Basic Definition: A web location which allows you to utilize more than one search engine at once. In other words, a Central Search Site will utilize a number of other Computer-Generated Web Indeces and/or human created directories, thus providing a more comprehensive search of web resources.
An exciting recent development on the Web is the evolution of central search pages. These locations contain forms for myriad search engines and links to other Net indices. These pages offer the best jumping off points for targeted Internet searching or even for random surfing. Some of them even allow the user to employ several search engines simultaneously in pursuit of a query.
CUSI Sites
The Configurable Unified Search Engine (CUSI) is a configurable interface for searching a number of Net resource databases. CUSI allows you to search a number of sources one right after another without having to navigate to each database location and retype the keywords. The official location of CUSI is http://Web.nexor.co.uk/public/cusi/cusi.html. CUSI is also available from any of the following reflectors:
Quarterdeck: http://www.qdeck.com/cusi.html
Northwestern University: http://www.eecs.nwu.edu/susi/cusi.html
Tennessee CommerceNet: http://www.tenn.com/cusi/cusi.html
Ulysses Telemedia: http://www.ulysses.net/cusi/cusi.html
PenTeleData Inc.: http://www.ptd.net/cusi/cusi.html
Europa Communications: http://www.europa.com/~jdm/cusi.html
The Internet Wizard at Spry: http://www.spry.com/wizard/index.html/
CUSI provides either links or search forms for many of the databases discussed earlier. Forms are provided for: The CUI W3 Catalog, the GNA Meta-Library, CityScape's Global On-Line Directory, Yahoo, Galaxy, Lycos, The Whole Internet Catalog, NIKOS, WebCrawler, The WAIS Directory of Servers, Archie, the Mac Software Catalog, Netfind and the Catalog of Electronic Texts (ALEX). Supernet, at http://www.supernet.net/search.htm, is a particularly slick graphical implementation of the CUSI interface.
The CUI Search Engines Page
The CUI Search Engines Page, located at http://cuiwww.unige.ch/meta-index.html, provides access to several search engines from one central location. Forms on this page allow searches to be performed on: CUI World Wide Web Catalog, Global Network Academy Meta-Library, ALIWEB, WebCrawler, NIKOS and the WWW Worm. Other catalogs searchable from this page include: Lycos, The Whole Internet Catalog, Veronica, EINet Galaxy, Jughead and the WAIS directory-of-servers.
Software catalogs are also available including: Archieplex, The Language List, The Free Compilers List, The Free Database List, The Virtual Software Library, NEXOR's Mac Software Catalog and Iconix WWW PowerPage. For tracking down e-mail addresses, CUI provides links to the Netfind gateway, the Finger gateways at Digital CRL and mit.edu, the Ph gateway, the UFN Search and FOUR11 Directory Services. Pointers are also available to publications such as Rik Harris' Abstracts Index, The Unified CS TR Index, Computer Science TR Archive Sites and the Gopher Catalog of Electronic Texts.
Super Searcher
Super Searcher, available at http://www.iquest.net/iq/reference.html,
provides a front end for a number of Internet search engines. Forms are
provided for Lycos, WebCrawler, the CIA World Factbook, the UNIX Software
Searcher, the MS-DOS Software Searcher, the "What's New List" at NCSA, the
MAC Software Archives, Webster's Dictionary and the Netfind People Locator.
Starting Point
Starting Point, at http://www.stpt.com/, claims to be "the single best
starting point to explore high quality Web content." Forms on this page
permit the searching of Lycos, Yahoo!, InfoSeek, CUI's W3 Catalog,
URLsearch, and Netfind. Topical links are provided to: News, Weather,
Sports, Entertainment, Business, Investing, Professional, Reference,
Travel, Shopping, Magazines and Education. The listing of online magazines
is particularly impressive.
SavvySearch
SavvySearch is a meta-search tool or parallel Internet query engine
designed to submit a user's information query simultaneously to several
Internet search engines. Found at
http://www.cs.colostate.edu/~dreiling/smartform.html, SavvySearch provides
a one-stop location and common Interface for querying: Lycos, WebCrawler,
NIKOS, Archie, CSTR, FTPSearch95, ALIWEB, InfoSeek, Webster's Dictionary,
Roget's Thesaurus, Harvest Home Pages, Pathfinder, Open Text, Harvest:
1-800 Directory, Galaxy, Harvest: Technical Reports, DejaNews, Yahoo!, the
Internet Yellow Pages and the Internet movie database. SavvySearch acts as
an intelligent agent contacting multiple Internet search engines, gathering
information from each source, then returning the linked results. An "Expert
Options Section" permits fine-tuning of searches.
To begin the search process, you enter a series of keywords into the form
box, using Boolean operators, if you choose. You then select up to three
sources or types of information to search. These include: WWW Resources,
Software, People, Reference, Commercial, Academic, Technical Reports,
Images, News or Entertainment. You may request up to five engines to be
queried. Each query returns a list of links. The source of each of these
pointers-which engine returned them-is noted.
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