Websites are arranged as treelike hierarchical listings by subject headings in directories. These are valuable especially in capturing broad topic areas.

InfoMine

Features access to targeted university research and educational tools.

Internet Public Library

In its own words, The IPL provides library services to Internet users. Activities include: finding, evaluating, selecting, organizing, describing, and creating information resources; and direct assistance to individuals. This is a large set of publically-available authoritative information resources aimed at learning and teaching environments.

Librarian’s Index to the Internet

A subject directory of Internet resources chosen and evaluated for their particular usefulness to public library patrons.

Lycos

Most results come from the Open Directory project, with data from another search engine. See also Lycos Zone, with content for children.

Yahoo!

Users recommend and staff add unevaluated sites to this amazingly popular resource. Yahoo’s popular guide for kids is Yahooligans!

Search engines, sometimes referred to as keyword indexes, put the query control in one’s own hands. The choice of words, called keywords, which guide the search are the user's own. Relevance and thoroughness vary with queries and tools.

AllTheWeb

The largest search engine database on the Web. It's response time is fast. Offers "Offensive Content Filter" A good engine for running a search that has not retrieved results elsewhere.

AltaVista

A fast engine using one of the largest databases on the Web. Offers various advanced search interfaces as well as a filtering option.

Ask.com

Their ExpertRank algorithm claims to give relevant search results by identifying the most authoritative sites on the Web.

Excite

A powerful, informative, and popular engine based upon a vast database. Excite claims concept searching.

Google

A clean interface distinguishes this search engine from others. Gives results based on popularity of links returned. Offers a Safe Search Filtering option

HotBot

Drop-down boxes make this search engine easy to understand and use. The power search feature provides many search options.

These engines use other tools, often several, and consolidate or cluster the results. Each tool here has its peculiarities with regard to operation and presentation of data.

Dogpile

Straightforward search engine that returns results from several other search engines simultaneously. It organizes results by search tool source and lets you to customize how items are returned.

Ixquick

Finds sites rated best by multiple engines for your search. Regular, Boolean and natural language searching are supported.

MetaCrawler

Allows you to search once through multiple WWW crawlers.

Search.com

Uses the metasearch technology of SavvySearch to search 700 search engines, Web directories, auctions, storefronts, news sources, discussion groups, reference sites, and more.

ToxSeek

An advanced meta-search and clustering tool for toxicology and environmental health issues. This was recently released after development at the National Libraries of Medicine. Users control the data sources very easily.

Vivisimo

Enter a search term, and Vivismo will not only pull-back matching responses from major search engines, but will also automatically organize the pages into categories. Slick and easy to use.

Subject areas have their own, often new, tools for finding information. We list here some tools of wide utility.

Google Maps

Locate geographical information visually with a robust mapping search tool

Technorati

"Technorati lets you search sites that update with extreme frequency, like blogs and news. Unlike other engines, our results are individual posts (portions of pages), so they're more specific. Search results are listed newest to oldest, and are often only minutes old!" the site states. Lists weblog sites, or blogs, and facilitates searching with user-supplied access data, or "tags."

Universities Search

Especially useful for locating information about educational institutions of higher learning.

WhoWhere?

An early Internet “people-finder,” now part of Lycos.

These tools are popular among users looking for a kickstart for searching. Almost as suggestions, the concept linkages help begin a search and suggest avenues for narrowing and focusing efforts.

Grokker

This attractive tool provides a visual representation of the information requested. The characteristics are indicated graphically. A fascinating tool, especially for consolidating information and demonstrating linkages and sources.

Ujiko

An advanced clustering tool with the ability to learn a user’s interests. The graphical interface suggests linkages among concepts. Searches multiple types of data.