Searching & Forms
Search Engines
There are billions of pages on the world wide web so you need a way of quickly finding the information you need. Search engines use programs called spiders that visit millions of pages and take note of the information on the page. This allows you to type words - search terms - into the search engine, they search through all the pages they know about and show you a list of results.
You have a choice which search engine to use, currently (2017) Google is the most popular, but there are others.
- Bing is Microsoft's search engine
- Ask - formerly known as Ask Jeeves
- Duck Duck Go offers more privacy
- Wolfram Alpha Not really a search engine - it computes answers to questions
Remember that instead of going to a search engine, you can type your search terms directly into your browser's address bar. This will use your browser's default search engine which might be Google or Bing or something else.
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How to search
For this example we will search Google for Dumbarton Rock
- Go to the Google website: if you use the link on the list of search engines above, Google will open in a new tab in your browser
- Make sure the cursor is in Google's search box (the cursor is a flashing vertical line that shows you where any text you type will go)
- Type dumbarton rock (your search terms) into the search box. You don't need to use capital letters but do leave spaces between the words
- As you type, you might see a list of suggestions appear below the search terms. You can click on one of these if it's what you're looking for but we won't bother this time
- Finally, click the search button or press enter on your keyboard
The Results
After you click the search button or press enter you should see a list of results similar to those below (I have only shown the top 3 results). Each result shows:
- A blue link that will take you to the website if you click it
- The address of the website in green
- Some text from the website that may include your search terms (dumbarton rock in this case)
You can also see a list of search categories. At the moment you're looking at all the results, but if you just want pictures of Dumbarton Rock then click Images; if you want to know where it is, click Maps and so on.
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Image Search
You can use Google (or other search engines) to find pictures:
- Click on Images from the list of categories
- You should see a page of small thumbnail images - click on any of them
- Click View image to see a full-size version of the picture
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Search Tips
- Your search terms should be words that are likely to appear on the website you want. If you get loads of results that are not helpful, think about changing your search terms
- You can use a phrase search to find the exact text you type in the order you type it. To do this, put your search terms in quotation marks. For example, searching for dumbarton rock could find pages with the word rock at the top and dumbarton at the bottom, but searching for "dumbarton rock" will only get pages with the 2 words together in that order.
- Put the minus symbol immediately before a word to exclude pages with that word from your search results. For example, if you were getting lots of results about rock music in Dumbarton you could search for dumbarton rock -music
- Watch out for adverts. Search engines are free to use, but they make money from advertising so some of the results will be adverts for businesses. These results should be identified a word like 'Ads'.
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Web Forms
Some pages you visit on the web need you to give them some information before you can get what you want. Usually there will be a form for you to fill out.
Forms usually have a number of fields that let you input different types of information - text, dates, passwords etc. You need to click in each field in turn to get the cursor into the field and start typing (or use another input method). Once the form is completed, there will be a button that you click to submit your info.
Tip: You can use the tab key on your keyboard (above caps lock) to move to the next field on a form.
Sample form
Try filling out the form below. Remember to click in the field you want to use.
- The password is 123456 (you should know why this is a terrible password!)
- The start date is the first of next month
- Use the Reset button if you want to clear the form
- Click the Submit button when the form is complete
Some websites that use forms
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