Chapter 3

In chapter 3 I became more familiar with terminology regarding search engines. Recently learning about how to query our SQL databases in CIS-148 for information and after reading chapter 3 I realize that an internet search is very similar to the queries were using in SQL, except the database is much larger than the one we’ve been dealing with in CIS-148 and the actual search expression is a lot easier on the internet. The thought of using the same search expression on google and Bing and getting different results was something that never really crossed my mind, but certainly makes sense. I always figured that the differences in search engines were mostly down to UI, and different extensions available on their respective platforms. Its apparent that in order to have your site up at the top of search results you will need to pay the platform some amount of money, so it makes sense why different engines will have different results.

The sheer number of different ways you can search for things really surprised me. I can say that I never was aware of search operators before reading through the chapter. Knowing that you can use filetype: and then pdf, html, ppt, etc. to help specify what type of document you’re looking for can really narrow down a search. In addition to the filetype operator using site: can help you find information specific on a single site. So, combining these two together you can find specific document types on a specific website, that’s a lot better than just using keywords in a search. Along with search operators the other thing that I certainly never used was Logical Operators. The truth tables we’ve covered are starting to pop up more and more, because I never thought of using AND, OR, or NOT statements in my google search but those are essentially the examples of Logical Operators the books mentions.

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