Chapter 3 - Searching the Web - Search Queries

Search query for Internet searches is very similar in nature to SQL. Essentially when searching through a search engine you are searching a database of either primary or meta searches. A search query utilizes a key word to find information on the web for the topic you are inquiring about.


For example, if you are wanting information about dogs you would enter the word dog as a search keyword.

Now realize that this will return every website and page as well as documents that contain the word dog in the context of the body. This means you will have to sift through millions of pages of information in hopes of finding what you want to know about dogs. To narrow down our search results we can use operators such as AND, OR, and NOT. These are called Boolean operators.

We can use the Boolean operators for a targeted search. In the search box we can enter two or more words to limit the return results. You do not have to use the word and between each word as it is implied. The Boolean operators follow the same process as it does in logic where for a search result to be true each component or keyword must return a true value or be present in the website.

For example, lets continue with the search on dogs. Say you want to know more about a certain breed of dog. You could enter in dog Westie West Highland Terrier. The actual search string would read as dog and Westie and West and Highland and Terrier. This will only return the documents that contain all of the keywords within it.

With the keywords we can also use wild cards for when we are unsure of spelling or want to use an open-ended search. For example, say you are unsure of how to spell Mississippi but you want to find information on Mississippi. You can enter Miss*i. This will return all documents that have words that start as Miss and end with an i as well as Mississippi.