1) Guessing URLs 
If you're looking for a corporation or institute, start by guessing once or twice what its URL (Uniform Resource Locator)  might be. Businesses spend a lot of money to have an obvious and easy-to-guess URL, for exactly this reason. If you guess wrong,  you'll be told "URL not found." 

•    Assume the URL starts with "www."
•    End the URL with the correct suffix, as indicated below. 

 2) Use Web Site Listings 
If guessing doesn't work, the next step is to go to a search site.
Web site listings are created by people who surf the Web for a living and manually record Web sites. These Web sites are then categorized and subcategorized into a hierarchy of sites.
You can browse through these categories and subcategories until you get a listing of Web sites. 

Web site listings are useful if you're looking for a site on a fairly general topic, one for which there are hundreds, or even thousands, of Web sites. For example, by using selected listings for a popular topic like "Star Wars" or "African bees,” you will avoid the unofficial and not-very-good sites and find only the best. 

   Try clicking through this path on Yahoo! You will end up with a listing of Star Wars sites:

   Entertainment --> Movies & Film --> Genres --> Science
   Fiction & Fantasy --> Series --> Star Wars 

There you'll find the listing of Star Wars sites, wonderfully organized by subcategories (clubs, books, chats, screenplays, humor, etc.). You'll find the official Star Wars site, sites by Star Wars fans, and more. 

You can also access the listings by using a search field. Try typing "Harrison Ford" in the search field below and press Submit to see the Yahoo! listings. 
As you see on the top of the Yahoo! page, Harrison Ford is listed under Entertainment --> Actors & Actresses. 

   Some Web site listings: 
        Yahoo! (www.yahoo.com) 
        Excite (www.excite.com) 

In addition to portal sites like Yahoo! that specialize in search engines for the entire World Wide Web, many smaller sites provide a sub-set of the Web, highly filtered for quality and content. 

While they can be very helpful, Web site listings don't always work. It's much harder to search for specific information, rather than a subject area. For example, if you want to find a calendar that lists election days, then you might be better off with a search engine. 

3) Use search engines. 
Search engine computers search the entire World Wide Web and create a huge, raw, and unfiltered listing of all sites, regardless of quality or type. When you submit to a search engine some words describing what you're looking for (keywords), it will provide you with a long listing of all sites related to your keywords. 
   Some search engines: 
        Google (www.google.com)
        Alta Vista (www.altavista.com)
        Go.com (www.go.com)
        HotBot (www.hotbot.com) 
        InfoSeek (www.infoseek.com) 

However, if you're not specific or careful enough in your request, you could be overwhelmed with thousands of links--and then you won't know which ones to start with. 

Conducting a Basic Search 
      Narrow your search with:

• Specific words

The simplest way to search is to type in a single word. If the topic is narrow enough, that may be sufficient.
For example, "dysphasia" might work, but  "cats" will give you too many listings. 

• Adding Quotation Marks 

Quotation marks specify phrases instead of individual words. 

 Maybe you're looking for something that can't be expressed in a single word, such as "Persian cats," "computer games," "drug therapy," "stock portfolio," "sports cars." If you type in sports car (with no quotation marks), then you'll end up with a listing of every Web site that has the word 'sports' and every Web site that has the word 'car'. 

   When searching for a phrase, make sure to enclose it in quotation marks: 

        "cross-country skiing" 
        "early nineteenth century literature" 
        "Jane Doe" 
        "Great Barrier Reef" 
 

•  Adding Plus & Minus Signs 

 The plus sign (+) requires a search function to include specific words.
 The minus sign (-) requires a search function to exclude specific words. 

 A (+) guarantees that a particular word will be in all the Web pages in your results listings. A (-) guarantees that a particular word won't be in any of the Web pages in your results listings. 
 

•  Capitalization 

 Capitalization makes a search case-sensitive. 

 If you capitalize letters in your search, then you narrow the search to only occurrences of that word with the exact same capitalization. If your entry is all lowercase, then the search engine will search for all occurrences of the word, regardless of capitalization. 

The last thing you should keep in mind is that almost all search sites have an Advanced link next to the Search field. If you click on that, you'll be given ways to refine your search, such as by date and language.

Go to Top

1) How did you hear about the Web site?

Is the site a brand name you're already familiar with? Was it recommended by a reputable source, such as another Web site you trust, a newspaper, or magazine? Or did you simply stumble upon it while surfing? With millions of Web sites at your fingertips, it's wise to use a good filter. ThirdAge.com, for example, provides Web Guides to sites we reviewed and found to match our standards of excellence. 

2) What's your impression of the Web Site?

Is it up-to-date and accurate? It is professionally presented and maintained? Is a link to the individuals or organization behind the Web site (such as an "About Us" link) easy to find?
If the site's creators don't want you to know who they are,  that's a warning sign. Likewise, look for links to biographical information about the authors on the site. What are their qualifications? 

3) What's the purpose of the Web site and are they trying to sell anything?

You can start by looking at the Web site address. For example, if the Web site is produced in the United States, it will likely end in one of the following:
        .com = commercial 
       .org = organization 
        .edu = educational 
        .gov = government 
        .net = network 

Always keep in mind the motivations of the Web site producers. If you're getting health information from a Web site built by a pharmaceutical company, then it's a good bet that the information may be biased towards that company's products. Advertisements are to be expected on any commercial site (just like you'd except ads in a magazine), but it's essential to confirm if the editorial content is fairly presented. In sum, what's the source of the information on the site and is it biased?