Please explain why one search engine is better than another? Somebody mumbled that Google is now THE BEST. How?
We were just discussing this in the BBQ Pit (Does nobody know how to use a search engine). My favorites are SavvySearch and WebFerret. The former is a metasearch, meaning it searches with several engines at once. The latter also searches several engines, but it requires a download of software. I find it generally works better and faster than SavvySearch, but SavvySearch is better for phrase searches. I have not been impressed with Google, though some people swear by it.
There’s a few relevant factors: Size of database, speed, and relevance (that is, does it put the useful pages before the 99% junk) come to mind offhand. Note that I do not know how any search engines rank specifically on any of these points. I usually use AltaVista, but that’s just because when I started using the web a few years ago, it was the best, and I got used to it. It’s quite probable that some other engine has since passed it up.
My personal favorite.
I use a metasearch site, The Big Hub most often, and will sometimes use Dogpile (linked above) or others.
One thing to remember is that they are not actively searching the Internet when the respond to your search request, they are searching their own database. These databases are updated continuously based on the criteria they tell their bots to use. Some databases are reviewed by humans.
This site among others gives top honors to Google. IIRC, a couple of years ago, the Wall Street Journal gave top honors to HotBot. But SearchIQ gives top honors to ixquick which I never heard of before. The same rating ranks google well ahead of SavvySearch. I tried ixquick and I find it gives good results, but it’s slower than WebFerret. “ix” it may be, but “quick” it ain’t. At least not tonight. It does seem to give better results than SavvySearch, though, except for phrase searches.
Ratings are subjective. They depend on many factors, including speed, comprehensiveness of the database, relevence of hits, etc. There’s no one best engine. It depends on what sort of searches you do, and how important speed is to you.
WebFerret can be downloaded for free from FerretSoft.
Thre are many different ways that search engines can work. Sorry, I can’t often match engines with the way they work.
Some possible methods:
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“Quantity is all”. Send out a spider that hits as many pages as possible and index them . I believe All the Web uses essentially this principle.
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“Humans know”. Only post links that have been reviewed by humans, Yahoo. Tends to have fewer links available 'cause human review takes time, but those links tend to be highly categorized and relevant. Often misses some categories completely.
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“Web page designers know”. Rank links depending on how web pages link to them. Artifacts tend to show up; netscape.com and microsoft.com rank incredibly high in such engines.
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“Searchers know”. Rank links depending on how many people clicked those links when viewing the results of searches.
See Search Engine Watch which includes Search Engine Features for Webmasters
Although Google’s index isn’t as large as some other search engines, I like it because its results are relevant. It determines the relevance based on how many other pages link to a given page.
So, until recently, if you searched for more evil than Satan himself,'' the first match was http://www.microsoft.com/ :) This is because a whole bunch of people use the word evil’’ or ``Satan’’ to link to Microsoft.
And the cache is great for pages that are gone or servers that are temporarily down.
It also depends on what you’re searching for. If I’m looking for some highly technical info (such as "what’s the dielectric constant of polyethelyne? or what are the different integrated circuits out there with a VGA controller on them?) I’ll use alta-vista, and be prepared to possible wade through some random hits (although the “near” keyword in alta-vista helps a lot).
If I’m looking for a particular web page that I suspect is out there (for example, Virginia’s Division of Motor Vehicles page, or the home page for some company name or a city), I’ll use yahoo- since it’s created by humans, it tends to put home pages, etc. at the top of the list.
Arjuna34
Google is currently the best because its system of ranking pages by number of links to it usually brings the link you want up very quickly. It’s also very quick, and the cache feature is great if the page has been taken down.
Yahoo is awfully good if you’re looking for websites on a particular subject. Most search engines will find sites where your subject is mentioned; Yahoo finds sites devoted to your subject.
For a metasearch, Dogpile is pretty good, as is Copernic (which is metasearch software).
I also like Northern Lights, which reports results grouped by general subject, and http://www.alltheweb.com, which is better at finding non-U.S. sites.
From Forbes issue “Best of the Web”:
Favourite:
Hotbot / http://www.hotbot.com
Best (feature): Highly customizable
Worst: Search partners like Dealtime pop up no matter how irrelevant their services may be
Others (in alphabetical order):
Altavista / http://www.altavista.com
Best: Enormous breadth and depth of information available
Worst: It takes some effort to grasp all the site has to offer
Direct Hit / http://www.directhit.com
Best: Best for commonly searched items
Worst: Obscure topics provide meagre results
Google / http://www.google.com
Best: You can search in a dozen different languages
Worst: Harder to narrow your search
Northern Light / http://www.northernlight.com
Best: Get alerts if a new Web site appears on a specific topic you have identified
Worst: No customization features
Savvy Search / http://www.savvysearch.com
Best: Create and name your own personal search engine
Worst: Antiquated site design
Thank you, now maybe I can narrow my searches down to 3-4 engines and save some time! Jois
Don’t bother, use a meta-search (a search of search engines) like askjeeves.com. But google.com is really well done. Between yahoo’s index by subject and google’s content search its pretty easy to find what I need.
I’ll second a vote for Webferret. It’s pretty cool.
Why is one engine better than another ?
Kind of like cars – depends on the spec. What suits you may not suit another, some others might be plain inferior.
Why is this ? Because each search engine (that doesn’t include meta engines like dogpile or Directories like Yahoo) has in place it’s own methodology for determining which sites in it’s index are relevant to a searcher’s request. After the engine’s done that, it has to determine the order of relevance - putting what it deems to be the most relevant at number one and working down.
What can make an engine good is the way it makes those two determinations. It’s done by using an algorithm – a complex means of analysing the composition of every web page in it’s data base (and in the last few months also by analysing the web pages that link to other web pages). Once it does that analysis, it’s produces the results – takes about 2 seconds max. Pretty awesome stuff.
So, the effectiveness of an engine is determined by
(1) How tech advanced it is, and
(2) How many people have worked out enough of it’s algorithm to manipulate it to their advantage and not yours.
Cracking an algo is not unlike cracking a safe. I know of one guy who grossed $4 million last year as an affiliate selling Viagra. But he is the very, very best.
Problem with the results from meta engines is that they can be easily manipulated by a web site’s meta tags. This can lead to irrelevant results for you but more clicks for the site that misled you into thinking it was on topic.
Directories provide more reliable results as each web site is assessed by a human before being included in the index, the engines all use automatic submission systems. Aside from Yahoo, don’t forget the largest but as yet least well known Directory http://www.dmoz - compiled by volunteer editors and twice the size of Yahoo.
Google is probably the best engine right now for both speed and accuracy but its index isn’t as large as some others. Excite is still ok. In about three months the best engine – together with Google – will probably be one you can’t access directly. You get to it by using Hotbot or the ‘web pages’ tab that comes up AFTER Yahoo has returned your result. It’s called Inktomi but not many know of it because it’s in the background providing results for very many of the ‘named’ engines. It has a new algo it’s trying out and it’ll take a while for it to settle down.
I think most of it is how you narrow your search. I get good results from google and alltheweb simply because I’m familiar with them. That said if you want to get down to the nitty-gritty try the metasearches although frankly I think askjeeves is a load of crap, maybe I’m just not familiar with it. I keep a directory of search engines, Netstrider, for looking up stuff as well. With something like Netstrider handy you can choose a search engine that fits your needs or style of searching.