by joshuaaa

General Questions

• In blogs, the title can be whatever you want it, but the last part of the URL has to be the [blog: title]
• Bloglist is a program that goes through all the blogs and orders them in a particular fashion
• Easy to rename pages, down at bottom of page: click options, rename
• It sometimes may be easier to use a text editor rather than type in your web pages

Don’t forget, bullets are asterisks and numbered lists are pound signs

How to Create a Blog Entry

• Type "blog:name of blog" at the end of your personal wiki page URL (or type it in the “add new page” box)

Why Do Search Engines Return Different Results?

• Different files that they index
• Different search syntax accepted
• Processing of search results differ, different back-ends

Why Use a Search Engine?

• The main point of using a search engine is to find information fast
• Goal of class is to become masters of search techniques
• The simplest tools are the words and phrases you type in
• Some operators target specific parts of a document (i.e. intitle:subject)
• Others target the URL
  • flintstones inurl:umich OR inurl:lib
• Some target sites
  • flintstones site:www.lib.umich.edu OR site:umich.edu

Helpful hints

• Unique words and phrases are key
• Make your queries as specific as possible, as early as possible
• You have to realize the different ways things can be named or referred to
  • Formal references: last name, first name
  • Places can be more problematic
    • Use zip or area codes

Search Engine Practice

• Use related searches to narrow your query
• Open queries in new window – less easy to close a query
• Try to think of what the document would be called or what kind of information it would contain when searching
• Directory function of Yahoo is like “tree tagging” – not random, but in categories
• [Define] function returns specific results, just like weather or map
• Ideally, put what you would like to find in your results as your query

To view Dr. Moore's outline for this class, click here