Effective Search Strings Continued

Truncated Searches A special symbol (*) which allows you to search simultaneously for several words with the same stem computer Comput* computers computing computer careers computations

Wildcard Searches Let you search for numerous word versions Use the “?” symbol in your search word Example: m?n = man or men or msn wom?n = woman or women

Boolean Searches Let you to broaden a search Let you to narrow a search Operate differently in each search engine

Boolean Searches How do I narrow a search using “and”? Using and will only provide links to sites which have BOTH of these words present

Boolean Searches How do I narrow a search even more? Using and twice will limit the search even more You will only get pages that include all THREE of the terms

Boolean Searches How do I narrow a search using “not”? Using not narrows the search by telling the search engine to exclude certain words AltaVista uses the form and not elementary

Boolean Searches How do I broaden a search? Use of the word or will broaden a search Use or if two words may be used interchangeably Can use or more than once to get very broad

Google: Advanced Search

HotBot : Advanced Search Options

Yahoo Canada : Advanced Search Options

What is a ‘Meta’ Search Engine? does not create its own information database It searches the databases of other engines Allows you to look through many pages from different search engines at once Best to use only when you are having trouble locating information on your topic

Hints for searching Use unique keywords Check your spelling Use quotation marks around phrases Try using different search engines Read the help files

Remember Hits are returned and ranked according to – How many times terms appear on the page How often terms appear How close terms are to each other How near the top of the page the terms are found The best results will appear on the first page or two of hits No two search engines are alike. Try another search engine, or rephrase your terms if you don’t get good results.

Adapted from: Kathy Schrock M. Rosettis - School Library Information Centre - St. Augustine C.H.S.