Search Engines – My picks

Susan Nash Travetto

My favorite Travel Search Engines

http://www.sidestep.com - SideStep searches more than 100 sites to find the Web’s best travel bargains including online agencies, consolidators, and the sites of the airlines, hotels, vacation package providers and rental car companies. This search engine is not an online travel agency and gets price quotes from online agencies like Orbitz.

http://www.kayak.com - Kayak helps the consumer find travel products, and buy them from other people. Kayak’s tagline is "Search with us, book with them."™ Kayak.com is not a travel agent like Expedia, Orbitz and Travelocity.

I used both of these engines to help me find plane tickets. Between the two, I believe I got everything that was available. Each engine picked up at least two different flights. I was even able to see flights from small airports like Hagerstown.

My favorite Medical Search Engines

http://www.healthfinder.gov - A Service of the National Health Information Center, and U.S. Department of Health & Human Service, this search engine enables the consumer to conduct a search as well as offering the following features:

Health Library, Health Organizations, Online Checkups (health assessments), Health Care (information about physicians, dentists, public clinics, hospitals, long term care, etc), Selected Health Topics, and Health News

http://medlineplus.gov – A service of the US National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health, this search engine also enables the consumer to conduct a personal search. This search engine also features selected health topics, directories, and other resources. In addition, it features a medical dictionary and encyclopedia as well as a link to information on drugs and supplements. Unique features of medlineplus.gov include interactive tutorials, lists of clinical trials, and surgery videos.

A trusted friend and medical professional highly endorsed both search engines.

My favorite General Search Engines

http://google.com - For a long time I didn’t even consider looking for information anywhere else. Google simply gives me everything I need in the most efficient way. I now find myself using “google” as a verb in general conversation. It is my favorite general search engine because it responds to my intuitive questions.

http://www.altavista.com – This search engine is one of my favorites because of the simple format. I especially like the easily accessible images, audio and video sites. It has an excellent news feature in addition to shopping, travel, yellow pages and people finder sites.

My favorite Shopping Search Engines

What can you say about this kind of research? “Somebody’s got to do it!”

http://shopping.yahoo.com has it all and is extremely easy to navigate. With links to Consumer Reports and a Broadway ticket finder, this search engine ranks as my favorite for online shopping.

http://www.bizrate.com – The selection of shopping search engines is a purely emotional decision. Bizrate.com is a comparison shopping search engine that doesn’t feel like stepping into a warehouse. I like the layout, the colors, and the feel of it. Shopping for the lowest price doesn’t have to feel barren and stark.

My favorite Kid Safe Search Engines

http://yahooligans.yahoo.com – This search engine’s opening page bright, interesting and inviting. Although this is a commercial site, the advertisements were not obtrusive. It features games, animals, music, TV, science, cool sites, jokes, movies, e-cards, news, horoscopes, reference and “ask Earl”. The directory includes science and nature, school bell, sports and recreation, computers and games, arts and entertainment and around the world. Most directories feature sounds, videos and pictures. It’s a nice blend of high interest and fun topics and educational links.

http://www.kidsclick.org - KidsClick! was created by a group of librarians at the Ramapo Catskill Library System to address concerns about the role of public libraries in guiding young users to valuable and age appropriate web sites. Kids can conduct their own searches or click on one of the following categories: geography/history/biography, reading/writing/speaking, computers and the internet. popular entertainment, the arts, facts and reference, weird and mysterious, religion and mythology, society and government, sports and recreation, literature, science and math, health and family, home and households, and machines and transportation. Kids are also given search tools for pictures and sounds.

My least favorite Kid Safe Search Engine

http://www.ajkids.com – Exploring Ask Jeeves Kids was an exercise is closing commercial pages. Prior to getting any information, I had to look at page after page of advertisements. The price was too high to pay for getting information.

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