POSTING 3 - Start Your Search Engines!

Write and discuss the similarities and differences between search engines like mamma, google scholar, eric digest and yahoo.

This time, we students have been assigned to not only an educational task, but also a rather beneficial and handy task. Based on the lectures and guides given, I have explored various search engines and come to conclude that most search engines are alike. Instead of simply stating point-by-point, I would prefer to elaborate more by search engines. Hence, to start with;

1. www.mamma.com : Mamma.com is a Meta search engine with a wide range of other web search engines for its results! Like the company’s saying, “The Mother Of All Search Engines”, mamma.com certainly is the central to other search engines available on the net. However, practically speaking, most of us do not have all day to browse through search engines to other search engines. Thus, mamma.com may require one to spend a lot of time browsing through these web engines before arriving to the final destination for results. However, one will be able to browse through the type of information looked for such as for WebPages, jobs, videos, shop, travel, yellow pages and white pages. Hence, the results obtained will be somewhat precise yet wide in choices.

2. www.google.com : Not to be bias, google.com is certainly a search engine I have always preferred. Given that there are ample of relevant reasons to support my stand on this search engine, I have decided to break my ideas to be more comprehensible. Below are the benefits available for those who may be new or still unfamiliar with this amazing gizmo.

a) Google as a SEARCH ENGINE: There are many ways you can narrow down your information to the exact information you are looking for. Hence, this expert search engine works simply professionally to help you narrow down your search!

-Quotation marks (“…”) = – to help on find the exact phrase in the information.
-Define: = - to help one find the definition of a particular word or phrase (works as an excellent dictionary!)
-filetype: = to help one find the actual file type looked for. (E.g.: filetype:pdf to find pdf files).
-ext: = similar as the search for specific file types and known as an extension operator.
-site: = works as a site operator.

b) Google as a CALCULATOR: Why download or install an electronic calculator when you can simply click on google to help you count your fingers for you.

-Currency Converter == to convert from one currency to another. (E.g.: 1myr in USD)
-Calculator = serves a similar role to an e-calculator.

c) Google NEWS: This wonderful state-of-the-art provides us with the latest news and happenings all over the world. Thus, you can now save money on those newspapers as well as the paper-cuts!

3. www.ericdigest.com: Unlike other search engines, Eric Digest falls more towards the educational background. For example, most of its links are designed for educational purposes such as Educational Journals, Eric Digest Lesson Plans, Classroom management, National Geographic and other related reasons. However, this search engine may not be as excellent when compared to google and mamma since it tend to be less helpful when concerning other entertainment cum educational based searches like images and videos.

4. http://www.yahoo.com/: Yahoo has been around from the early days of internet and appears as a famous search engine. Similar to google, it has other wonderful services such as games, downloads, emails, horoscopes, news, music and the list goes on. However, unlike the other search engines, yahoo has an advantage that may help those hazy ones look for the apt information. Well, the moment one starts keying in the word or phrase they wish to look for, the search bar drops a list of other suggested words and popular searches to look out for. Thus, there is hardly any spelling or sentence/phrase structural mistakes that one might commit during the process of searching. Most important, the layout is rather interesting with images and latest updates on events currently being updated on the webpage. Hence, there may be ample of coincidental learning via this webpage. (There is also a higher chance of one to get diverted from the actual information they are to look for!)

Thanks to the brilliant novelty of technology, we now do not have to flip through those bulky books to find a little piece of information. So, start your search engines and race your way through the web pages!