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Objectively Comparing Competing Search Engines?
aendeuryu asks: "My default search engine of choice is, like most of you I assume, Google. That said, some complaints about Google over the years do seem to have some merit -- basically, that sometimes the indices aren't always updated, that it's too easy to manipulate via googlebombing or legislation, and that maybe too many of its featured services never get out of beta stage. Maybe the fact that Google has gone so long without significant competition is enough to make one at least begin to ask questions about it possibly becoming stagnant. Personally, I'm so used to doing things the Google way (and achieving acceptable results quickly) that I'm not really interested in switching -- case in point, all the above links referenced were quickly found via Google. However, what am I missing out on by not giving (for example) Yahoo search a shot? Or, more to the point, how would one go about trying to effectively and objectively compare competing search engines? In what areas have people found Google to have become obsolete for their purposes? Have less ignorant people than myself figured out ways to test a competing search engine's efficacy for themselves?"
personally I prefer dogpile. I like the organization of results much better.
""I don't see an obvious biosynthetic pathway from allicin (CH2=CHCH2SS(=O)CH2CH=CH2)to isothiocyanates (R-N=C=S) ""
Yahoo search is okay, not as nice as google, but a good second.
Alltheweb.com has found things google hasn't, but in general I rarely use it.
I rarely use MSN because it was awful all the times I tried it. Same for Altavista.
In general, if I'm searching for something I'll use google first and then Yahoo and Alltheweb to catch anything that google may have missed.
God Bless America. Why? Did it sneeze?
Unfortunately, comparing search engines is a nearly impossible task, since they probably aren't indexing the same data.
When you measure a search technology, the values you typically look for are precision and recall. precision says "of the X results you gave me, how many of them are relevant". recall says "in the world, there were Y possible pages you could have found, but you gave me X of them".
you can't measure recall for a public search engine, but you can measure precision. Take a set of sample queries, and some users. Have them perform the queries, and go through the first ~100 pages and give them a "thumbs up" (relevant) or "thumbs down" (not relevant).
Your overall score will measure precision: if at N=100, all 100 were relevant, that's 1.0. if only 50 were judged relevant, precision is 0.5.
You can estimate recall by judging say 1,000 documents (phew). Then sample precision at N=10, 100, 500, etc, assuming that is an "exhaustive" list of documents in the world.
Many people don't realize that Yahoo! has a scaled down (Google like) search interface which is actually pretty sweet: http://search.yahoo.com
Lately my Google results have been so Google bombed that I've been going back and forth between the two. I can't say for sure yet, but I may be in the middle of a bit of a personal transition.
Depending on what you're searching for, Google is often so front-loaded with dead-end advertiser links that its results aren't really worth much. Although it has to be said, it depends what type of a search user you are, and what types of things you're looking for.
Google is still the king of advanced search.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
I will agree that 99% of the time, google is perfect for what I need. Stick a few words together, add an extra one, and VOILA, you have what you're looking for.
The times that I have had problems is when I am not exactly sure what I am looking for in a few quick words. I can put it together in a question, such as "What is my house in Utah worth?" or "Why are flamingos pink?".
in those cases, I usually do ask.com That will get me going on a few pages, at which point I will know more clearly what I'm looking for (Utah "Real Estate") and can google from there on out.
"There is a reason Linux is free"
~me~
I personally think Microsoft's sandbox search engine front-end is pretty nifty.
Too bad the search results aren't nearly as up to par as google's results (in my opinion)
http://start.com/1
WTPOUAWYHTTOTWPA
What's the point of using acronyms when you have to type out the whole phrase anyways?
I've stuck with Google for a while, but I used to do surveys pretty often. My approach was to start preparing a couple of days in advance, by keeping notes about things I was searching for. Then I'd take three or four of them, usually the ones that I'd had the most trouble refining, and try them out on a bunch of search engines. For each, I'd keep track of how many searches I had to do and how many junk pages I had to get through before I could get to something useful on that subject. It usually became clear pretty quickly which search engines were allowing me to make efficient use of my time and which were wasting my time.
Another thing you might want to do is check out some of the newer "clustering" or "concept map" search engines such as Vivisimo or Kartoo, to see whether they suit your searching style better. They're really quite different from the search engines we've gotten used to, so the metrics I just described don't quite work for them. That doesn't mean they're better or worse - just different.
Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
if you visit Google's No Country Redirect page, it'll set a cookie to stop you being redirected to your national page when visiting google.com
Not sure why you end up at different fr/dk/... domains though
For some time now, Search Engine Watch has provided a good editorial and comparison on various search engines. They focus on marketing topics, but also tend to talk a lot about the underlying technology, etc.
A recent roundup of engines is at http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/215 6221.
Oh, don't get me started about Experts-exchange. Most of the time someone there is asking the exact question I'm trying to find the answer to. However, once you've paid (and I did, once, because the person I was working for was under time pressure) you inevitably discover the "answer" is something you're already tried. Just try getting your money back. Of course, after registering, you can always ask your own question. Didn't help me, though, since I couldn't wait a week (or however long it takes) for the answer. After about an hour of extra searching, I ended up finding what I was looking for. Its was just too bad I paid for Experts-exchange first.
"Shared pain is lessened; shared joy is increased. Thus we refute entropy" - Spider Robinson
That kind of engines are indeed nice. Still, they have their own oddities. For laughs, I tried to ask the system whether moon is made of cheese.
It so turns out that moon is indeed made of cheese!
"is moon made of cheese?"
"The Moon is Made of Cheese"
I guess it still takes some time before that kind search engines become more popular than the traditional ones.
What be really sweet, would be a way to EXCLUDE certain sites.
For each site that you want to exclude, add a term along the lines of -site:overstock.com to your query.
Um... yeah, you can pay, but you can also scroll down about 2 pages of advertisements and a listing of catagories and find the answers lodged beneath. Unless there are yet more answers to these questions?
For example: a question about Java. The question first, then the SIGN UP! bla bla, then a bunch of catagories, but if you scroll down further, you'll find answers to the questions, including the 'accepted answer' and such.
Hope this is useful to someone.
Cheers
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