This page lists search engines which have one to five responses in
the survey: not enough for even a rough average. However, we find the
user comments on advantages and disadvantages to be fascinating and
enlightening -- just be sure to check the date reported (new versions
may have addressed the problems) and note how long the program was in
use on that date.
| SearchTool |
rating |
how long |
date reported |
What about this search shortName works well? |
Any problems or issues with this search shortName? |
| Alkaline |
5 |
1 year |
08/2001 |
Easy to install and
configure even for a non technichian. Searches PDF:s. Good up-to-date
documentation. Accurate answers from the help-desk. Developments
and improvements has been done and are being done. Released versions
are now almost bug free. Its very inexpensive for professional companies
and free for the rest. It index other sites or even parts of other
sites. You could set up several applications on the same machine.
It does a fast job indexing in the background, catching changes
made to pages real fast which in turn makes the index up to date
and the users satisfied. |
I don not think its
relevance ranking is the best. However, in the 1.5 version I believe
there will be possibilities to manipulate with term weight and the
relevance of metatags. |
| 5 |
6 months |
07/1999 |
It does what I want
and does not pretend to do more. It's easy to install and it's free. |
- |
| 2 |
1 year |
11/1999 |
Fast searches Handles
PDF files well |
Timeouts in some versions
Bugs in current version Support agreement not forthcoming |
| 2 |
3 months |
10/1999 |
- |
- |
| AltaVista |
4 |
2 years |
09/1999 |
AV currently provides
a broader search than SWISH-E |
Am somewhat distressed
that it does not recognize Dublin Core meta tags. |
| 2 |
5 years |
07/2001 |
- |
old version |
| 2 |
3 months |
04/2000 |
indexes pdf files |
- |
| 1 |
3 months |
01/2000 |
- |
we have not been able
to optimize it for our site. we have multiple feeds (news, weather,
entertainment) and these always surface before any real meaty relevant
pages |
| 2 |
1 year |
07/2002 |
- |
Difficult to integrate
because we need to pull content from a database (as well as spidering
our discussion boards) and separate it by content type. |
| Apple e.g. |
2 |
3 years |
03/2000 |
Very good stemming,
intelligent searches, high quality returns |
It crashes; not supported,
but we can't find anything better. We're looking and all of the
Mac products have problems. |
| 1 |
1 year |
06/2000 |
serves up pages reasonably
closely related to the query |
crashes the machine |
| 1 |
?? |
01/2000 |
- |
It takes a very long
time to return any pages, and when it serves up the page, the url
changes nightly, so that pages are not bookmarkable |
| ask jeeves |
3 |
4 weeks |
11/2001 |
gives good results |
no yet |
| ASTAware
SearchKey PRO |
5 |
4 months |
07/2002 |
Vwry easy to install
and administrate. I tested it both on Windows and unix, on PDF and
HTML files, it can index both formats. Due to the fact that .html
files load faster in the browser, I chose to restrict the index
to this format. The results are generated very fast, it behaves
excellent when concurent queries are launched against tha database. |
No problems occured
so far, and the price it's reasonable if you look for a solid product
& customer support. |
| Autonomy |
5 |
1.5 years |
08/2001 |
Integration between
etherogeneus Info (Web pages, Data Bases ....) Customisation for
Intranet use |
- |
| 3 |
1 year |
11/2000 |
- |
- |
| beseen |
4 |
4 months |
04/2001 |
great customization
for look and feel |
just started including
"featured" search results which are NOT on my site |
| 2 |
6 months |
05/2000 |
It is easy to find
on the site and customizes the display of the information in order
of relevancy. |
It slows down the
download of the pages considerable and sometimes will not load at
all or create a backup and will information is lost. |
| 2 |
3 months |
12/1999 |
- |
I have to specifically
instruct it to reindex when new information is added and it can
only be reindex once every seven days |
| bravenet
search |
3 |
- |
06/2001 |
good speed |
to much advertising |
| cfm.index |
1 |
2 years |
11/2001 |
- |
manual indexing only.
only searches by section |
| CNIDR Isearch |
2 |
5 years |
11/2000 |
it finds the relevant
documents. |
Isearch returns only
the URL and title of relevant documents. This isn't very useful
on our site--our documents are huge--average between 500K and 1MB
each. I'd like the results page to display excerpts from the document
that show context. |
| Database |
2 |
2 months |
03/2002 |
simple. works well
with simple search |
not able to handle
searches with multiple key fields |
| 2 |
1 week |
10/2000 |
The amount of content
is small enough so that it performs reasonably |
It is a temporary
solution, much functionality is needed and when sote load and content
increase it will not work. |
| DBtextworks
Intranet Spider |
3 |
2 months |
04/1999 |
You can add fields
and edit information in the database itself, eg. value added indexing
terms and abstracts which aid retrieval. Total control over design
of query screens and report formats. Every searching feature known
to mankind (except proximity)- boolean within and across fields,
field specific, range searching Will spider documents in a file
directory too if asked to. |
Not yet |
| Delphes |
4 |
4 months |
07/2002 |
Results are very relevant.
Includes also local file indexer. |
- |
| DioWeb |
5 |
9 months |
07/2002 |
Excelent relevancy
module with a very nice results presentation. |
No |
| 5 |
3 months |
01/2002 |
Easy to install and
integrate and a very attractive price. I fully tested this product
and after 3 months of usage I considered it as the best search engine
on the market. |
It does not index
Flash animations. |
| 5 |
10 months |
07/2002 |
Very easy to install
and administrate. My users are coming to mention how well it performs
to find faster their info. |
Nothing so far... |
| divine Participant
server |
1 |
6 months |
07/2002 |
- |
Doesn't catalogue
four languages, poor performance, no ranking, no spell check, no
synonyms |
| Domino |
2 |
5 years |
01/2002 |
- |
- |
| 1 |
5 years |
07/2002 |
automaticm, advanced
tool uses native metadata |
Inflexible |
| 1 |
2 years |
06/2002 |
- |
Searches full input
string Not easily customisable Results prioritisation poor |
| 3 |
3 years |
06/2001 |
- It meets our business
needs of being able to search based on field level. ie: language=english
- It is free with the domino server. |
- It has limitations
on how to narrow searchs, therefore, making it less effective because
it returns too many hits. |
| 1 |
6 months |
09/2000 |
- |
- |
| exploit7 |
2 |
- |
07/2001 |
- |
- |
| Fast Site
Search |
5 |
1 year |
06/2001 |
relevant results,
good performance, native xml indexing, and its pretty easy to use |
no |
| Fluid Dynamics |
4 |
1 week |
08/1999 |
Good output, that
is very important. No problems with administration. Easy to do,
fast to crawl. |
- |
| 2 |
3 months |
02/1999 |
Records details of
searches in a file. |
Has peculiar case
sensitivity - doesn't always find pages containing words in a different
case. Only searches the site it is running on, would like it to
also search other web sites that I specify. |
| 1 |
3-4 months |
03/2000 |
Easy set up and template
design. |
Multiple directory
levels cause problems and number of directories slows it down. |
| Freesite |
2 |
3-4 months |
03/2002 |
automatic updates |
paid positions, ads |
| Fulcrum |
2 |
2 years |
02/2001 |
- |
- |
| 2 |
2 years |
08/1999 |
fast, has vendor API |
hard to maintain,
not many new features, vanilla keyword searching, low throughput/not
scalable |
| 2 |
1 month |
07/2000 |
- |
- |
| google |
5 |
4 months |
05/2002 |
- |
- |
| 3 |
2 years |
02/2001 |
typing |
- |
| 3 |
1 month |
10/2001 |
Familiar name; fairly
deep indexing; includes other formats such as PDF; low cost. |
Infrequent refreshes;
little control. |
| 2 |
1 month |
04/2002 |
- |
inability to run regular
updates |
| Harvest |
3 |
3 years |
03/2000 |
Searching performance
is good! Very flexible |
can't do fuzzy search,only
keywords |
| 2 |
4 years |
03/2001 |
good indexing |
slow search |
| 2 |
4 years |
11/1999 |
- |
- |
| 2 |
4 years |
04/1999 |
- |
will no longer cope
with newer developments, specifically can't cope with http v1.1
on server so much of site no longer indexed |
| HitBox Search |
1 |
1 year |
09/2000 |
fast |
they don't re-index
pages |
| HomePageSearch
applet |
2 |
5 months |
08/2000 |
Free, easy and works |
Much too slow |
| Hotlinks |
4 |
1 month |
12/1998 |
- |
- |
| Hyperseek |
1 |
1 year |
11/1999 |
- |
complicated to install
and update - complicated user interface - to expensive |
| IBM NetQuestion |
1 |
6 months |
09/2000 |
Very little |
Many symbols (eg.
UK pound sign) not searchable. Differences in results returned between
browsers. Keyword search only (limited to 5 words). Slow. Limited
information about returned results. Ranking of results cannot be
modified and seems random. |
| iCat |
1 |
4 weeks |
05/1999 |
- |
questionable returns,
obscure syntax, lack of insight into indexer |
| ICE |
3 |
not yet |
06/1999 |
it will be fast. It
requires a keyword index; I'm trying to come up with a way to pick
out proper people and place names to also treat as keywords. |
[adaptation using
ASP (perlscript, vbscript) and SQL DB] Difficult and time-consuming
to implement |
| 2 |
2 years |
01/2000 |
Reasonably fast |
Prefer more options
for user |
| 2 |
8 months |
04/2000 |
Fast, easy to install
& Customise, Free |
Not terribly accurate,
too dependant on titles and META tags, lack of configurablility |
| iFilter |
4 |
6 months |
07/1999 |
indexes CONTENT of
PDF files |
periodic incompatibilities
between Adobe and Microsoft |
| Inquery
5.0 |
4 |
3 months |
01/1999 |
- |
- |
| Intelligent
Miner for Text |
2 |
1 year |
07/2000 |
- |
no Java API not enough
sort criteria |
| Lycos Site
Spider 1.0 |
2 |
8 months |
02/1999 |
Easy to configure,
returns results quickly |
will not do "Fuzzy"
or "Like" searches. Seems to be case sensitive. |
| Namo Web
Search |
3 |
3-4 years |
07/2002 |
simple, easy to use,
cheap, easy to install |
doesn't handle multiple
collections |
| NetIS |
5 |
2 years |
09/1999 |
Full text search with
advanced search options (wildcards, proximity, boolean etc.) Hit
highlighting + pinpoint navigation Ability to fully customize the
looks & feel + data display (for the user as well) through usage
of CSS Ability to deal with super big databases Ability to do web-publishing
through our engine Abiloity to perform page-sensitive banners and
many more |
NO. |
| nsearch |
2 |
6 months |
03/2002 |
- |
- |
| OfficeVision/400 |
4 |
10 years |
07/1999 |
Combined search of
content and object descriptions |
IBM are withdrawing
support |
| Oneworld
Search engine |
1 |
2 years |
02/2001 |
Not much |
Very slow, not accurate
results |
| OpenFTS
for Postgres |
2 |
6 months |
01/2002 |
Speed (but have not
tested scalability) Exact matching Stopword exclusion |
Only a framework really,
needs a lot of customization on the interface side Maybe scalability
issues with more search load |
| opentec |
2 |
6 months |
05/2002 |
It does a good general
job |
Lacking more advanced
features. |
| Oracle ConText |
1 |
1 year |
03/2000 |
No special entry rules |
Need to search content
of pages (HTML), not just titles. |
| Oracle InterMedia |
- |
not yet |
05/2000 |
- |
- |
| Perlfect |
4 |
1 month |
09/2000 |
Simple to install
(also on more virtual servers) and easy to configure |
nope, but maybe too
little features |
| 3 |
6 months |
09/2001 |
Very good Mailinglist |
Installation is a
little bit difficult |
| 2 |
1 Year |
01/2000 |
Ease of use |
Too generic the results
returned. |
| Phantom |
4 |
1 month |
03/1999 |
Robot |
not yet |
| 3 |
3 years |
12/1998 |
Easy to customize
Multiple logical indexes |
Crawling is slow Data
file is fragile- not robust |
| 2 |
don't know |
12/2000 |
poorly |
bug |
| 1 |
don't know |
10/2000 |
- |
- |
| PicoSearch |
2 |
1 year |
09/2001 |
Internet based |
- |
| 2 |
1 year |
06/2000 |
quick and easy |
no longer works |
| 2 |
1 week |
06/1999 |
quick |
never updated |
| - |
1 day |
08/1999 |
- |
- |
| Pinpoint |
4 |
2 years |
09/2001 |
ease of use, Self
timed re-indexing |
n |
| PLWeb |
1 |
3 months |
03/1999 |
template configuration |
big probblems creating
a large index, data can only be added incementally |
| Qfinder |
1 |
2 years |
11/2000 |
- |
slow and doesn't work
well in client/server environment. |
| ResourceMiner |
2 |
3 years |
08/2000 |
It can do a content,
natural language query and opens the PDF to the exact page of the
hit. The hit words are highlighted. |
Biggest problem is
it only searches PDFs. It is hard for people to understand a natural
language query when they are used to simple word matching. |
| Sambar |
2 |
1 month |
08/2000 |
- |
can't spider other
sites |
| Scout |
4 |
2 years |
09/2001 |
multilingual |
- |
| Search Light |
3 |
2 months |
05/1999 |
- |
- |
| Search Maestro |
4 |
3 years |
11/2000 |
Most things are OK. |
Frozen development |
| search maker
Pro |
4 |
1.5 years |
07/2002 |
Automated database
building |
It offers page(s)
with highlighted terms - I need to be able to go straight to the
term rather than just to the top of the page |
| search.pl |
1 |
3 years |
03/2002 |
Easy request entry |
waaaaaaaaaaaaay too
slow |
| SearchCSV |
4 |
4 months |
06/2001 |
Results returned |
CGI Pathnames |
| SFE Search |
2 |
1 year |
08/2001 |
Good basic search
functionality |
Doesn't provide the
ability to index pdf's, Word, or Excel documents |
| 4 |
2 weeks |
01/2001 |
either exact or close
results. clean uncluttered index pages. Its free. |
a bit difficult to
implement for a nvice |
| Sinky Search
Engine |
1 |
2 months |
07/1999 |
Nothing |
I does not display
any thing expcet the query in in the address bar |
| SiteMiner |
2 |
1 month |
11/1999 |
- |
- |
| 1 |
1 day |
03/2000 |
Ease of set up. Includes
www search as well. |
This site does not
combine an index that includes my 4 different URL's. |
| Sun i-Planet
search |
2 |
2 years |
05/2002 |
It indexes all of
the pages. |
Results are awful.
There is no search abstract with search results. Search results
don't produce hits that are often expected. |
| Surf Map |
2 |
9 months |
11/2000 |
Includes site map
with search function |
Very slow, doesn't
always find content it should |
| web-search/dataeasy |
2 |
2+ years |
02/2001 |
- |
Difficult to make
it see the diference between "kansas," and "Arkansas" |
| WebBoard |
4 |
don't know |
10/2000 |
Over all the Oreilly's
WebBoard is a good package, but the search tool doesn't search document
attatchments. |
search tool doesn't
search document attatchments. |
| WebIndex
/ WebFind |
1 |
5 years |
06/2000 |
It doesn't work very
well at all. |
It returns a very
long list and often the list of items is irrelavent. Doesn't provide
enough information about the file. Doesn't search the mega tags. |
| 1 |
3 years |
05/1999 |
can run on schedule,
allows us to exclude files based on file names contains, file title
contains |
takes too long to
create and merge indices, not always accurate |
| WebSTAR |
4 |
5 years |
03/2002 |
user-friendly, powerful
natural language and boolean searches, good relevance rating, summarization
of documents, "more like this" links |
difficult to combine
indexes, cumbersome customization of results displays, unreliable
external indexing, limitations in handling pdf files, poor administrator
controls to configure indexing |
| 4 |
1 year |
02/1999 |
Natural language query
results are very accurate (usually the answer I am looking for is
in the top 3 results) |
People don't understand
how to do natural language queries, bad PDFs can corrupt the entire
index. |
| 3 |
2 years |
07/2002 |
- |
Boolean operator default
"or" (want "and") |
| 2 |
3 years |
09/2001 |
- |
Support for scandinavian
letters |
| WhatUSeek |
3 |
1 year |
12/1999 |
Keyword search |
Lack of updating |
| 2 |
6 months |
04/2000 |
it's there. has soundex...
|
cannot sort by date.
indexes different number of pages each time spidering done.. no
help link... no email contact for help. |
| 1 |
6 months |
09/2000 |
- |
I suspect there is
some limit, but I have no documentation or statement from the search
provider. |
| yahoo store
default search |
3 |
1.5 years |
03/2002 |
finds what customer
is looking for |
doesn't display it
in a format that I like & no control over how it does searches |
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