A search engine is an Internet service that scours the World Wide Web and reports back matches of Web pages or sites for the keywords of your topic of interest. There are literally hundreds of search engines out there and most of them are similar in the ways they conduct searches and bring you the results.

The Ask.com Search Engine

A good example of a search engine is the Ask Jeeves search engine. This is a Website that allows you to type a real question relating to your field of interest in a small text box. For example, you would like to find out more about search engines on the WWW. You could go to the Ask Jeeves Website and conduct a search!

 

1. In the Navigator Location Bar, type in http://www.ask.com/, then press "RETURN" or "ENTER."

 

 

2. Next, enter a question in the entry field on the page as seen below.

 

 

3. After you've entered the question, press "RETURN" or "ENTER," or click the Ask! button. The search engine will respond by displaying a page with a list of Web pages related to your topic of inquiry. Our question about search engines yielded the following results page. (Only part of the actual page is displayed.)

 

 

4. Finally, all you need to do is select the match that best fits your question, and click the Ask! button!

Ask Jeeves also tries to find matches for your questions in other search engines such as Yahoo!, WebCrawler, Infoseek, Excite, and Alta Vista.

A Demonstration

For a demonstration of the Ask Jeeves search engine, enter a question in plain English in the entry field below, then click Ask Jeeves.

 

Enter your question here:

 

Other Search Engines

There are many search engines available out there. You will surely find a favorite one that you would go back to again and again. Although there may be small differences in the details of their use, most of these search engines behave in a similar way, taking a list of keywords from you and returning a list of Web pages containing those keywords. Feel free to select and experiment with the ones in the menu list below!

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Ask Jeeves is a trademark of Ask Jeeves, Inc., Copyright 1996-1999 Ask Jeeves, Inc. All other brands are properties of their respective owners.