INTERNET

RESEARCH
WITH GOOGLE

by: Amanda Deason

[ This page intentionally left blank ]

TABLE OF CONTENTS
TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................3
CHAPTER ONE: UNDERSTANDING THE INTERNET ....................................8
THE INTERNET..........................................................................................8
WEB BROWSERS .................................................................................. 10
URLs ..................................................................................................... 13
SEARCH ENGINES .................................................................................. 16
THE DEEP WEB ..................................................................................... 17
SEARCH ENGINE FEATURES ............................................................... 18
SEARCH TERMS AND SEARCH QUERIES ............................................... 21
PUNCUATION...................................................................................... 22
FIELD SEARCHING .............................................................................. 27
REFINEMENTS ...................................................................................... 30
USING BOOLEAN LOGIC ....................................................................... 36
GOOGLE TRICKS .................................................................................... 41
Get show times: ................................................................................. 41
Find out when your favorite shows are on: .................................... 41
Find songs by your favorite artist or band: ..................................... 42
Find books by author: ....................................................................... 42
Check flight status: ............................................................................ 43
Calculations ....................................................................................... 44
Get help with conversions: ............................................................... 45
Calculate the tip: .............................................................................. 45
Get detailed weather: ...................................................................... 46
Get the times for sunrise and sunset ............................................... 47
Compare two items .......................................................................... 47
Get translations: ................................................................................. 48
Get definitions .................................................................................... 48
Get company information: Stock.................................................... 49
Search by voice ................................................................................ 50
GOOGLE IMAGES.................................................................................. 50
GOOGLE MAPS ..................................................................................... 51
EASTER EGGS ......................................................................................... 52
GOOGLE ............................................................................................. 52
CHROME TRICKS .................................................................................... 55
IN-BROWSER TEXT EDITOR .................................................................. 55
OFFLINE GAME ................................................................................... 55
Glossary .................................................................................................. 58
APPENDIX A: LIST OF COMMON DOMAIN EXTENSIONS .................... 61
Common country extensions ........................................................... 61
APPENDIX B: COMMON FILE EXTENSIONS ........................................... 62
APPENDIX C: REFINEMENTS & OPERATORS ......................................... 64

APPENDIX D: LIST OF GOOGLE TRICKS ................................................ 66

Dear Reader,
Thank you for taking the time to read this book. This book is meant
to be a guide and hand reference for using Google to conduct
online research. While the items discussed are Google specific
many will work across various other search engines.
Google can be a powerful tool once you learn how it operates.
Many of the search tips listed in this book I use on a daily basis. You
will find shortcuts, tips, tricks and even some Easter Eggs that will
have you power-searching with Google in no time.
I hope you find this book helpful and that you enjoy learning the
contents as much as I enjoyed putting it together.
All the best,

PART 1
UNDERSTANDING HOW THE INTERNET WORKS

CHAPTER ONE: UNDERSTANDING THE INTERNET

Most of us know how to use the Internet without actually
understanding how it works similar to the electricity in your home or
office. You use it everyday but you most likely dont understand the
mechanics behind it.
Over the next few pages youll learn how the Internet works. This
understanding will help you craft better search queries and get you
better results faster.

THE INTERNET
When most people think of the Internet they likely picture the
following:

INTERNET

But the Internet is not a cloud! In reality the Internet looks more like
this:

The Internet is a wire. It is actually buried in the ground or laying on

the ocean floor. The Internet is a global system of interconnected
computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite
(TCP/IP) to link several billion devices worldwide.

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use

the standard Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to link several billion devices
worldwide.

When two or more computers connect to the wire they can

communicate over the Internet. The following diagram shows two
servers connected to the Internet. A server is a special type of

computer that can connect directly to the Internet. Web pages

are filed on the servers hard drive.

gmail.com
216.58.218.197
INTERNET

Google.com
74.125.227.161

Each server has its own address on the Internet, much like your
home address. In the example above the Google.com servers
address is 74.125.227.161 and the google.com servers address is
216.58.218.197. This address is called the IP address. This address is
used to by other computers to find each other.
As you might imagine it would not be very easy or convenient to
have to remember and type all those addresses every time you
need to visit a Web page! It is this reason we also give them names
like Google.com and gmail.com. These names are called domain
names. Well learn more about addresses later in the URL section of
this book.
So how does the Internet work? Well for starters, your computer is
not a server since it doesnt connect directly to the Internet. The
computer you use is called a client because they are connected
indirectly to the Internet through an Internet Service Provider (ISP).

Every computer on the Internet has an IP address. A computer connected

directly to the Internet is called a server. A servers IP address also has a
name called a domain. A computer that can access the Internet indirectly is
called a client.

If you wanted to access your Gmail account you would connect to

the Internet through your ISP:
9

gmail.com
216.58.218.197
INTERNET

ISP

There is quite a lot more to really understanding the Internet,

however, this is all you will need to understand for the purpose of
this book.
If you would like to learn more about how the Internet works you
can visit http://www.internetsociety.org/internet/how-it-works

WEB BROWSERS
When you want to connect to the Internet you will need to use a
piece of software called a Web Browser.
A Web browser is different from Windows or iOS that are systems
that allow you manage files and programs on your computer. A
web browser (commonly referred to as a browser) is a software
application for retrieving, presenting and traversing information
resources on the World Wide Web.

A web browser (commonly referred to as a browser) is a software application

for retrieving, presenting and traversing information resources on the World
Wide Web.

You get to your Web browser by clicking on its icon from your
desktop or start menu. Pictured on the next page are some
common Web browsers.

10

One you have opened your Web browser, you access Web pages
by typing the Web address in the address bar. For example if you
wanted to visit the United States Department of Agriculture site you
would type usda.gov into the address bar like so:

The Web browser is the most important piece of software on you

machine because every Web page you access from your
computer will be retrieved and displayed through it.
11

Different Web browsers have different features, pros and cons. I

encourage you learn more about the various browsers and choose
the one that best suits your Web browsing needs.

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE

DIFFERENT BROWSERS:
Learn more and download Chrome by Google at:
https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/
Learn more and download Firefox by Mozilla at:
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/
Learn more and download Opera by Opera Software at:
https://www.opera.com/download/
To get the most recent version of Safari by Apple, install the most recent
version of OS X from the Mac App Store.
Learn more and download Internet Explorer by Microsoft at:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/internet-explorer.aspx

Features to consider when choosing a Web browser include:

Speed
Ability to split work across multiple tabs
Sync capabilities
Privacy
Ease of use
Bookmarking

There is a good article at PCWorld.com that covers more on the

differences between different browsers. That article can be found
at the following link:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2605933/browser-comparisonhow-the-five-leaders-stack-up-in-speed-ease-of-use-and-more.html

12

URLs
A Uniform Resource Locator, or URL, the term for all types of names
and addresses that refers to the global address of documents and
other resources on the World Wide Web. Another name for URL is
Web address. The URL or Web Address is what you type in at the
top of a Web browser as previously mentioned.
Understanding the structure of the URL is important to being able to
perform expert-level Web searches. There are multiple parts to a
URL.

Figure 1: Anatomy of a URL

To better understand the URL we will use the following URL as an

example and dissect each piece.

URL: http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf

This first part is the protocol. In this example the protocol is http
which stands for Hypertext Transfer Markup language.
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf
You can think of the protocol as the set of rules or language your
browser and computer will communicate in so they can
understand each other.

13

The next portion, www, stands for World Wide Web.

http://www.aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf
This is something most browsers will add by default so there is no
need to key this portion in.

Look for the next / in the URL and youll find the domain name
and extension right before that.
http://www.aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf
In this example the domain name is tamu the website for Texas A&M
and the domain extension is .edu

A more comprehensive list of common domain extensions can be

found in the appendix of this book.

14

The information between the protocol and the domain is called the
subdomain. It is an entirely separate website with its own content
but there is no new domain name.
http://www.aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf
In this example aggie-horticulture is a subdomain of tamu.edu for Texas
A&Ms Aggie Horticulture site.

The next section after the / are the folders and paths taken to
arrive at the Web page.
http://www.aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf

The next section of this URL between the last / and the last . is
the title of the Web Page. The title of this webpage is
pecans_native_2015
http://www.aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf

The last piece of this URL tells us the file type.

http://www.aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/fruit-nut/files/2015/04/pecans_native_2015.pdf
In this example the file is a .pdf. We will cover file types in more detail
later in this book and a list of file types can be found in the
Appendix of this book.

This is the extent of knowledge about the structure of the URL you
will need to prepare you for the advanced searching methods
discussed in later chapters.
If you would like to learn more about URLS you can visit the Word
Wide Web Consortium website at:
http://www.w3.org/Addressing/URL/url-spec.html

15

SEARCH ENGINES
When you open your browser and pull up Google or Bing you are
using a search engine. You probably use one every day but do you
know what they are or how they work? Understanding what a
search engine is and how they work is essential to being able to
get good results from your queries.
A search engine does not allow you to search the entire Web.
Instead it allows you to search a database of indexed pages on
the search engine providers server. There are two types of search
engines, standard search engines and meta search engines.

SEARCH ENGINES
Web sites used for retrieval of data,
files, or documents from a database
For the same reason you need a
card catalogue in a library, people
use a search engine when browsing
the Web.
A search engine assists the
researcher in sifting through the
near endless and constantly
changing information on the Web.

A standard search engine is a program that searches for and

identifies items in a database that correspond to keywords or
characters specified by the user, used especially for finding
particular sites on the World Wide Web. The standard search
engine sends out tiny computer crawlers called spiders or web
crawlers that copy web pages and send them back to the search
engine to be indexed.

16

A meta search engine is a search engine that searches other

search engines indexes. They submit your search queries to other
search engines and the return a summary of the results back to the
user. In this way a meta search engine allows the user to search
many search engines at once.

A standard search engine crawls the Web and indexes Web pages in a
database that the user can query. A meta search engine allows the user to
query multiple search engines.

THE DEEP WEB

Remember that search engine spiders cannot access every part of
the web. Pages that may not be reachable or indexed by spiders
are part of the Deep Web. Examples of deep Web content
include:
Password Protected Sites
The webpage requires the user to log on in order to view it,
like your bank account and email
Password Protected Services
Websites that require a password (subscription or nonsubscription) like LexusNexus or other academic and business
databases, journals and directories.
Form Controlled Entry Sites
Sites that are not password controlled but require the
completion of some form or action before the user is allowed
to access the content like travel sites. This also includes
technology-hindered content such as pages that require
CAPTCHA technology
Time-Controlled Content
Some sites only offer content for a specified time or a certain
number of views.
Hidden Pages
Robots rely on Web links to travel from page to page for
indexing. Some pages are not linked to by other pages and
thus never found by the spider and cannot be indexed.

17

Robots Exclusion
The webpage has a robots.txt files that requests the spider
not index the page.
Unconventional Protocols
Pages that reside outside of conventional protocols like
http:// or https://
Just because a search engine doesnt come back with the right
results or any results at all that doesnt mean it doesnt exist. It only
means it wasnt indexed by the search engine or the wrong query
was used. We will learn more about queries in the next chapter and
performing a deep Web search later in this book.

SEARCH ENGINE FEATURES

Features and support vary among the different search engines.
Most of us are familiar with Google, Bing, Yahoo! and Ask. Aside
from these well-known search engines there are literally hundreds
of other search engines to choose from!

SEARCH ENGINES
STANDARD SEARCH
ENGINES

META SEARCH
ENGINES

When choosing a search engine some features to consider include:

18

Refinement support
The search engines ability to use Boolean, Phrase, and Field
searching.
Wild Card (Truncation) support
The search engines ability to substitute part of a word or a
whole word with *
Stemming support
The search engines ability to find variants of terms such as,
tense, plural & singular form.
Feel and look
The search engine should be uncluttered and have an easy
to use interface.
Categories
Many search engines allow the user to search specifically for
images, news, videos, blogs and more.
Size of quality of the database
Each search engine has its own special sauce when it
comes to indexing Web pages. There can be significant
differences between databases in both content and size.
You can keep up-to-date on current search engine news at the
Search Engine Showdown website at
https://www.searchengineshodown.com

Attempt&your&query&in&
different&search&engines.&
The&results&may&surprise&
you!
19

PART 2
DEVELOPING A SEARCH STRATEGY

20

SEARCH TERMS AND SEARCH QUERIES

Search terms are the individual words or groups of words you type
into the search engine. The search term or terms make up the
question you are asking the search engine, otherwise known as the
search query.
Each researcher develops their own unique style of selecting
search terms and forming queries and soon so will you. It only takes
a little time and patience.

Knowing URL endings

will give you clues to
who is sponsoring the
website and help you
evaluate sources!

21

There are many ways to get the most out of your search queries.
Over the next few pages Ill discuss punctuation, field searching,
Boolean phrase searching, symbols and refinements.

PUNCUATION

Search for an exact phrase

Phrase Searching allows the researcher to query for documents
that contain an exact sentence or phrase as opposed to being
limited to only keywords.
Phrase searching is performed by enclosing the phrase in quotation
marks [] to indicate to the search engine that is should search for
the terms in that particular order and wording only.
For Example: You are searching for Information Security.

22

When phrase searching you are asking the search engine to find
the phrase in the exact order and spelling you specify. Because of
this, the query [ abc 123 ] would return results containing abc
123 but not 123 abc or any other variation.
Phrase searching is often used when searching for famous quotes,
proper names, recommendations, and forcing the inclusion of stop
words like or, it, the, etc.
Examples:

Proper Name [ Jane Doe]

Famous Quote [ to be or not to be]
Recommendations [ best astronomy book ]

*An Internet savvy teacher may even use phrase searching to

detect plagiarism!
You could also choose verbatim from the options menu by clicking
on Search Tools and then changing All Results to Verbatim as
shown below:

Exclude results
Place a minus sign in front of the word or words you want to
exclude from your query.
23

For example, if you wanted to search for banana but not

bread

Search for a Google user

Place a plus sign in front of the Google+ username. You could find
me on Google+ by performing the search below.

Search for Social Hashtags

Hashtags are labels that are given to messages or posts on social
media to help make it easier to find the messages or posts with a
specific theme or content.
If using Google to search with a hashtag, the search isnt limited to
just Google+. Google will return results from other sites such as
Twitter, FaceBook and Tumblr. To search for hashtags across
multiple social media platforms you can place a [ # ] symbol in
front of the term you are searching for.
If you wanted to see what people where saying about the annual
Louisiana Credit Union League Convention you could use the
social hastag #LCUL14 as your query.

24

As you can see from the above example, this search returned
results from multiple sites.
Search for prices
Some search engines allow the ability search for a specific price.
This is done by placing a [ $ ] in front of the price.
For example, If you wanted to do a search for dollar slots you could
perform the following search:

Search for a range of numbers or prices

You can even search a range of prices or numbers by placing two
dots [ .. ] between the range of numbers or prices.
For example, if you are looking to buy a 1969 Corvette Stingray but
you have a budget of $5,000-$10,000 you could perform the
following search:

25

Or perhaps you would like a list of cyber security tips that is 5-20 tips
long. You could perform a search like this one:

Search for a phrase with missing terms

The wildcard symbol [ * ] acts as a placeholder for any unknown
or wildcard terms. This is helpful when you can remember parts of a
phrase or quote but not all of it.

26

Here is a summary of the symbols that a search engine may

support. Some search may not support all of these or they may
support others that are not listed here. It is important to learn the
feature of your search engine.

SYMBOLS

FIELD SEARCHING
The content of Web pages and other electronic records are
organized into separate fields.
Where available, Search Engines can allow the researcher to query
for documents by directing the search engine to search specific
fields through a powerful method called Field Searching.

27

site:
Millions of websites are online and there are many navigational
differences among them. Using the site refinement is a great to
search the site for the information the researcher is looking for
without leaving the search engine.
The site: refinement is used to find web pages from a web site. This
is done by typing [ inurl: ] followed by the site you would like to
restrict your search to. You can also add additional terms to your
search query if desired.
EXAMPLE: You want to retrieve information on Australia from the
National Geographic website. You could do so by performing the
search below.

inurl:
The inurl refinement is used to restrict the search to pages that
contain the query term in the pages web address. This is done by
typing [ inurl: ] followed by the search term.

28

SEARCHING INURL:
The$inurl:'re&inement$is$used$to$restrict$the$search$to$pages$that$
contain$the$query$term$in$the$pages$web$address.$
$
THE URL FIELD
$
$$$
$

For example: You want to find the calendar of events for Louisiana
State University in Shreveport. First you would limit your search to the
lsus.edu website and then request all results that contain the word
calendar in the URL. The search could look like this:

intitle:
The intitle: refinement is used to restrict the search to pages that
contain the query term in the title tag. This is done by typing [
intitle: ] followed by the search term or phrase.

29

SEARCHING INTITLE:
The$intitle:'re&inement$is$used$to$restrict$the$search$to$pages$that$
contain$the$query$term$in$the$title$tag.$$
$
$
$$$
$

TITLE
TAGS

For Example: You want to do research on global warming and you

only want results form an educational site. You could perform the
search below by restricting the search to only .edu sites and
searching for global warming in the title tag as shown below.

REFINEMENTS
In addition to the field searching operators a search engine may
support the ability to add refinement operators to your search.
These labels help you identify results that match a behavior you
specify.
link:

30

The link operator allows you to find pages that link to a certain
page. You can perform a link search by typing [ link: ] followed
by the URL with no spaces.
For Example: You want to find sites that link to the oberserver.com
site.

A search using the link label will not return every result, however, it
will give you a good sampling of sites that link to the site you
specify in your query.
related:
The related operator allows you to find sites that are similar to
another site. This is done by typing [ related: ] followed by the
website URL with no spaces.
For Example: You want to find sites similar to
NationalGeographic.com

31

info:
The info operator allows you to search for more information about
a specific site. You can perform this type of search by typing [
info: ] followed by the website URL with no spaces.

You will notice in the example above that Google can provide you
more information on the site you searched for. Clicking on any of
the options (similar, link, from and contain) will provide you with
more options for exploring the site and related sites.
32

cache:
The cache operator allows you to view the search engines cached
copy of the Web page. To perform a cache search you would
type [ cache: ] followed by the webpage URL.
Google and other search engines take snapshots of the webpages
it visits and stores them in thier index. If the webpage you are trying
to view is not responding or cannot be found a cache search can
show you what the webpage looked like the last time the search
engine visited it.
For example the search:

Returns this webpage:

33

The cached page can also be retrieved by clicking on the arrow in

the search result and choosing Cached:

filetype:
Using the filetype: refinement you can search for documents on the
web by restricting the results to only the filetype you specify. You
perform a filetype search by typing [ filetype: ] followed by the
extension you specify.

COMMON FILE TYPES

.doc Word Document
.log Log File
.txt Text File
.pdf Adobe Document
.csv Comma Separated Values File
.ppt PowerPoint Presentation
.xls Excel Spreedsheet
.mp3 MP3 Audio File
.mov Apple QuickTime Movie

You can explore more file types at: www.FileInfo.com . A list of file
types has been provided for you in the Appendix of this book.

34

For example: You want to find a PowerPoint presentation on the

evolution of fish. Using the following query would yield the results
you might be looking for.

You could further refine your search to include only results from
educational sites by combining the site operator with the filetype
operator like the following example:

35

USING BOOLEAN LOGIC

Boolean logic is at the heart of how computers think. Once you get
the hang of using Boolean logic you will have a powerful tool in
your research toolbox to help you get the results you want.
THE OR OPERATOR

The OR operator will find pages that include EITHER of the search
terms immediately adjacent to it.
For Example: The query [ford OR dodge ] will return pages that
contain either of the terms ford or dodge.

36

The OR operator can also be keyed using the vertical bar symbol
[|]
The query [ford OR dodge ] and the query [ford | dodge ] are
equivalent. This is proven below:
[ford OR dodge ] returns:

[ford | dodge ] returns:

As you can see from the searches above whether you choose to
use the OR operator or the vertical bar your search will be
accepted and carried out by the search engine in the same
manner.

37

THE AND OPERATOR

The AND operator will find pages that include BOTH of the search
terms immediately adjacent to it.
The query [ford AND dodge] will return only pages that contain
both of the terms ford and dodge.

38

THE NOT OPERATOR

The NOT operator will find pages that do not include search term
immediately following it.
The query [ford NOT dodge ] will return only pages that contain
the term ford and not the term dodge.

The NOT operator can be keyed using the minus symbol [-]. The
query [ford NOT dodge ] and the query [ford -dodge ] are
equivalent.

39

PART 3
TRICKS & EASTER EGGS

40

GOOGLE TRICKS
Get show times:

Type [ movies ] the city and state to get local movie show times.

Find out when your favorite shows are on:

Type the name of your favorite shows and the term [ episodes ]
into the search bar to find out when your favorite shows are on.

41

Find songs by your favorite artist or band:

Type [ songs by ] and your favorite artist or band to get a list of

songs.

Find books by author:

Type [ books by ] and the authors name to get books written by

that author.

42

Check flight status:

Checking flight status is easy! Type the airline, [ flight ] and the
flight number to get current flight status.

43

Calculations

Google can do various calculations for you. Simple type the

problem into the search bar and hit enter.
Like this:

Or perhaps something a bit more complicated:

44

Get help with conversions:

To convert from one unit of measurement to another type the first

measurement, [ to ] and the second desired unit of measurement.

Calculate the tip:

Need to calculate the tip? No problem! Simply type [ tip

calculator ] and Google will display a tip calculator. Enter in the
amount of the bill, select the Tip% and number of people splitting
the bill then let Google do the math.

For example, your table gets a bill of $10.00, you would like to tip
15% and the split the amount between two people:

45

Googles tip calculator computes each person would need to pay

$5.75.

Get detailed weather:

You can get the weather forecast by typing the city, state and the
word [ weather ].

46

Get the times for sunrise and sunset

Type [ sunrise in or sunset in] and the city to get the time.

Compare two items

Compare two items easily using [ vs ] between the words you need
to compare.

47

Get translations:

Google has a handy translator that brought up by typing

[language1 to language2 ] in the search bar.

Get definitions

The define operator allows you to get the definition of any word.
For example: You need to know the definition of the word affect.

48

Get company information: Founder

Type [ founder ] and the company name to get founder
information.

Get company information: Stock

Get stock information by typing the company name and [ stock ]

in the search bar.

49

Search by voice

Google has the option to search by voice. Click on the

microphone

and Google starts listening!

GOOGLE IMAGES
Search by pasting the image URL or uploading a photo from your
computer:

50

GOOGLE MAPS
Geocode of a location
To get the geocode of a location go to http://maps.google.com
and type in the address.

Right click on the red pin and click Whats here?

51

The geocode will be found in the result.

EASTER EGGS
GOOGLE
Tilt and Askew
Search for the word [tilt ] or [askew ] and the results will be
slanted.

52

Barrel Roll
Google will be doing flips for you when you type [do a barrel
roll ] into the search bar!

Zerg Rush
You can play the game Zerg Rush in Google by searching for [zerg
rush].

53

Red and Yellow zeros will attack the results. Click them to destroy
them!

Atari Breakout
You can play the game Atari Breakout in Google by searching for
[atari breakout ] and then clicking on images.

Watch as all the images transform into the game and you can
actually play it!

54

CHROME TRICKS
IN-BROWSER TEXT EDITOR

You may find yourself needing to make some notes and dont
have a handy text editor. No problem. Google has an in-browser
text editor. Type the following into your address bar. Save to
favorites to always have a handy text editor at your fingertips.
data:text/html, <html contenteditable>

OFFLINE GAME

No Internet connection? Kill the time by playing endless T-Rex

runner game in chrome. When your Internet connection is down
you see the Network Error page, with the lonely T-Rex glyph
created by Google designer Sebastien Gabriel:

55

Instead of closing out the browser tab, tap the space bar on your
keyboard and the T-Rex at the will suddenly fall to a stretch of land
and thenhell start running! Tap the space bar on your keyboard
to help the T-Rex clear the cacti. Run as far as you can, for as long
as you can, until you crash.

56

PART 4
GLOSSARY

57

Glossary

browser
A client computer program that can retrieve and display
information from servers on the World Wide Web.
client
A system entity that requests and uses a service provided by
another system entity, called a "server." In some cases, the server
may itself be a client of some other server.
domain name
A domain name locates an organization or other entity on the
Internet.
file format (type)
the kind of data stored in a file. Most modern operating systems use
the filename extension to determine the file type though others
store this information elsewhere in the file system.
filename extension
a suffix (separated from the base filename by a dot or space) to
the name of a computer file applied to indicate the encoding (file
format) of its contents or usage. Examples of filename extensions
are .png , .jpeg , .exe , .dmg and .txt .
Internet
A term to describe connecting multiple separate networks
together.
IP Address
A computer's inter-network address that is assigned for use by the
Internet Protocol and other protocols. An IP version 4 address is
written as a series of four 8-bit numbers separated by periods.
meta search engine
search engines that search other search engines
protocol
A formal specification for communicating; an IP address the
special set of rules that end points in a telecommunication

58

connection use when they communicate. Protocols exist at several

levels in a telecommunication connection.
search term
the individual words or sets of words you type into the search
engine.
standard search engine
a program that searches for and identifies items in a database that
correspond to keywords or characters specified by the user, used
especially for finding particular sites on the World Wide Web.
subdomain
A subdivision of a domain.
query
a question

59

PART 5
APPENDIX

60

APPENDIX A: LIST OF COMMON DOMAIN

EXTENSIONS
DOMAIN
EXTENSION

TYPE

.com

commercial

.org

organizations

.int

internal
organizations

.net

network

.edu

educational

.gov

government

.mil

military

DESCRIPTION
This is an open TLD; any person
or entity is permitted to register.
This is an open TLD; any person
or entity is permitted to register.
The .int TLD is strictly limited to
organizations, offices, and
programs which are endorsed
by a treaty between two or
more nations.
This is an open TLD; any person
or entity is permitted to register.
The .edu TLD is limited to specific
educational institutions such as,
but not limited to, primary
schools, middle schools,
secondary schools, colleges,
and universities.
The .gov TLD is limited to
governmental entities and
agencies in the U.S.
The .mil TLD is limited to use by
the United States military.

Common country extensions

DOMAIN EXTENSION

COUNTRY

.au

Austraillia

.ca

Canada

.eu

European Union

.us

United States

.uk

United Kingdom

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APPENDIX B: COMMON FILE EXTENSIONS

Some common file types are:
TEXT FILES
doc Word Document
log Log File
txt Text File
wpd WordPerfect Document
wps Microsoft Works Word Processor Document
pdf Adobe Document
DATA FILES
csv Comma Separated Values File
dat Data File
ppt PowerPoint Presentation

SPREDSHEET FILES
xlr Works Spreadsheet
xls Excel Spreadsheet
xlsx Microsoft Excel Open XML Spreadsheet
AUDIO FILES

mp3 MP3 Audio File

wav WAVE Audio File
62

wma Windows Audio File

VIDEO FILES
m4v iTunes Video File
mpg MPEG Video File
rm Real Media File
mov Apple QuickTime Movie
wmv Windows Media Object File
IMAGE FILES
ai Adobe Illustrator File
jpeg JPEG Image
png Portable Network Graphic
bmp Bitmap Image File

OTHER FILES

exe Executable File

dwg AutoCAD Drawing Database File
kmz Google Earth Placemark File
html Hypertext Markup Language File

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APPENDIX C: REFINEMENTS & OPERATORS

Refinement or Operator

Description

Parenthesis

Search for an exact phrase or quote

-Minus sign

Exclude a search term

Search for a specific user

Search for a social hashtag

Search for prices

..

Search for a range of number or

prices

* Wildcard

Search for missing terms

inurl:

Restrict search to results that

contain the query in the URL

intittle:

Restrict search to results that

contain the query in the title

site:

Restrict search to a specified site

link:

Retrieve pages that link to a

specified site or URL

related:

Find sites that are similar to other

sites

info:

Find more information about a

specific site

cache:

Retrieve the search engines

cached copy of a webpage

filetype:

Search for documents by type

64

OR

Returns results that include either of

the search terms immediately
adjacent to it

AND

Returns results that include both of

the search terms immediately
adjacent to it

NOT

Returns results that do not include

the search term to the right of it

65

APPENDIX D: LIST OF GOOGLE TRICKS

Lable

Description

movie [city] [state]

Get show times

[show title] episodes

Find out when favorite shows are on

songs by [artist/band]

Get list of songs by artist or band

books by [author]

Get list of book by author

[airline] flight [number]

Get flight status

[calculation]

Type a calculation to get the result

[measurement] to [unit]

Get conversion

tip calculator

Googles tip calculator

[city] [state] weather

Get weather forecast

[city] [state] sunrise

Get time of sunrise

[city] [state] sunset

Get time of sunset

[item1] vs [item2]

Compare two items

[language1] to [language2]

Get translation

define [term]

Get definition

founder [company]

Get company founder information

[company] stock

Get stock information

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