Internet - Web Directories

If you are trying to find general information on a subject by searching the internet, your best bet will probably be using a web directory, rather than a search engine.

A web directory is a tree style organization by major topics. Under the major topics are sub-topics, then sub-sub-topics, and so on.

I will use the Google Directory for the example below. There are other Web directories, such as Yahoo, the Open Directory Project, but Google is what I use the most.

The Major topics of the Google Directory, at the time of this writing, are: Arts, Business, Computers, Games, Health, Home, Kids and Teens, News, Recreation, Reference, Regional, Science, Shopping, Society, Sports and World.

Lets say that you want to know more about designing and maintaining a web site.

If you select Internet, under the Computer topic, then Web Design and Development you will find a list of more sub-topics related to your search: Accessibility, Authoring, FAQs, Help and Tutorials, Hosting, and more each of which will have further subtopics; within these might be more and eventually you will get a listing of websites related to what you are looking for.

With a search engine like Google, Yahoo and many others, you enter a keyword or phrase to search an index, refining by adding more specific keywords or phrases, until you get what you are looking for. A web directory, saves a lot of typing and figuring out what keyword or phrase to use to get to where you want, most of this has already been done, you just need to drill down to get what you are looking for.

I almost always use a web directory, when trying to find information on a very broad topic. Try using web directories yourself for broad searches and I believe you will find you spend less time getting pertinent information.

As always, leave a comment and let me know if this works for you and if not why not.