Uses a local search engine, for recent updates (frequent indexing of the site. The search engine accepts a large variety of symbols and expressions in the query string, thus allowing an accurate description of the search criteria and specific search results. In order to keep the number of requests as small as possible the user is encouraged to take advantage of this capability whenever possible.

Syntax:

compute*: Finds compute, computer, computing, etc. computing center: Computing and Center must be matched both. "computing center": Computing and Center must be next to each other. computing and (center or centre): Includes the british spelling of the word Center.

center near "computing services": Finds Center for Computing Services.

computing and not center: Excludes any pages that contain the word center.

Google University Search ("search uzh.ch") restricts the search to the Zürich University webspace, "search www" searches the entire world wide web.

All About Google

Google uses an advanced ranking (PageRank)system to determine the relevance of a page. PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page's value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and help to make other pages "important."

Important, high-quality sites receive a higher PageRank, which Google remembers each time it conducts a search. Of course, important pages mean nothing to you if they don't match your query. So, Google combines PageRank with sophisticated text-matching techniques to find pages that are both important and relevant to your search. Google goes far beyond the number of times a term appears on a page and examines all aspects of the page's content (and the content of the pages linking to it) to determine if it's a good match for your query.