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Improve your searches and store your finds

Presented to Victoria Computer Club

Ed Prior - September 10, 2018

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https://tinyurl.com/y7byy6hw

Link to this presentation

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Maybe you don’t want a search engine

Wikipedia - users contribute content on anything - https://www.wikipedia.org/

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Wikivoyage - users contribute travel information - https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Main_Page

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WebMD - information on health conditions - https://www.webmd.com/default.htm

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Drugs.com - information on prescription drugs - https://www.drugs.com/

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Maps

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The major search engines

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Lots of others

Useful for specialized searches

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List of search engines:

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_search_engines

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Examples of medical search sites:

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_search_engines#Medical

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How to start a search

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You can go to the site directly

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A better way

Type search terms into the address bar

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Will take you to the DEFAULT search engine

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Search results for victora (MISSPELLED!) computer club

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How to change browser default search engine

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Chrome

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(defaults to Google)

  • Three dot menu (right corner) → settings�
  • Settings → scroll down to search engine�
  • Change default with drop down menu�
  • If desired engine isn’t on menu:�“Manage search engines”���

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Firefox

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  • Three bar menu (top right) menu →�
  • Settings → scroll down to search engine�
  • Change default with drop down menu�
  • If desired engine isn’t on menu:�“Manage search engines”���

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Edge

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Defaults to Bing

  • Three dot menu (top right)�
  • Settings (at bottom)�
  • Scroll down to “View Advanced Settings”�
  • Under Privacy and services:
    • Change search engine

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You won’t find a list of other search engines unless you visit them using Edge. It seems Microsoft really wants you to use Bing by making it hard to change.��

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How to do better searches

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This presentation will use Google

Other search engines work similarly

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Key point: Google will try to find ALL the terms in your search, considering the first ones as more important

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Example:

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Population New York City London

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AND between terms is implied / can use OR ‘|’

Happy Joy

(finds both words)

Happy OR Joy

(finds either word)

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Use - to exclude term

Jaguar

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Jaguar -cars

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Use quotes for “exact phrase”

(I can’t think of a good example)

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More hints from Google

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Google tricks

Lots of handy little tools

  • Calculator�
  • Currency Conversions�
  • Definitions�
  • Flights�
  • Movies�
  • Postal Codes�
  • Time / Weather�
  • Translate�
  • Unit conversions���

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There are downsides to Google (and Bing, and Yahoo! …)

Ads and sponsored links skew results

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Your search history also affects results

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To overcome ads: Carefully examine results

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To deal with search history affecting results

  • Clear your history: In Chrome:
  • 3 dot menu (top right)
  • History / History
  • Clear Browsing data
  • Select time frame (from last hour to the beginning of time)

2) Clear your Google account search history Myactivity.google.com

3) Use incognito (Chrome) / Private (Firefox) window:

  • Top right menu / New Incognito Window

4) Use a different search engine

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Alternatives to Google

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Duck duck go https://duckduckgo.com/

  • Does not profile users�
  • Shows the same results for the same search terms to every user every time

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Duck Duck Go has its own tricks

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  • Expand Shortened URL�
  • Generate [strong] passwords�
  • Alternatives to programs or websites

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How to store your search finds

Stay tuned for Part 2 - to be presented October 15, 2018