[WEB4LIB] Clarification: looking for a .wav file

[Charles P. Hobbs]

Let's try this again...forward does funny stuff to mail, it seems...

plim wrote:

> Hi all again,
> I need to clarify that the .wav file for Moroccan national
> anthem was a challenge from a computer science instructor,
> who wants to know if librarians are really so good in in
> finding hidden Internet files. That's why it has to be a
> .wav file and not something that needs conversion.

So, where did he "hide" the file? First of all, no search engine can
"know" about any file that hasn't been submitted to it, either directly,
or via
linking to a page it already has indexed. So if this file is just
sitting on a server
somewhere, saying "Come and get me"...not enough. Someone must tell the
search engine about it, one way or another.

There's a pretty good article about what search engines do and don't do
in the latest Searcher:
http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/oct01/price.htm

Now, finding .wav files can be difficult because they cannot be indexed
like a text or PDF file can. (There was/is a search engine somewhere out
there
that purported to find midi files based on the searcher humming into a
microphone, but I never got a change to test it. But midi files are
*considerably*
more easy to analyze and index, than .wav files. Trust me on this one).

So any attempt to find .wav files on the Internet, at least with the
current search engine technology, will involve some level of educated
guessing, based on:
1. the name of the file (morocco.wav might be a good guess, but then it
might not)
2. other text on the page linking to the .wav file (pages about Morocco,

or collections of national anthems of the world). It might also make a
lot
of sense to search on non-English words for "Morocco" and "national
anthem"

as well.

I tried this strategy, and pulled up a couple of .mp3's, but no .wav's;
maybe you might be luckier. (I used Altavista and Google).


--
Charles P. Hobbs
King Drew Health Science Library
http://www.cdrewu.edu/kdhsl