Searching for Information

The Internet is a worldwide network of computers that allows you to send and receive information practically instantly. You'll be amazed at what you can find on the Internet with just a little bit of surfing. Whatever you can think to look for, someone else has probably thought to provide. Here's your guide to what the Internet carries.

What's on the Web?
Are the Internet and the Web the same thing?
Web links to get you started
What are newsgroups?
What's an FAQ?
What are Usenet, FTP and gopher?

Once you get connected to the Internet, you need to know how to find the Web sites and newsgroups that interest you. You may find, as many people do, that its fun just to wander - or surf - from site to site, going wherever the links take you. But if you want to find something specific and find it as soon as possible, you need to use a search engine. Here are the basics of searching:

Search engines: Finding the needle in the haystack
Deja News: Searching for newsgroups
Tips for searching

The World Wide Web is home to millions of Web sites, set up by businesses, agencies, institutions, individuals, and others. You name it, it's probably somewhere on the Web. Ever heard of a narwhal? It's a whale that sports a long horn on its forehead and lives in the Arctic ocean - and, yes, it's the subject of multiple sites on the Web. Here's a guide to some of the slightly less obscure Web information that you might want to explore.

Shop and buy instantly on the Web at the sites of individual companies or through mall-like sites that connect you to thousands of "stores." Such sites allow you to browse through products and services and even order and pay for them online. Here are some sites you might want to try.

• From The Microsoft Plaza, you can connect to merchants in numerous categories, including books and music, clothes and accessories, computers and electronics, and home and garden.
• At Amazon.com, you can browse or search through millions of titles for a book that suits you and then purchase it online. The site also includes book reviews, interviews with authors, articles about the book world, and more. Amazon.com sells sheet music, CDs, and audio books, too.
• If you're into music, check out CDNow. Search for a CD by artist, title, song title, record label, or soundtrack. Or browse through categories including rock/pop, world/new age, classical, and others.
• To find shopping sites, search for the name of your favorite companies, products, or stores, or just search for the word "shopping," and peruse the results.
• You can use directories, such as the All-Internet Shopping Directory, to locate online buying opportunities.
• Try visiting the Internet Mall, a site that links you to 27,000 stores and brand names, selling products from computers, to flowers, to dental services.

Banking and Investing
The Internet is full of information and services related to banking and investing, from general advice about planning for retirement to up-to-the-minute stock prices. Plus, more and more banks are offering their customers online access to their bank accounts. You can also manage your own stock portfolio online.

• To learn some of the basics of investing, visit the Web site of the Association of Individual Investors, too.

News
No need to wait for the morning paper to find out what's happening in the world. Many news sites on the Web are updated repeatedly throughout the day. So you can get the latest on world events, sports, weather, and more, whenever you want it.

• MSNBC, the most popular news site on the Web, brings you the latest national and international news, weather, business and sports news, and more. You can even get local news by identifying your local affiliate.
• For the latest information about weather around the world, turn to The Weather Channel. Besides getting the top weather stories, you can access current forecasts in many U.S. cities and view a variety of weather maps.
• ESPN Sportszone, which provides in-depth coverage of a variety of sports, up-to-the-minute scores for ongoing games, and more, is another popular Web site.
• At home.microsoft.com, you can even customize the news, weather and stock quotes you want to see. Once you select your preferences, subsequent visits to the Web site deliver your customized content in the order you want it to appear.
• The home page of your favorite search engine may have links to news articles. Click on the News link at Yahoo!, for example, and you get a list of detailed topics-such as top stories, business, politics, entertainment, and health-to choose from. These take you to story titles and summaries, which you can click to get the full story.
• If you have a favorite newspaper, search for it on the Web. There are online versions of just about every major newspaper. The New York Times, for instance, publishes an online edition, which is updated throughout the day to include breaking news.

Reference
The Internet provides you with access to numerous reference materials, including the collections of many libraries, research facilities, museums, and similar institutions. You can find information as simple as the definition of a word and as complex as the latest in scientific research.

• Microsoft Encarta® Online is an interactive encyclopedia full of information about cultures, events, discoveries, and more from all over the world. From the Encarta Online home page, you can search for any topic.
• You can access "Familiar Quotations: Passages, Phrases, and Proverbs Traced to Their Sources" by Bartlett through the Web site of Columbia University.
• The Internet Public Library is an online collection of hyperlinks to hundreds of other resources, including magazines, newspapers, almanacs, dictionaries, encyclopedias, and other online libraries, so it's a good place to start looking for reference material.
• The Library of Congress Web site includes exhibits, publications, catalogs, photographs, and more.
• Find out if your local library has a Web site. You may be able to access parts of its collection or databases for periodicals and other materials through the site. To search for your library (or others) online, start at the References: Libraries category of the Yahoo! directory.

Miscellany
Part of what makes the Web interesting and valuable is that it's easy for not only large companies and organizations but also smaller entities and even individuals to maintain their own Web sites. So there's something for everyone on the Web.

Shopping, banking and investing, news, and reference materials are just the tip of the iceberg. There's also plenty in the way of entertainment and fun, obscure topics, and eccentric interests. Here are just a few examples of some of the variety on the Web.

• National Geographic Online - where you can access the National Geographic Society's photographs, maps, globes, magazines, expeditions, travel tips, and more
• The Dilbert Zone - home of your favorite, cubicle-bound cartoon character
• Art Museum Network - a guide to the world's leading art museums and calendars of their exhibitions
• NASA - in-depth information, including photographs from space and sections specially designed for kids, about space exploration and the programs and astronauts of the National Aeronautics & Space Administration
• Left Hand Publishing - "dedicated to making life easier and more enjoyable for left-handed people"

To get an idea of what else is out there, explore the Web using one or more search engines. Type in any topic, see what comes up, and surf from site to site.

For starters
The Web also includes starter sites, Web sites designed to help new users find their way around the Web. You can also click Microsoft Internet Magazine. This takes you to articles about what's on the Internet and how to use it.

The Internet and the World Wide Web (sometimes abbreviated W3) are closely related but not the same.

• The Internet is a decentralized global network of computers.
• The Web is a collection of documents, or Web sites, that you can access via the Internet and your Web browser. The Web comprises the vast majority (but not quite all) of the content available over the Internet.

How does it work?
Web sites reside on computers called Internet servers. When you're connected to the Internet, your Web browser can communicate with Internet servers, asking them to send to your computer a copy of the Web page you'd like to see. The URL you type or the hyperlink you click tells your computer which server to try to contact and which page to ask for.

What is TCP/IP?
The interconnected computers of the Internet are of different types, and they use different operating systems. To communicate with each other over the Internet, they use a common set of rules called Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) or just Internet Protocol (IP). TCP/IP software allows your computer to connect to the Internet, too.

What's on the Internet besides the Web?
Many types of information are accessible over the Internet. Here are some things, in addition to visiting Web sites, that you can do using the Internet:

• Send and receive electronic-mail messages. (See All About E-Mail.)
• Join in a Usenet newsgroup.
• Transfer documents and programs between your computer and FTP, or File Transfer Protocol sites.
• Use a "gopher" to locate information on other sites.

Sites to visit
You can learn more about the Web from the World Wide Web Consortium, an industry group that works to develop and promote the Web.

Whether you're new to the World Wide Web or an experienced surfer, Web sites that review or rate other Web sites and provide hyperlinks to them can be a great resource. For links to many sites in a variety of categories, try visiting these.

• Microsoft® Internet Start Best of the Web-categorized lists of useful sites (plus their links). Click a category heading to see a full list of links.
• PC Magazine's The Best 100 Web Sites-a regularly updated, categorized list of sites (plus their links) that the experts think are top notch
• 100hot.com-a directory of 100 hot sites (plus their links) in various categories, from celebrities to job hunting to computer hardware to jokes
• toptenlinks.com-top 10 lists of sites (plus their links) in categories including family, sports, travel, and government

Usenet newsgroups are Internet discussion groups on just about any topic you can imagine. (There are more than 50,000 newsgroups, and more are added all the time.) Each newsgroup covers a particular topic, often alluded to in its name.

A newsgroup creates a discussion string, or series of related messages. Each message responds to an earlier message or addresses the overall newsgroup topic in some way. You can post your own message in response to the messages that interest you most.

Thousands of topics
Do you suffer from migraines? Check out the newsgroup alt.support.headaches.migraine for support. Are you the owner of hunting dogs? Visit rec.hunting.dogs. Here are some more examples of newsgroups to give you an idea of the variety that's out there:

• sci.physics.fusion
• soc.genealogy.hispanic
• biz.jobs.offered
• rec.arts.animation
• alt.autos.antique

And, of course, there are plenty of newsgroups about computing.

You can find newsgroups that may interest you by searching for them through the Deja News Web site. The Deja News site is a good place to learn more about newsgroups, in general, too.

How to do it
If your E-Mail client is also a newsreader, you can use it to subscribe to, read messages from, and post messages to newsgroups. Microsoft® Internet Explorer v4.0 makes newsgroup access easy, too. On the Go menu, simply select News. Internet Explorer automatically launches Outlook Express™ and opens your newsgroups folder so you can get down to business.

Start here
Before you join into a newsgroup discussion:

• Read a newsgroup's FAQ (frequently asked questions) file first to learn more about the group. (Almost all newsgroups have a FAQ.)
• Check whether the newsgroup has a file containing its charter and rules. If it does, read this before you post messages.
• Read a good portion of a discussion string before joining in. Others in the discussion will appreciate that you took the time to get familiar with the conversation first.

Sites to visit
The Deja News Web site is a good place to learn more about newsgroups, and it provides a way for you to search newsgroups for those that interest you.

ZDNet's "Usenet 101" article covers newsgroup basics.

FAQ, pronounced "F-A-Q," stands for "frequently asked questions." Many sites on the World Wide Web include a FAQ, which answers common questions about the site, such as what it covers, how to find information on it, and who created it. Typically a FAQ will be in the form of a text document you can download, rather than a full-fledged Web site. When you visit a newsgroup for the first time, look for its FAQ. It will probably answer all of your questions about the newsgroup and can help you get the most out it, as well.

Usenet, FTP and gopher represent ways of accessing information other than Web sites over the Internet.

• Usenet-a collection of several thousand newsgroups on just about any topic. Using a newsreader, you can subscribe to a newsgroup, read the messages other subscribers have posted, and post your own messages in response. Newsgroups provide a way for users to share information about topics that interest them. The Deja News Web site provides and introduction to newsgroups and a way to search them.
• FTP-stands for "File Transfer Protocol," a system of rules and a software program that allow you to log on to another computer and transfer information between it and your computer. Most browsers have some FTP capability built in. You can find many FTP sites using a regular Internet search engine, or use the Archie search engine, which indexes FTP sites.
• Gopher-a simple menu system that you can use to connect to files on the Internet. This easy-to-use system introduced many users to the Internet before the World Wide Web became popular. Using the University of Minnesota gopher, which was the first gopher, you can connect to gophers worldwide. You can search gophers using a program called Veronica.

Sites to visit
Find out more about newsgroups at the Deja News Web site.

Visit the University of Minnesota gopher to find out about gophers, to link to other gophers, and to search gophers using Veronica.

Learn all about Archie and search FTP sites from the Archie home page on the Web.

Use Galaxy to search gophers.

Search Engines: Finding the Needle in the Haystack
A search engine is a service that indexes, organizes, and often rates and reviews Web sites. It helps you find the needle - that one Web site you've got to see - in the Internet haystack. Different search engines work in different ways.

• Some rely on people to maintain a catalog of Web sites or pages.
• Some use software to identify key information on sites across the Internet.
• Some combine both types of service.

So when you search their "holdings," you're bound to get different results.

No search engine keeps track of all the content on the Internet. Even the major search engines - such as Excite, Infoseek, Lycos, and Yahoo! - won't give you everything. (Some studies indicate that even the top search engines find less than half of what's really out there!) You can try several major search engines by visiting an all-in-one search site.

Here's a quick introduction to some of the major search engines:

• Excite. A hybrid search engine, Excite fulfills the traditional search engine definition (it is always visiting Web sites and cataloging them using a software program) but also has a directory - a subsection of its cataloged sites, which have been reviewed by people.
• Infoseek. Infoseek's search engine boasts an extensive catalog of sites. Infoseek has a directory, too, that categorizes sites by topic using software. Some sites have been reviewed and are recommended.
• Lycos. Like Excite and Infoseek, Lycos is a search engine with a directory, organized by subject. You can also search the Lycos service "Top 5%," sites considered by its reviewers to be among the top five percent of sites on the Internet.
• Yahoo! This is actually a directory rather than a search engine, meaning humans compile and categorize the sites it searches. So you may get fewer results. But Yahoo! makes it easy to search for sites by category and to continue your search using a search engine, if you want to.
• Metacrawler. Rather than keeping its own database of Web sites, Metacrawler conducts your search simultaneously on several search engines, including Excite, Infoseek, Lycos, and Yahoo! This takes a little longer than using just one search engine, but it's likely to yield a more comprehensive set of results.

Major search sites generally provide more than a search engine for finding Web sites. They also allow you to look up information such as recent news stories, newsgroup postings, reference material (such as dictionary entries and maps), and E-Mail addresses, street addresses, and telephone numbers of business and individuals.

Here are two guidelines for picking a search engine:

• If you're looking for a broad, common topic, such as how to buy a personal computer, use a search engine that tends to give you fewer results of higher quality (usually the type that relies on people to catalog sites), such as Yahoo!
• If you're looking for a rare topic, such as 19th-century Hungarian authors, use a site that may be less discriminate but yields more results (usually the type compiled by a software program), such as Excite.

Sites to visit
Go directly to one of these search engines: Excite, Infoseek, Lycos, Yahoo!, and Metacrawler.

Deja News: Searching newsgroups
Usenet newsgroups are Internet discussion groups on just about any topic you can imagine. (There are more than 50,000 newsgroups, and more are added all the time.) Do you suffer from migraines? Check out the newsgroup alt.support.headaches.migraine for support. Are you the owner of hunting dogs? Visit rec.hunting.dogs. Here are some more examples of newsgroups to give you an idea of the variety that's out there:

• sci.physics.fusion
• soc.genealogy.hispanic
• biz.jobs.offered
• rec.arts.animation
• alt.autos.antique

And, of course, there are plenty of newsgroups about computing.

The Deja News search engine allows you to search millions of newsgroup messages to find a specific topic that interests you. It also allows you to post your own message in response to what you read. The Deja News site is a good place to learn more about newsgroups, in general, too.

Sites to visit
Find out more about newsgroups at the Deja News home page.

Tips for searching
Whatever search engine you use, these tips will help you find what you're looking for.

General searching

No search engine indexes all Web sites and Web pages. So if your first search doesn't produce the results you wanted, try searching with at least one other searching engine.

Read the "About" page.
Many search engines have a link that leads to detailed information about how the search engine compiles and searches through information and how to get the best results from it. Reading this page can save you a lot of time and headaches. Also, visit search engine home page links with names like "How To," "Search Help," and "Advanced Search" for searching tips.

Get targeted results by being specific.
The more specific your search word, the more targeted your search results will be. If you search for the words Labrador retriever, for example, rather than the word dog, your search will yield fewer sites, but they will be targeted to the type of dog that interests you.

Get more results by being general.
If your search word is too specific, your search may yield few or no results. To get more results, try searching for a related word that is more general.

Define your search using Boolean operators.
The major search engines let you select whether to search for the exact phrase you typed, all the words in the phrase but not necessarily together, any of the words in a phrase, and so on. A few search engines do not give you such options. In this case, you can define the search yourself by adding one or more words or symbols to your search topic.

• AND. To search for two (or more) terms on the same page: Type the word AND between the terms. (Example: sea AND kayak.) Or put a plus sign right before the second term. (Example: sea +kayak.)
• OR. To search for either of two (or more) terms on the same page: Type the word OR between the terms. (Example: kayak OR canoe.)
• AND NOT. To search for pages that include the first term and not the second: Type the words AND NOT between the terms. (Example: kayak AND NOT whitewater.) Or put a minus sign right before the second term. (Example: kayak -whitewater.)
• "". To search for an exact phrase: Enclose the phrase in quotation marks. (Example: "sea kayak rental".)
• (). To group parts of your search: Enclose them in parentheses. (Example: kayak AND (gear OR equipment). This returns pages with both the words kayak and gear or with both the words kayak and equipment.)
• *. To search for various forms of a word: Add an asterisk to the end of the word. (Example: kayak*. This returns pages with the words kayak, kayaks, kayaked, kayaking, and so on.)

1. On the toolbar, click the Search button.
2. In the Search bar that appears in the left pane of your Internet Explorer window, choose your preferred search engine from the drop-down list in the box labeled Select provider.
3. Depending on the search engine you've chosen, you may now have some options for configuring your search. Make your selections, or accept the default selections.
4. In the appropriate text box, type the word or phrase you're looking for, and then click Search, Submit, or Go Get It, depending on the search engine.
5. The search results appear in the list within the Search bar. Click on any link to open the associated Web page in the right pane of your Internet Explorer window.
6. Any time you want to pursue another link from the search results, click it. The new Web page will open in the right pane.
7. To hide the Search bar, click the Search button on the toolbar again.

1. In the Address bar, type go, find, or ? followed by a space and the word or phrase you want to find. For example, type Go Labrador retriever.
2. In the list of search results, click a link to display the Web page.

1. On the Edit menu, click Find (on this page).
2. Type the text you want to find.
3. Change any settings as needed.
4. Click Find Next.

Find a Web site when a URL doesn't work-using Internet Explorer 4.0
If the URL, or Web address, that you type in the Address bar or click on a Web page doesn't work, try this to correct the address:

1. On the View menu, click Internet Options.
2. Click the Advanced tab.
3. Scroll to Searching. Under Search when URL fails:

• If you want Internet Explorer to ask if you want it to search for a similar address, click Always ask.
• If you want Internet Explorer to search without asking first, click Always search.
• If you don't want Internet Explorer to search for a similar address, click Never search.

1. If you want Internet Explorer to search for the address using a different domain, select the Autoscan common root domains check box under Searching. (A domain is specified by the three-letter extension-such as .org, .edu, .com, and .gov - in the address. It tells you a site's type. If you select the Autoscan common root domains option, Internet Explorer will check the root of your URL with other domain extensions.)
2. Click OK.

Sites to visit
Find out more about newsgroups at the Deja News home page.