NetWorth Searcher

[Robert J. Tiess]

In my endless quest to develop better search tools
for Internet librarians, patrons and netizens in
general, I have created and am now testing an
alternative search tool called NetWorth Searcher,
something quite a departure from my ongoing work
on the Proteus (http://www.thrall.org/proteus.html)
search tools, which I still regard as a superior
means of searching the Internet.

NetWorth Searcher is the first CGI search engine I've
created using my DIFFUSE search engine model (Data
Infused Free Form Unified Search Engine), which
takes the most general user query and infuses it
with data to maximize potential for relevant results
in search engines.  More on the DIFFUSE model can
be found at

  http://networth.virtualave.net/diffuse.htm

The search engine itself is accessible at:

  http://networth.virtualave.net/search.htm

This service uses purely HTML and CGI, and the
Java that executes is associated with the mandatory
pop-up window provided by the host, not my site.

As this is a keyword-based tool, I have also been
experimenting with a Spanish language version

  http://networth.virtualave.net/search-espanol.htm

to demonstrate DIFFUSE's flexibility over multiple
languages.

As a proponent of having users learn the fudamentals
of basic and advanced searching, I feel obligated
to say this tool is not being presented as a proven
or pure research tool.  Rather, I'm regarding it,
for now, as an online exploratory tool for far more
adventurous researchers who want to see "what's out
there."  The DIFFUSE page above explains all of this.

In so many ways this performs antithetically to what
I have come to understand as sound searching on the
Internet, but as an alternative search engine it
has many possibilities, as you will see.  The sole
goal here is to produce a higher degree of relevant
hits based on general user queries, not a very small
amount of precise hits.

Anyone is welcome to try NetWorth Searcher and
provide feedback regarding it and/or the DIFFUSE
search model.  Write to me at rjtiess at warwick.net
with your thoughts on this and feel free to ask
questions.  Further instructions are available at
the site.


Robert J. Tiess
rjtiess at warwick.net
http://members.tripod.com/~rtiess