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FingerTips "best on the web".

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Northern Light - possibly the biggest and probably the most intelligent free-text search engine on the web. Links to articles appearing in non-electronic publications are included.

bulletYahoo UK - the ultimate subject catalogue type of search engine - often the best place to start. There are links to free-text engines such as Alta Vista if nothing can be found in its indexes.
bulletAlta Vista UK - the most well-known free-text service. Covers a number of useful features, including automatic translation of foreign language pages.
bulletRaging - a stripped-down-to-the basics form of Alta Vista (US edition). As a result it is faster while retaining the same depth of coverage. Customise option allows for a useful options which are turned off be default - including automatic translation of foreign language sites.
bulletGoogle - another basic (and therefore fast) engine, but in this case with a remarkably good coverage of the contents of UK government web sites.
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Lycos - was the top engine until Alta Vista came on the scene. One of two nice features, including the ability to search for graphics. Started out as a search engine dependent on listings that came from crawling the web. In April 1999, it shifted to a directory model similar to Yahoo. 

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WebHelp - you get real answers from real people in real time 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Simply click on any Live Search Service button or type your request in the WebHelp search bar on any of our Directory pages and you will receive expert assistance from a live, knowledgeable web wizard in real time.  It also contains news and information from leading content providers in a wide array of topics, including current weather conditions, stock quote lookups, sports scores, and news headlines.

 

Best of the rest

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All the Web - all the web, all the time.

bulletDirect Hit - more accurate search results because it learns from the search experience of millions.
bulletGoDado - categorised bargain hunting in the UK and the world.
bulletExcite! UK - search or shop anywhere.
bulletFAST Search Fast Search & Transfer ASA powers the information-on-demand economy by enabling people to get the information they want, wherever and whenever they want it.
bulletGo - good quality searches and an impressive human-compile directory of web sites.
bulletGoTo - search or classified, features a small business directory to which people submit their websites.
bulletGlobal Online Directory - a directory, not a search engine which has been around since the web's early days. UK-based, but it covers the globe - or rather it used to - doesn't seem to be there at all now.
bulletH2G2- Earth edition of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Highly idiosyncratic and personal with information submitted by readers. One to watch.
bulletHotBot - a favourite among researchers due to its large index and many power searching features. Owned by Lycos, but continues to be run separately.
bulletLooksmart - a human-compiled directory of web sites originally backed by Readers Digest.
bulletMetacrawler - search the search engines.
bulletMirago - news, weather, what's on and offers a filtered version for children.
bulletMSN Search - Microsoft's popular service but gets its information from LookSmart and AltaVista.
bulletNetscape Search - offers a Google search as well as a categorised one.  Does an excellent job of listing official web sites.
bulletOpen Directory - uses volunteer editors to catalogue the web - has a human touch.
bulletSearch UK - automatically crawls UK-related domains and will look outside these domains when asked. Has over 2 million pages listed.
bulletNBC - a human-compiled directory of web sites intends to challenge Yahoo as the champion of categorising the web.
bulletStarting Point - not a good one any more, doesn't exist!
bulletStudent Advantage - for academic research.
bulletUK Index - lists sites based in the UK or that are UK-relevant.
bulletUK Plus - features reviews of UK-relevant sites, grouped into various channels, covering everything from Arts and Business to Travel and Work, prepared by a team of journalists.
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Webcrawler - the smallest index of any major search engine on the web so not the place to go when seeking obscure or unusual material. Good place to start on general subjects.

Page last revised: 09 Nov 2002 14:25 GMT Hit Counter

 
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