Transcript Searching the web - Wiltshire College

Google searching
Tips and ideas
Search engines
• Using different search engines will get different results so try
different ones:
• Bing – www.bing.com
• Yahoo – uk.yahoo.com
• Dogpile – www.dogpile.com – this searches other search
engines for you
• Try out the differences between www.google.com and
www.google.co.uk
• Compare results from different browsers - searches on IE and
Mozilla give a different listing of results
Search terms
• Think carefully about what you are actually looking for
• There will be lots of words to describe what you want – decide
on several and try them all
• Think about broad and narrow terms – general to specific use both
• Put words in different order to get different results
• Think about synonyms
• Think about European or American sites – language
• Translate non- English sites
• When you have a few hits look at the “similar pages” option –
this may find other useful pages
Narrowing search options
• Open up the side bar
• Decide on dates for search
• Reading level – pick advanced
level if you want academic
material
• Verbatim means it will search
for the words in the order you
have requested – a very useful
tool
• Use the translation option
Tips •
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http://www.googleguide.com/advanced_operators.html
“ “ – double quotations marks around search phrase
- minus sign will exclude sites - news -site:bbc.co.uk
~ synonym search – ~ planes will get airplanes, aeroplanes,
OR – to get alternative terms US OR America
• Filetype – if you want .ppts or spreadsheets
marriges filetype: .ppt – also use .pptx etc
• Site - use if you want certain types of sites or domains
marriage site: statistics.gov.uk or education site: ac.uk
• Link: - this will find pages that have the website you are on linked
to it
Authority of sites
Signs of a good site
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Author is obvious
Recently updated
Lots of links to other sites
Contact us option clearly visible
Has RSS feed on home page
Aim of site clear
All the links work
Google scholar
http://scholar.google.co.uk
• Very useful place to look for material
• Very useful for citations
• Check source of any journal articles as some may be illegally
downloaded
• Check dates of any articles etc
Copyright and plagiarism
• Everything on the web belongs to the person who created it
• Always cite source – see the LRC guides to bibliographies and
referencing
• Images – use creative commons or use the advanced search
option in Google images to adjust search to free to use
material
• The LRC has a list of freely available images on your course
page – or ask at your campus LRC
• Use the Wiltshire College guides to copyright and plagiarism –
on signpost or ask in the LRC
• Keep notes – if you don’t have permission or don’t know the
author you can’t use the material