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22 June, 2004
Review by Bianca Bronzin
Search engine secrets are now no longer secret because Miranda
Morfey, Medical Librarian at Flinders University, gave it all away
with her most interesting, vibrant and practical session on how to
use a variety of search engines to enhance our searching skills.
This exciting session held at CPA House in the city, was very well
attended and enjoyed by all. Miranda's impressive knowledge and
enthusiasm for her topic was contagious and her coloured handout
'cheat' sheets are a great bonus for those who attended. These
sheets give brief but clear information on how best to use each
search engine to obtain maximum results. In addition, Miranda gave
us a copy of her PowerPoint slides of her presentation.
We were shown the most useful ways of using the various search
engines. However Miranda suggested that when starting to look at a
new area, we ask ourselves "who would know about this topic?" so
that we could search for a particular organisation specialising in
the that field. Such organisations could be private, government
organisations or universities and finding their websites can provide
a wealth of relevant and reliable information. For example going to
the Australian Bureau of Statistics website when looking for
statistical information.
Miranda pointed out that it is best to practice using several
different search engines in addition to using Google, as other
websites have some unique results and features. Several search
engines were discussed and we were shown wonderful tools and
features for Google, Alltheweb, Teoma, HotBot, and Vivisimo (this
latter one useful when searching on a new topic - it focuses on
concepts).
During the practical brainstorming session we exercised our minds to
develop the best and alternative search
strategy [Word document] for a reference query. Using Google, we
used truncation, ~ (tilda), URL domain and file types such as 'pdf'
and 'doc' to reduce search results to answer our question. It was
most interesting to see how lateral thinking helps in finding the
best possible results.
The evening proved to be most successful with attendees feeling they
have gained further knowledge to enhance their reference searching
skills. In appreciation of Miranda's skilful and exciting
presentation, the SALIN Committee thanked Miranda and presented her
with a potted plant.
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