What's the difference
between Search Engines and Directories?
It's important to understand that you
use two distinctive vehicles for searching on the internet.
One is search engines and the other is directories.
Both, while different, are tools to allow
searches on a subject or word and to bring valid results,
aka hits, that match the inquiry back to the users.
Top
Search Engines |
| There are basically
12-15 top engines/directories and
they often trade spaces in popularity
statistics. |
|
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Search Engines
are automated computer programs called robots, or more
specifically "spiders", that "crawl"
the web by following links to index and save documents
back to huge databases. The engines use different spiders
who use different algorithms to validate the content
of websites. Popular Search Engines are Google, AltaVista
and Hotbot.
Directories
are human-edited; sites are evaluated for content &
level of interest and placed into categories. While
it may take longer to get listed with a directory, directories'
indexes tend to contain a comparatively small number
of high-quality links & high ranking here is very
desirable. Most popular directories are Yahoo!, Looksmart
and Open Directory.
To gain market share by delivering high-quality
search results to users, many of the different search
companies have chosen to partner with others; a directory
will add a search engine and vice versa to offer a hybrid,
more complete service.
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