How to Better Search THE WEB

For most people, searching the web is limited to just entering a bit of text into a search box. Here we show you how to search faster, more accurately and have some fun while doing it too.

Google 

Launched in 1997, this search engine with a minimalist design has grown in a way that a few would have imagined. It is adopted by multiple browsers as the engine for their top search bar and is also used as a homepage by various browsers. 

Tips, tricks and easter eggs

1. Search in Klingon — If you're a Star Trek fan, head to http://google.com/intl/xx-klingon to view Google in Star Trek's Klingon language. 2. Search as Elmer Fudd — Looney Tunes fans can view Google in the way Elmer Fudd speaks by vis iting http://google.com/intl/xx-elmer. 3. Play Pacman in Google — http://google.com/ pacman has a mini version of the game to play. 4. Experimental Google - http://google.com/experimental will show you options to enable keyboard shortcuts for a faster web search.

Yahoo 

Although Yahoo has been in the search business since 1994, they have recently entered into a deal with Microsoft for their search engine to be powered by Bing. The transition is expected to be complete sometime during 2012. 

Tips, tricks and easter eggs 

1. Yahoo Yokel — Open www.yahoo.com (not the Yahoo India site) and click on the exclamation mark in the Yahoo logo on top to hear the Yahoo yokel. 2. Compose email from search box — In the search box type "!mail abc@xyz.com" (where abc@xyz.com is a complete email ID) to directly compose a mail with that email ID in the 'to' field (You need to be signed in to Yahoo for this to work). 3. Search within a website — Yahoo allows you to search within other sites from its search page. Just type "!sitename query" (for example !wiki Vegas). 

Bing 
    
Bing has been through its share of transitions right from when it started off as MSN Search in 1999. Over the years it was changed to Windows Live Search and Live Search before Microsoft finally settled on Bing in 2009. 

Tips, tricks and easter eggs 

1. Get the full version of Bing — The localised version of Bing's search page shows a trimmed down version. Go to www.bing.com/worldwide.aspx and set your language to US-English to see the en tire interactive search page. 

2. Get search results as RSS feeds — You can subscribe to search results as RSS feeds by adding "&format=rss" to the search results page URL. 3. Results for linked files — You can search a specific site for linked files by adding "contains:filetype" in your query (for eg site: bing.com contains:doc). Search Engines for Specific Needs 

For Music 

Use Midomi to discover new music, listen to samples or just sing/hum into your microphone to find the name of a song you've heard before. They also offer free iOS & Android apps. 
www.midomi.com 

Deep Web Search 

Dogpile combines most relevant search results of your query from Google, Yahoo & Bing to deliver results faster. You can even add it to your browser or get a toolbar. 
www.dogpile.com 

For Images 

Bookmark PicSearch to search for images from all over the web. It offers easy ways to streamline your search plus image dimensions & file size are clearly mentioned upfront. 
www.picsearch.com 

Medicine Related 

Probably the largest medical resource on the internet, WebMD can check on symptoms, offer food advice, tips on parenting and pregnancy and lists common names for drugs. 
www.webmd.com 

For Videos 

Blinkx has over 35 million hours of video stored — all searchable, but you can also view categories, ask it to show you current news, entertain you or create a custom channel. 
www.blinkx.com 

Automatic Search 

Wolfram Alpha is not a search engine; it's a computational knowledge engine. Use it for conversions, stats, fact finding or just enter anything that you want to know about in the search box. 
www.wolframalpha.com