English 202 Fall 2005 - Research Writing |
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A
thorough researcher wants to use all available avenues for gathering
information, including the print resources, digests, indexes, and
journals accessible through
libraries. Too often,
even when we search the "open" or public web, we are overwhelmed with a
huge number of hits, many of which are not helpful or relevant.
Search Terms: Remember that search engines are not intelligent; while some can now detect mis-spellings or suggest related searches, the success of your web searching is a function of the search terms you enter. Please conduct the following sample searches using www.google.com. and observe how changing the form of a term, adding and excluding term, shapes and narrows the results given back. When you have practiced with the following examples, go on to do some searching relevant to your topic. Be sure to save any useful resources you find!
OPEN Web Searching (Some
Examples): vegetarianism 1.
BOOLEAN NARROWING
vegetar* and meat* ADVANCED SEARCHING 3. EXCLUDING and INCLUDING Site Types
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Note that most search engines let you focus searches in this way although exact steps for doing so may vary from one to another. Look for "advanced search" or "search help" in your preferred search engine to learn more. Teoma.com is a useful engine, which takes similar commands to google; it cannot easily exclude sites, but it does provide suggested refinements and link collections on the right hand margin. Always keep in mind the expression "garbage in, garbage out;" take care how and what you search.
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