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Course Modules:
Comprehensive
Web Search
Strategies
Keywords and Synonyms
In this next series of activities, you will make repeated passes through the Search Engines you explored earlier. On each pass, you will use a different search technique that will enhance web search.
Resize your Netscape browser window and open the text editor and digital logbook. Keep a running log as you complete the activities.
On the first pass through the search engines, enter a minimum of five keywords and synonyms (you can use more if you wish… most search engines will allow you to enter as many as 256 characters in the text field) from the "Analyzing Your Search Topic" template. Enter the most important keywords first as the order of the words can influence the results with some search engines. Use lower case letters and leave a space between the words.
After you have entered the keywords and synonyms, drag across the words while holding down the mouse button. Select Copy from the Edit menu to copy the search string into the text editor window. When you move on to the other search engines, you will paste the same search string into the text field. This will allow you to compare the results returned by the different search engines.
On these sequential passes, you will find webpages that you may have missed in the basic web research module. When you find a website that is related to your topic, add it to your bookmarks.
The point of this exercise is to force the search engine to search for all of the words instead of the simple topic you entered back in the basic web research module.
Record your observations in the digital logbook.
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maintained by Bob Jost | bjost@josts.net
| last revised Jan. 1, 2002
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