Amanda Bannigan
Search Engine Activity
SEARCH ENGINES!!!
Here is a list of the two
best engines I found in the following categories: meta-search, news, travel,
kids, and images.
META-SEARCH:
GOOGLE: I have to go with the tried and true for this one. How many times have we all heard some one say, “I’ll have to Google that.”? This site provides numerous types of sites for all searches. It provides a little snippet of information from the site which can help the searcher to decide if that is the site they really need. I am pretty sure that if it is on the web, Google can find it.
Look Smart: This is another site that provides many hits for specific and broad searches. It also provides a short synopsis of the site and other sites a person might want to visit if they enjoyed one found in the search.
NEWS:
Google- News: This site provides current news coverage on national and international. It is easy to navigate and search for specific stories. The page lists the source of the information and when the information was obtained. This assures the searcher that the information is the most recent.
CNN News: This site also provides up-to-date news information. It is a bit more difficult to navigate than the Google site simply because it is broken down into more detailed categories, so it takes a little more searching to find exactly what you are looking for.
TRAVEL:
In this era of internet, everyone loves to book trips online. I found two sites that can find air fare, hotels, rental cars, and even suggest activities to do at your chosen destination and provides a chance to book tickets for those extra activities.
Both Expedia (http://www.expedia.com) and Orbitz (http://www.orbitz.com) are easy to navigate and provide the best responses for vacation searchers!
KIDS:
Yahooligans: This site is designed to be used by kids, which has both pros and cons. When doing a search, you are given category sites and specific sites. It is a good way to get a lot of general information. However, the homepage of the site itself is very distracting. There are game links, joke links, and a huge picture of SpongeBob. I could see kids easily getting off task here, but if they do the searches, they will get great information.
Ask Jeeves for Kids: This site can help searches be narrowed from the broad to the specific. It would be good if a student has a huge idea for a project and is having a hard time making the topic more manageable. This site can help with this because of the way it answers the questions asked. It has less distractions than the yahooligans site and also provides a place for getting specific study help with various topics.
http://www.ajkids.com/index.asp?origin=0&meta=1
IMAGES:
Google-Images: This site provides numerous images for many, many topics. The searcher gets to see the actual image on the page instead of having to get to a link that will show them the picture; it is right there for them.
Alta-Vista Images: This site is very similar to the Google site. Images of the search topic are displayed along with a link to the site where the image is located. The layout is very nice because you can view multiple images and once and can decide which one is the most appropriate for your project.
http://www.altavista.com/image/