often students in classrooms have laughed at fellow
students' questions. Remember the beautiful girl or handsome man that
you would have loved to meet, hampered by the fear of asking a
stranger questions.
It
doesn't matter whether we're asking a parent, teacher, friend, expert,
consultant or the Internet; we need to know how to ask our questions
in ways that will satisfy our curiosities.
One
of the attractive things about the Internet as a source of information
is that no one has to fear asking questions. Once you learn how to
explore using the Internet, you'll know how to get satisfactory
answers to many of the questions that you might fear asking another
person.
The
thing we need to be careful of when using the Internet to explore and
make discoveries is finding just as many--perhaps more--wrong answers
there as we would asking other people.
Do
people give wrong answers intentionally? I'm reminded of the time when
someone laughed about giving a stranger visiting his city the wrong
directions. While the wrong answers found on the Internet can result
from the intent to mislead, as with politics, propaganda and
controlled news, the rest can be simply errors. When in doubt,
question more than one source.
Which
brings us to how we explore the Internet to make the discoveries we
want. Almost anyone who has a computer has used a search tool. That's
because most computers get delivered with a browser, like Internet
Explorer or Netscape; and most of those have come installed with one
of the popular search tools as a Home Page.
If
you're an experienced Internet user, you can skip the next three
paragraphs. If you're new to this (and several people have told me
that they are), the first thing you see after your computer starts is
your 'Desktop' and on your Desktop you'll find a number of 'Icons'
(small images of things like "My Computer" and "Recycle
Bin").
The
blue e is the icon for Microsoft's Internet Explorer; while the circle
with an N inside is the icon for Netscape. These are the two most
popular browsers. However, most users have the Internet Explorer on
their desktops.
It
has become the most popular browser in use. When you click on the blue
e, you'll see the Home Page for your browser. Some computer shops use
MSN for the home page, but you can make any Web page you like your
home page by clicking on 'Tools' and inserting the address for the
page you want.
Often
the pre-installed Home Page that comes from your computer dealer is
one of the major search tools--often referred to as a search engine.
On that page you'll find a horizontal bar for you to type what you're
looking for; and beside or under the bar is the word
"search".
Before
going further with tips on how to search and discover what you want,
let me list the major search engines and their addresses so that you
can try them all. A few years ago, there were about 15 search engines
that you needed to know about to do any serious exploring. Now most
users manage with only four.
It's
reminiscent of how local cold stores evolved into neighborhood
markets, then to supermarkets and finally to hypermarkets. Today's
four major search engines are the hypermarkets of the Internet: Google,
Yahoo! Teoma,
and Vivisimo.
Each
of these search engines has something different about its look and
feel and many of the websites they present for any search will differ.
For that reason, the first lesson any serious researcher learns is not
to depend on a single search engine.
You
should also be aware that in addition to these four major search
engines, there are a number of other search tools, including
directories and search tools for the invisible Web. I'll come to those
later.
The
search engines already mentioned have an automated method for
compiling information, using 'robots' and 'spiders' to comb the Web
and report their finding to a database.
A
search engine takes the information you give it, word-by-word; and
compares it with what it has in its database; and then gives you the
result in the form of a list of websites. Since this activity doesn't
depend on humans, they can collect vast amounts of data very quickly.
At last count, Google had more than 8 billion Web pages in their
database. That many Web pages can provide a lot of answers to your
queries--and they do.
One
of the problems with using search engines comes when you search using
a single word that has a number of different meanings. Suppose, for
example, you want information about "pitch" as the
particular motion of an aircraft.
In
the first place, you'd have to go through three pages of listings in
Google before you came to a site that had relevant information. In
addition, you'd have to scan the headings and summaries for many Web
pages to find another dealing with the particulars you're interested
in knowing about.
Google
lists more than seven million websites for the word 'pitch' That
includes pitches for cricket and baseball, voice and tuning
instruments, pitch black and the movie by that name, and much more.
Rather
than go through all that, many people just give up. Who can blame
them? If you typed "aircraft pitch" into Google, the number
of Web pages available would go from more than twenty-four million to
1 million, and everything on the first 3 pages is relevant to some
aspect of aircraft pitch.
If
you know exactly what you're looking for about aircraft pitch, you can
refine the results of your search even further. If you want to know
about pitch and loops in aerobatics, then type in "aerobatics
pitch loops" There's no need to type 'and' since search engines
ignore unimportant words unless you include them as part of a quote.
The
key to using search engines, then, rests with using all the words--as
many as six or seven--that you can think of related to your question.
The more specific the information you feed into a search engine, the
more satisfying the results will be.
Google
happens to be the most popular search engine today, partly because of
its 4.3 billion pages, followed by Yahoo! With more than three billion
pages in their database. Teoma has about one billion pages indexed.
All three of these have the full text of the Web pages indexed.
In
addition to indexed Web pages, both Google and Yahoo! have images, for
those who want to find photographs and illustrations, and news from
thousands of news sources. Google also has Usenet Discussion Groups.
Rather
than provide website addresses here, along with extensive information
about what various search engine databases include, how to refine your
search and use your other options and facilities, now you can learn by
doing:
Simply
type "using search engines" into the search bar in either
Google or Yahoo. You'll find many pages of links to websites with
plenty of advice, how-to guides, tutorials and Web resources.
When
you're finished, you'll have made important discoveries that come with
learning the basics of how to explore the World Wide Web. Those
discoveries will include finding that the Web's search tools include
directories as well as search engines.
Directories
can be useful when you start with a general subject rather than a
specific one, and when you want to explore a large field of
information rather than starting out with specifics.
For
instance, if you wanted to know what Reference works have been
included on the Web, you would simply click on 'Reference' in the
directory. Both Google and Yahoo! have Directories, but two others
that stand out include About
and The Open Directory
Project.
If
you happen to be a student or an academic or a serious researcher,
you'll find several additional directories useful, some of which have
databases on the invisible Web and are not listed in the search
engines: Librarians'
Index to the Internet, Infomine,
Academic Info,
The Invisible Web,
Direct
Search, and Complete
Planet.
With
these last search tools, you'll be ahead of 90 per cent of the
Internet users who have learned how to use search engines, but haven't
ventured into exploring the territories beyond.
The
search engines alone have access to only about half the information
available on the Internet. With these last addresses, you'll be able
to make discoveries in some of the remaining 50 per cent.
One
more search tool deserves mention. Several people think it's the best.
Copernic has three different versions of its software: Copernic Agent
Basic, which is free, Personal and Professional versions that are
fee-based. You can find out about all of the incredible features this
search tool has at the copernic
website.
Just
before this article went to press, Microsoft came out with a beta
version of a new search engine that boasts having 5 billion pages
indexed. This would make it a major player and potential competition
for Google.
A
quick comparison of both using the same search terms revealed that
both MSN and Google have indexed most of the same websites. However,
their different approaches give the sites contrasting positions. For
instance, a listing on Google's first page turned up on MSN's fifth
page.
If
you happen to be one to end your search after one page, you'll benefit
greatly by using more than one major search engine. Add MSN
to your list.
With
the explorers' tools you now have, there's nothing to keep you from
making useful discoveries and finding satisfying answers to most of
your questions--at least to those for which answers exist.
Happy
exploring!
