Finding stuff on the Web

This document is a brief guide to locating programs, files, and archives of various sorts on the World-Wide Web, or accessible through it. It seeks to answer these questions:

I've heard there's a WAIS source on recipes. How can I find it?

I've heard someone has a gopher on recipes. How can I find it?

I've heard that someone is running a Web site at Hebrew University. How can I find it?

A note on using this document --- it can be a little difficult to follow the directions here if you can't see them. So, push the "Clone" button on the control panel below to create another Mosaic window before you start, or use the Mosaic history list (with the "Back" and "Forward" buttons) to move back and forth if you're short on screen space.

Wais sources

The best way to find a WAIS source on a particular topic is to use the "Directory of Servers", which is a WAIS server that allows you to do keyword search on a database of pointers to other WAIS servers. Here are directions:

Push the "Clone" button below to get a copy of this Mosaic window. Read these directions in one while you follow them in the other.
Click here in one of the windows to get to the directory of servers. (You also could have gotten there by pulling "WAIS Interface" down from the "Documents") menu, and following a hyperlink.
The "Search Keyword" text field in the window you just touched is now active, which is Mosaic's cue that this document supports keyword search. Move the mouse into that text field, enter your keywords, and hit <Return>.
Many WAIS servers don't support stemming, so it can be to your advantage to use several variants on your keywords (e.g. "recipe recipes").
If the search was successful, you now have a document full of pointers to WAIS sources whose descriptions in the database match your keywords. If not, you might want to go back ("Back" button on the control panel), and try another set of keywords. It sometimes takes a few tries to get what you want.

Gopher sites

The best way to find information on gopherspace is to use Veronica, which indexes gopherspace in the same way that Archie indexes FTP archives. Here are directions:

Push the "Clone" button below to get a copy of this Mosaic window. Read these directions in one while you follow them in the other.
CLICK HERE in one of your Mosaic windows. These directions will still be visible in the other.
Decide whether you want to search for files or directories. Then choose one of the available servers (this page keeps track of which ones are up), and follow the appropriate link. I'm looking for collections of recipes, so "directories" would be the right choice for that search.
The "Search Keyword" text field in the window you just touched is now active, which is Mosaic's cue that this document supports keyword search. Move the mouse into that text field, enter your keywords, and hit <Return>.
When formulating a Veronica query, it's very important to say "or" if you mean "or"; "recipe or recipes" is a much better Veronica query than "recipe recipes", as you'll see quite quickly if you try both. See the guide to querying Veronica for details.
You should now see a document containing pointers to veggie recipes, drinks recipes, archives of more general recipes, and of course, Numerical Recipes. Bon appetit.

Web sites

Unfortunately, there is no wide-spectrum index for the World-Wide Web itself comparable to Archie and Veronica.

If you know roughly where the Web site that you're looking for is (e.g., if you know it's somewhere at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, a.k.a. huji.ac.il), you can find it by doing a simple text search in a comprehensive world-wide list of Web servers, constructed automatically by a Web-roaming robot right here at MIT. (Text search in Mosaic is on the "File" menu).

Otherwise, you're stuck with lists compiled by humans. The best place to start is probably the one in Honolulu Community College's stunning multimedia campus information system, most notably because it has a list of several other such lists at the end of it. You can find a link to it here.

__________________________

Robert Thau --- rst@ai.mit.edu