• If you use Mac OS X, Apple's Safari web browser has a Google search window in the Navigation bar next to the URL. Type your Google search there. Clicking on the icon shows a menu of your recent searches.
• All recent versions of the Opera and Firefox browsers have a feature like Safari's: Type your Google Web search in the special search box next to the URL, then press the ENTER or RETURN key. A drop-down menu lets you choose other types of search.
• The Mozilla (not Mozilla Firefox) browser can show Google search results in its Sidebar, to one side of the browser window.
  
  

Exercises

1. If you use Windows 98/ME/2000/XP and Internet Explorer 5.5 or a more recent version, install the Google Deskbar on your system.

2. If you use a browser that supports the Google Toolbar, install it on your system. If you use another browser, install Google Browser Buttons on your system.

3. Make Google your home page.

4. Make Google your default search engine.

Shortcuts

Google provides shortcuts for finding commonly sought utilities and information, which you may have previously found offline or on specialized sites. The results of these shortcuts appear to the right of a tag or specialized icon and above your search results.

To read about all of these shortcuts, one by one, simply click the "Next" links at the top or bottom of this page and the following Google Guide pages. Or, to read about any one of them now, click on the item below:

Calculator
Phone Numbers and Addresses
Street Maps
Stock Quotes
Definitions (Google Glossary)
Travel Conditions
Search by Number
       Area Code Maps
       Package Tracking
       Flight Tracking Information
       Vehicle Information
       Patent Search
       FAA Airplane Registration Numbers
       UPC Codes
       FCC Equipment IDs

Calculator

Want to add up a list of numbers, convert from miles to kilometers, or evaluate some other mathematical expression? Instead of using a piece of paper, your calculator, or a computer math software program, you can now solve mathematical problems with Google's built-in calculator function.

Simply enter the expression you'd like evaluated in Google's web search box and click the ENTER key or click the "Google Search" button.

The Google Guide Calculator Reference provides a nice summary of some of Google's calculator features.

Once you have a result, you can use your browser's Copy feature (usually on its Edit menu) to copy the result. Then you can paste it into another program, a box in a form on another web page, and so on.

The calculator can evaluate mathematical expressions involving:

Basic Arithmetic

Compute expressions containing standard mathematical symbols. The following table lists operators that come between the two numbers on which they operate, e.g., to multiply 2 times 3, use 2 * 3.

Operator	Function	Example
+	Addition	[ 15.99 + 32.50 + 13.25 ]
-	Subtraction	[ 79 - 18 - 19 ]
*	Multiplication	[ 2 * 3 * 7 ]
/	Division	[ 378 / 9 ]
^ or **	Exponentiation (raise to a power of)	[ 4^10 ] or [ 4**10 ]
% of	Percent	[ 15% of 93.45 ]
mod or %	modulo (the remainder after division)	[ 15 mod 9 ] or [ 15 % 9 ]
the nth root of	calculates the nth root	[ 4th root of 16 ] [ cube root of 109 ] [ square root of 42 ] or [ sqrt(42) ]

Note: To do multiplication, you must include the * symbol; [ 3 * 4 ] will be calculated, 3 4 won't.

Advanced Math

Compute results involving mathematical constants, such as e, pi, i (the square root of -1), and mathematical functions. The following table lists just some of the functions built into Google's calculator.

Operator	Function	Example
sin, cos, tan, sec, csc, cot, etc.	Trigonometric functions (arguments are assumed to be in radians)	[ cos(pi/6) ] [ cosine(pi/6) ]
arcsin, arccos, arctan, arccsc, etc.	Inverse trigonometric functions	[ arccos(.5) ]
sinh, cosh, tanh, csch, arsinh, arccsch, etc.	Hyperbolic functions	[ cosh(6) ]
ln	Logarithm base e	[ ln(16) ]
log	Logarithm base 10	[ log(16) ]
lg	Logarithm base 2	[ lg(16) ]
exp	Exponential function	[ exp(16) ]
!	Factorial	[ 5! ]
choose	x choose y calculates the number of ways of choosing a set of y elements from a set of x distinct elements	[ 5 choose 3 ]

The following table lists just a few of the commonly used mathematical constants known to the calculator function.

Name and description	Example
base of the natural system of logarithms	[ e ]
pi, the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle	[ pi/6 ]
imaginary number, i, which represents one of the two square roots of -1	[ i^2 ]
Euler's constant, gamma	[ e^gamma ]

Units of Measure and Conversions

Compute expressions involving different units. By default, units are converted to and results expressed in meter-kilogram-second (mks) units. Many units have both long and short names. Use whichever name you prefer.

Type of Units	Examples
Currency	Australian Dollars (AUD), British pounds (GBP), Euros, US Dollars (USD)
Mass	kilogram or kg, grams or g, grains, pounds or lbs, carats, stones, tons, tonnes
Length	meters or m, miles, feet, Angstroms, cubits, furlongs
Volume	gallons, liters or l, bushels, teaspoons, pints
Area	square kilometers, acres, hectares
Time	days, seconds or s, centuries, sidereal years, fortnights
Electricity	volts, amps, ohms, henrys
Energy	Calories, British thermal units (BTU), joules, ergs, foot-pounds
Power	watt, kilowatts, horsepower or hp
Information	bits, bytes, kbytes, etc.
Quantity	dozen, baker's dozen, percent, gross, great gross, score, googol
Numbering systems	decimal, hexadecimal or hex, octal, binary, roman numerals, etc. Prefix hexadecimal numbers with 0x, octal numbers with 0o and binary numbers with 0b. For example: 0x7f + 0b10010101.

Here are calculations that involve units.

[ 2 meters + 5 feet ]

Convert from one set of units to another by using the notation, x units in y units.

[ three quarters of a cup in teaspoons ]
[ 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit in degrees Celsius ]
[ 130 lbs in kg ]
[ 130 lbs in stones ]
[ 65 mph in kph ] or [ 65 mph in km/h ]

Warning: When your query includes "Calories" with a capital "C," Google returns kilocalories called "calories" by nutritionists.

[ 160 pounds * 4000 feet in Calories ]

Convert from one numbering system to another.

[ 1500 in hex ] or [ 1500 in hexadecimal ]
[ 64 in binary ]
[ LVII in decimal ]

In many cases, you can also get the conversion factor between units:

[ meters per mile ]
[ furlongs per fortnight ]

That last conversion is a common joke among engineers — though, as Jim Jardine points out, "There is no reason to denigrate neither furlongs nor fortnights as they are both very easily defined measurements." (See his page Furlongs Today.)

Physical Constants

The following table lists just a few of the many commonly used physical constants known to the calculator function. Parts of this table were adapted from the table at the end of David W. Ward's article Physics the Google Way. Note: Sometimes Google's calculator interprets lower case letters different from upper case letters.

Long Name	Shorthand Notation	Click the Link for the Approximate Value
atomic mass units	amu	[ amu ] or [ atomic mass unit ]
Astronomical Unit	au	[ au ] or [ astronomical unit ]
Avogadro's number		[ N_A ] or [ Avogadro's number ]
Boltzmann constant	k	[ k ] or [ Boltzmann constant ]
electric constant, permitivity of free space		[ epsilon_0 ]
electron mass		[ m_e ] or [ electron mass ]
electron volt	eV	[ eV ] or [ electron volt ]
elementary charge		[ elementary charge ]
Euler's constant		[ Euler's constant ]
Faraday constant		[ Faraday constant ]
fine-structure constant		[ fine-structure constant ]
gravitational constant	G	[ G ] or [ gravitational constant ]
magnetic flux quantum		[ magnetic flux quantum ]
mass of each planet and of the sun		[ m_mars ], [ m_earth ], [ m_uranus ], ..., [ m_sun ]
molar gas constant		[ molar gas constant ]
permeability of free space		[ permeability of free space ]
Planck's constant	h	[ h ] or [ Planck's constant ]
proton mass		[ m_p ] or [ proton mass ]
radius of each planet and of the sun		[ r_earth ], [ r_pluto ], ..., [ r_sun ]
Rydberg constant		[ Rydberg constant ]
speed of light in a vacuum	c	[ c ] or [ speed of light ]
speed of sound in air at sea level		[ speed of sound ]
Stefan-Boltzmann constant		[ Stefan-Boltzmann constant ]

Here are some calculations using built-in constants.

[ 1 AU/c ]
[ 1.21 MW / 88 mph ]
[ (G * mass of earth) / (radius of earth ^ 2) ]

Parentheses (( )) can be used whenever they'll serve to make complicated expressions unambiguous, and also sets of parentheses can be used within parentheses. Don't use brackets ([ ]) for grouping.

The following are tips from Google's online help for the calculator, which can be found on the web at www.google.com/help/calculator.html.

You can force the calculator to try to evaluate an expression by putting an equals sign (=) after it. This works only if the expression is arithmetically computable. For example, 1-800-555-1234= (a US phone number followed by an equals sign) will return a result, but 1/0= will not.

Parentheses can be used to enclose the parts of your expression that you want evaluated first. For example, (1+2)*3 causes the addition to happen before the multiplication.

Feel free to experiment with the calculator as not all of its capabilities are listed here.

If you want a visual interface to some of the capabilities of Google's calculator, visit Soople's Calculator page, www.soople.com/soople_intcalchome.php.

Exercises

This problem set is designed to give you practice in using Google's new calculator function. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Convert 1 mile to meters.

2. Convert 1 kg (kilogram) to lbs (pounds).

3. Convert 0 degrees Kelvin to Fahrenheit or Celsius.

4. Compute the number of minutes in a 365-day year.

5. Which is larger pi^e or e^pi? The same relationship holds between x^e and e^x for all non-negative values of x except e. The exponential constant, e, is approximately 2.72 and the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle, pi, is approximately 3.14.

6. How many lottery combinations are there if the winning combination consists of 5 distinct integers between 1 and 99, i.e., there are 99 balls in an urn and once one is selected, it isn't returned to the box.

7. Compute the probability of your winning the lottery if you buy 1,000 tickets each bearing five distinct independently randomly chosen integers between 1 and 99.

Phone Numbers and Addresses

Use Google if you want to look up a phonebook listing for someone who lives in the United States. Just enter a person's name and a city, state, or zip code in the standard web search box. Then hit the ENTER key or click the "Google Search" button.

If you have easy access to the web, Google's phonebook feature can be more convenient than your local phonebook and more extensive too.

On the results page, phonebook listings are next to a telephone icon.

Google's residential phonebook feature recognizes inputs in the following formats.

To find a US residence, enter either ...	Examples
First name (or first initial), last name, city (state is optional)	[ Michael Bloomberg New York ]
First name (or first initial), last name, state	[ Michael Bloomberg NY ]
First name (or first initial), last name, area code	[ M Bloomberg 212 ]
First name (or first initial), last name, zip code	[ Michael Bloomberg 10021 ]
Phone number, including area code	[ 212-772-1081 ] or [ (212)772-1081 ]
Last name, city, state	[ Bloomberg New York NY ]
Last name, zip code	[ Bloomberg 10021 ]

Notice that Google supports reverse look up. You can enter a phone number with area code and learn to whom that number belongs.

Be aware that some listings are out of date.

When you want a US business white-page phonebook listing, enter a business name and location or phone number.

To seek a US business, enter ...	Examples
Business name, city, state	[ Trek Waterloo WI ]
Business name, zip code	[ Ben & Jerry's 05403 ]
Phone number including area code	[ (650) 930-3500 ]

Google lists up to three results that match your phonebook query.

To see other listings, click on the "Phonebook results" link that's just above the phonebook icon.

Notice that when Google provides an address, it includes links to map providers. In the next section, we'll look at how to obtain a map and directions.

If Google doesn't return a phonebook link, try using the phonebook: search operator.

Need an email address? Though it would be a nice feature for you and me, Google doesn't offer an email-lookup service, since spammers could use it to get your address and send you unsolicited spam email.

Exercises

This problem set gives you practice with looking up phone numbers and addresses. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. What is the address of the Empire State Building in New York City in the state of New York (the two-letter state code is NY)?

2. Check whether Google knows your phone number and address. If you wish to remove your listing from Google's PhoneBook, complete the name removal form, which you can find at www.google.com/help/pbremoval.html or by searching for [ remove phone number Google ].

Street Maps

Want to find where something is or how to get there? Instead of visiting an online map-providing service, just enter an address into Google. You can also copy and paste addresses, even ones with embedded carriage returns, into Google's search box. When Google recognizes your query as a location, the results page includes links to map providers for that location. Clicking on a map-provider link takes you to a map showing the location result.

Enter a U.S. street address, including zip code or city/state. Often, the street address and city name will be enough.

Beside an icon of a map are links to map providers, as shown below.

Click on either the Google Maps link , Yahoo! Maps link, or the MapQuest link to view a map showing 1600 Amphitheatre Pkwy in Mountain View, California.

Often the Google Local service can find where something is located without your providing an address.

Click on the link to a map provider to obtain a map.

Click on the link "To this location" in Yahoo!Maps or on the radio button "Driving Directions from this location" in MapQuest and specify your starting location.

Then you'll get a nice set of directions that you can print out and take with you when driving.

Exercises

This problem set gives you practice with looking up addresses and with getting directions. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Get a map showing the most crooked section of Lombard Street in San Francisco, which is between 1000 and 1100 Lombard Street.

2. Get a map showing Japanese restaurants in Topeka, Kansas by entering [ Japanese restaurants in Topeka KS ] in the Google Maps search box.

3. If you live in the United States, obtain a map showing where you live by entering your address into Google and clicking the link to a map provider.

4. If you live in the United States, get directions from your house to either a good friend's place or a great restaurant.

Stock Quotes

Looking for Google's stock symbol? It's GOOG on Nasdaq. Click here for Google's stock price or search for it on Google.

Want info on a publicly traded stock or mutual fund? Enter one or more NYSE, NASDAQ, AMEX, or mutual fund ticker symbols and Google will return the latest stock price (with a 15-minute delay for NASDAQ or a 20-minute delay for AMEX and NYSE), along with an intra-day chart, the daily high and low, the volume traded, the company's market capitalization, as well as a link to other financial information.

Click on the stock symbol link to see financial information, which may include the price of the last trade, the range of prices for the day and for the year, a one-year target price estimate, the previous day's closing price, the opening price for the day, the volume of shares traded during the day, the PE radio, dividends per share, the dividend date, and a chart.

Note: Entering a ticker symbol in the search box and then clicking on I'm Feeling Lucky will not take you to that symbol's financial information page. Instead, Google displays the first search results, whose link appears just below the box enclosing the stock information link.

Click on the "Stock quotes" link to view a chart for each stock symbol in your query.

You can also retrieve stock information via the stocks: search operator. For example, [ stock:brcm brcd ] will return a link to stock information about Broadcom Corporation and Brocade Communications System.

Exercises

This problem set gives you practice in obtaining financial information for US publicly traded companies. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Obtain a chart of Ebay's stock price for the past 5 years by entering Ebay's stock symbol, ebay, clicking on the link "EBAY" and then clicking on "5y" under today's chart.

2. Find current financial information for Yahoo and Amazon.

3. Using the similar pages feature, find competitors to google.com that are run by public companies. Check whether their stock prices have been climbing or dropping in the past three months.

Definitions (Google Glossary)

When you include "define," "what is," or "what are" in your query in front of a word, phrase, or acronym, Google displays one Glossary definition above your search results. Google Glossary provides definitions for words, phrases, and acronyms that Google finds on web pages. The Glossary is good for finding definitions for terms that aren't in some dictionaries, e.g., slang words, technical terms, ethnic words and other specialized terms.

In February of 2003, Google acquired Pyra Labs, a company that makes it easy for you to create your own blog. What's a blog? Let's ask Google to define the term.

You can search for blogs with Google, in the same way that you search for other documents. You can easily create a weblog (blog) post pointing to the web page you're visiting by pressing the "BlogThis!" button on the Google Toolbar and publish your thoughts on the web so others may find them. You can learn more about this feature on toolbar.google.com/button_help.html.

Google Glossary can also find definitions of acronyms.

One definition appears to the right of the words "Web Definition," below the statistics bar and above Google's search results.

When your query includes the "define:" operator, Google displays all the definitions it finds on the web.

If you want a dictionary definition, learn about a shortcut in the Dictionary Definitions section in Part II.

Exercises

These problems give you practice in finding definitions. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. What does aka mean?

2. What is Google bombing? If Google Glossary doesn't find the definition, find it yourself.

3. Google is named after the word 'googol.' What is a googol?

4. What does the abbreviation IRL commonly stand for?

Google Local (Search by Location)

Restrict your search to a particular geographic area.

Click on the Local link above the Google search box

Web    Images    Groups    News    Froogle    LocalNew!    more »

or visit local.google.com and then enter in the Google Local search box

a location

Anchorage
350 5th Ave, New York

a business

restaurants near the Metropolitan Museum of Art
cafes

directions

SJC to 886 Cannery Row, Monterey, CA
San Francisco to 94105

Google Local, aka Search by Location, local.google.com, scouts the web for addresses and clues to pinpoint where things are located.

Not only is Search by Location good for finding businesses and landmarks, but it can find locations of places that aren't listed in phonebooks. For example, you can find places that appeared in the film Sleepless in Seattle.

See these results on a map by clicking on the link just above your search results.

Exercises

This problem set gives you practice with using Google Local. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Find Thai restaurants in the zip code 94041 in Mountain View, California.

Travel Conditions

Google provides a shortcut for learning about delays and weather conditions at a US airport. Just enter the airport's three-letter code followed by the word "airport" into Google's search box.

Note: This feature may not work if you search from any of Google's non-US sites, e.g., google.de, google.com.co, google.ca nor from a foreign-language site, e.g., Swahili or Latvian.

For example, find conditions at Honolulu International Airport. If you don't know the airport code, look it up on Google. If your city has more than one major airport, include the airport name as well as the city in your query.

You don't need to click on the first result to see that the airport code for one of Honolulu's airports is HNL, because you can find that code in the first line of the snippet.

It's best not to trust this information, though, unless you know it's the answer you need. For instance, the first result for New York City may be JFK, but there are several New York airports. To check more closely — or if you find the snippet difficult to read — just click on the title of one of the snippets. Let's view the Honolulu Airport entry from World-Airport-Codes.com.

Now let's request travel conditions at Honolulu International Airport.

Click on the "View conditions" link to see the FAA's airport status information.

Exercises

These problems give you practice in finding travel conditions. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Find the travel conditions for Los Angeles International Airport.

2. Find the travel conditions for Kennedy Airport in New York City.

Search by Number

"Parcel tracking IDs, patents, and other specialized numbers can be entered into Google's search box for quick access to information about them," according to the Google Web Search Features page, www.google.com/help/features.html.

Special searches by number types include:

	Examples
Area Code Map	[ 212 ]
Package Tracking	[ 999444666222 ]
Flight Tracking Information	[ united 42 ]
Vehicle Information	[ JH4NA1157MT001832 ]
Patent Search	[ patent 5122313 ]
FAA Airplane Registration Numbers	[ n199ua ]
UPC Codes	[ 036000250015 ]
FCC Equipment IDs	[ fcc B4Z-34009-PIR ]

The rest of this page contains examples of input and output for most of these types of searches.

Area Code Map
Want to see a map of where a US telephone area code is used? Just enter the area code in Google's search box.

Click on the link to view a map.

Package Tracking
Instead of going to the FedEx (www.fedex.com), UPS (www.ups.com), or US Postal Service (www.usps.com) sites to find out where your package is located, now you can enter parcel tracking IDs directly into Google's search box.

Click on the link to view tracking information for a parcel.

Find the latest information about your UPS package by entering "ups" followed by the tracking ID into Google's search box.

Flight Tracking Information
Look up information on a flight by typing the airline name or code followed by a space and a flight number.

Click on the Travelocity link to view tracking information on the flight.

Click on the fboweb.com link to view how the actual flight is progressing.

Vehicle Information
Look up automobile vehicle information by entering a vehicle ID (VIN) number.

Click on the link to view information on the specified vehicle.

Patent Search
Look up a US patent by typing "patent" followed by a space and a patent number.

Click on the link to view information on the patent.

FAA Airplane Registration Numbers
Find out about a particular airplane by entering its FAA airplane registration number into Google's search box. An airplane's FAA registration number is typically painted on its tail.

Click on the link to view information about the aircraft.

UPC Codes
Find information about an item by entering its UPC code into Google's search box.

Click on the link to view information about this item.

FCC Equipment IDs
Find information about FCC equipment by typing "fcc" followed by a space and the equipment's ID number.

Click on the link to view information about this equipment.

Image Search

Looking for an image, map, graphic, photo, design or drawing? Try Google's Image Search by clicking on the Images link above Google's search box

Web    Images    Groups    News    Froogle    LocalNew!    more »

or visiting images.google.com.

Enter your query and click on the "Google Search" button. Alternatively, enter your query and then click on the Images tab. Google Image Search works best when there are many images available to choose from, e.g., photos of Anna Kournikova, the most photographed tennis player.

Click on the image that interests you. You'll go to a framed page with two parts. On top, you'll see Google's image thumbnail. On the bottom, you'll see the full page on which the image appears.

Clicking on the thumbnail image or on the "See full-size image" link that appears just below the thumbnail image will display the full-size image.

Save the image to your hard disk by either selecting "Save As" or "Save Page As" from the File menu of your browser or by clicking the mouse's right button and selecting "Save As" or "Save Page As" from the pop-up menu.

To view the page containing the image without the thumbnail image on top, click on the page's URL, which appears between the thumbnail image and the page itself following the text "Below is the image in its original context on the page."

How Does Google Image Search Work?

Notice that when you search for images of Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Image Search returns some photographs of Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

The words "Larry Page" and "Sergey Brin" appear near images of Eric Schmidt, or in image captions, or in links to those images. Google makes a guess that the words are related to the image. Google technology isn't yet to the point where it can tell what's in an image by looking at it directly.

Focusing Your Image Search

As with text searches, you can focus your search when it finds too many images. Restrict your results to images that are large, medium, or small by clicking on one of the links that is in the upper right corner on the Images results page.

Alternatively, narrow your query by using Google's Advanced Image Search form. To get there, either click on the Advanced Image Search link or go to images.google.com/advanced_image_search.

You can specify:

Option	Restrict results to	Values
Size	images of these relative dimensions	small, medium, large
Filetype	image files whose names end with the specified suffix	jpg, gif, png
Coloration	images with the specified color depth	black and white, grayscale, full color
Domain	a specific site or domain (for a description of site and domain names, see Anatomy of a Web Address)	Domains such as .com, .edu, .nl, or sites such as pandemonia.com
SafeSearch	the specified level of filtering. Be aware that Google's automatic filtering doesn't guarantee that you won't be shown offensive content.	none, moderate, strict

The Size restriction refers to the height and width of the image in pixels. The following table lists the approximate dimensions for each relative size specification.

Size Value	Approximate Dimensions  in pixels
small	150 x 150 or smaller
medium	larger than 150 x 150 and smaller than 500 x 500
large	500 x 500 or larger

For more information on Google's Image Search visit images.google.com/help/faq_images.html.

Exercises

These problems give you practice with finding images. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. I used a color chart to select colors for this tutorial. Find some color charts that show the HTML input to render at least 100 colors.

2. Google displays special logos on its home page on holidays and birthdays. Find some of these logos. Click on the link "repeat the search with the omitted results included" to view more amusing logos.

3. Find a photograph of the Alhambra in Granada, Spain to see whether you want to take a vacation and visit the Alhambra.

4. Obtain a map of the London Underground.

Groups (Discussion Forums)

Want advice, opinions, and recommendations that haven't necessarily been edited?

Then consider using Google Groups, which provides access (posting and reading) to thousands of discussion forums — an enormous storehouse of discourse, including

• Forums on practically everything from aviation to zymurgy (brewing beer)
• Opinions, advice, and resource information, e.g.,
  • Opinions on laser eye surgery
  • Reviews for small OR compact digital cameras
  • Travel tips from nonprofessionals
  • Security fixes for Windows 2000
  • New digital scanner setup files
• Annoying posts
  • Spam (widely distributed junk messages)
  • Gripes
  • Flames (insulting criticism or remarks meant to incite anger)

The Internet connects people from all over the world. When the Internet was initially established, people used it to send email messages to each other. As with physical mail, email must have the address of the recipient. In 1979-1980, Steve Bellovin, Jim Ellis, Tom Truscott, and Steve Daniel at Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill implemented a distributed bulletin board system supported mainly by UNIX computers. It became known as Usenet, which was short for Users Network, and, because it was free and non-proprietary, it swiftly became international in scope. Usenet discussion forums became popular in the 1980s before the birth of the World Wide Web. In 1995, a company named DejaNews began archiving Usenet. In 1999, during the .com boom, DejaNews changed its name to Deja.com. Like many .com companies, Deja.com didn't do well financially. In February of 2001, Deja.com sold its Usenet archives to Google for an undisclosed amount.

Google has Deja's entire archive (dating back to 1995), as well as lots of material posted earlier, available from the Google Groups home page. Google Groups also tracks recent postings on Usenet and non-Usenet groups. Finally, Google allows you to post messages to these forums by signing up for a free account.

Click on Groups link above Google's search box

Web    Images    Groups    News    Froogle    LocalNew!    more »

or visit groups.google.com to access this comprehensive archive of human conversation, dating back to 1981.

Note: Particularly in the latter part of the 1980s, there are some significant gaps in the archive. As traffic expanded, volunteers who had been saving Usenet traffic at their own expense were overwhelmed, and stopped archiving some groups. While the Google Groups archive is the most complete Usenet Archive known to exist, it is not a complete archive prior to the 1990s.

You can search and read public groups without identifying yourself to Google. To access private groups or to post a message to any group, you'll need a Google Account. (You may also be able to post to public Usenet groups through your Internet provider's own news server — without needing a Google Account. If this seems useful, ask your ISP whether they provide Usenet access.)

For a listing of groups organized by topic, region, language, activity level, and (for non-Usenet groups) the number of people who belong to the group, see the Group Directory.

Many of the Google Groups are part of Usenet. Usenet newsgroups (forums) are grouped into several large areas, each of which is broken into subareas. The different parts are always separated by a "." (period). The first part of a name is called its hierarchy. Consider, for instance, the name rec.sport.tennis. The newsgroup is in the rec or recreation area, in the sports subarea. Within each newsgroup, there are messages (also referred to as articles or postings) that look like email from one user to another. But instead of just being exchanged between two people, these messages are available to everyone who accesses the Usenet or Google Groups. The top level Usenet hierarchies are:

alt.	Alternative discussions (any conceivable topic)
biz.	Business products, services, reviews, etc.
comp.	Relating to computers
humanities.	Fine art, literature, philosophy, etc.
misc.	Miscellaneous topics, e.g., employment, health, etc.
news.	Relating to Usenet netnews itself
rec.	Relating to recreation, e.g., games, hobbies, sports
sci.	Relating to the sciences
soc.	Relating to social issues, culture
talk.	Long arguments, current issues and debates, frequently political

Below are some examples of Usenet newsgroup names.

alt.graphics.photoshop	misc.jobs.offered
alt.atheism.moderated	rec.aviation.soaring
alt.fan.letterman	rec.food.recipes
alt.personal.ads	rec.music.classical.guitar
biz.books.technical	soc.feminism
misc.invest.real-estate	talk.politics.misc

Discussion groups can be unmoderated (anyone can post) or moderated (submissions are automatically directed to a moderator, who edits and filters out inappropriate and irrelevant material). Some discussion groups have parallel mailing lists, with postings to a group automatically propagated to its mailing list and vice versa. Some moderated groups are even distributed as digests, groups of postings periodically being collected into a single large posting with an index. The names of some moderated groups include the suffix .moderated, e.g., rec.martial-arts.moderated.

Click on a topic (hierarchy) or enter your query.

Note that the results are sorted by relevance — that is, how closely they match your query — rather than by the date they were posted. Each result includes the date it was posted, shown in green next to the group name. To sort results by date, click "Sort by date" above the Sponsored Links.

Click the title to view the original article with your search terms highlighted. The article may be part of a discussion thread or topic — the original article together with any preceding and followup articles — as this example shows.

Want to participate in a discussion? For information on how to post messages, click on the "Groups Help" link above or to the right of the Google Groups' search box or visit the Google Groups Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) about posting at groups.google.com/googlegroups/posting_faq.html. Also be sure to read the first answer in Google Groups Posting Style Guide. Usenet has a very strong culture, and well-established ways of doing things. In order to get the best responses to your post, you should try to conform to Usenet standards.

If you post to Usenet via Google Groups, your email address will be distributed widely and you may receive lots of spam as a result. (Google Groups will make your email address difficult for spammers to find, but other Usenet servers may not.) Consider getting another email address from Gmail, Yahoo, or some other free service to use for your public postings. If you get a separate email address, though, do remember to check it periodically: some Usenet readers may send you a question or other private reply.

Want to search for a specific message or those written by a certain person? Click on the Advanced Groups Search link or visit www.google.com/advanced_group_search.

For more information on Google Groups visit groups.google.com/support.

Exercises

These problems give you practice in searching Google Groups. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Find recommendations for sites for booking flights online.

2. Find travel tips for places to stay and visit in central London.

3. Find reviews of online banking services.

4. What are some ways to automatically block spam?

5. How can you remove varnish from a maple coffee table?

6. Click on the link "rec." and browse the names of the recreational subgroups.

7. Find the list of especially memorable articles and threads from Usenet that Google has compiled.

News Search

After the tragedies of September 11, 2001, Krishna Bharat, a Google engineer, built a tool to crawl news sites and organize news into ranked clusters. Because of its popularity, Google expanded the demo into Google News.

Google News:

• Presents information culled from thousands of news sources worldwide.
• Updates entries continuously throughout the day.
• Groups together related headlines and photos.
• By default, automatically displays the latest headlines.

Click on the News link above Google's search box

Web    Images    Groups    News    Froogle    LocalNew!    more »

or visit news.google.com.

Google news indicates how fresh a story is by listing how long ago it was posted, e.g., 30 minutes ago for the top story on the left in the screen shot above. Click on the title to display the article. Notice the "and 1007 related" link at the bottom of the entry of the story on the left of the above screen shot. If you click an entry's "and XXX related" link, you'll see a page listing all articles related to the same topic.

Search news by entering your query and clicking on the "Google Search" button.

By default, results are sorted by relevance to your search terms. When you wish to see articles ordered chronologically, click on the "Sort by date" link, located in the upper right corner of the results window.

Advanced News Search, accessible from the Advanced Search link on the News page, lets you search by news source, location, date range, and other criteria. It's also available at news.google.com/advanced_news_search.

International versions of Google News are available for countries including Australia, Canada (English and French), France, Germany, India, Italy, New Zealand, Spain, and the U.K.

Making Google News Your Home Page

If you like keeping up with the latest news, consider making Google News your home page and/or setting up Google Alerts.

Make Google News your home page by following the instructions listed on www.google.com/options/defaults.html, changing https://www.google.com/ to https://news.google.com/ (or copying the URL from one of the non-US versions that we just mentioned). If these instructions don't work for your browser, check your Options or Preferences settings for a "home page" box; paste the URL into that box.

For more information on Google News visit news.google.com/help/about_news_search.html.

If you're a news junkie, check out Topix.net, which you can find at http://www.topix.net/ and Columbia Newsblaster, which you can find at http://newsblaster.cs.columbia.edu/. Like Google News, Topix.net and Newsblaster are systems that automatically track the day's news. Why are we including non-Google sites in a tutorial on Google? To make you aware of sites offering capabilities different from Google News's and to publicize a friend's site.

According to the About Columbia Newsblaster page, which you can find at http://newsblaster.cs.columbia.edu/faq.html, "There are no human editors involved — everything you see on the Newsblaster main page is generated automatically, drawing on the sources listed on the left side of the screen." Unlike Google News, Newsblaster summarizes clusters of articles about the same topic. "The end result is a Web page that gives you a sense of what the major stories of the day are, so you don't have to visit the pages of dozens of publications," according to About Newsblaster page.

Exercises

This problem set gives you practice with using Google News. For hints and answers to selected problems, see the Solutions page in the Appendix.

1. Find today's current top stories listed on Google News.

2. Find the latest news about Google.

Froogle (Search and Browse Items for Sale)

Froogle is a searchable and browsable shopping index tuned to finding products for sale online. Click on the Froogle link above Google's search box

Web    Images    Groups    News    Froogle    LocalNew!    more »

or visit froogle.google.com. Search results include price, brand, description, and, if available, a photograph. Note that unlike other online shopping services, Froogle doesn't actually sell things.

Froogle obtains listings for products from vendors and by scouring the web. When Google finds a page that appears to sell something, it feeds the information it collects to Froogle. Vendors don't pay to have their products included in Froogle's search results. However, they can purchase sponsored links, which appear along the right side of Froogle's results pages.

You'll find a link to Froogle on the Google home page. Or go to froogle.google.com.

You can browse products by clicking on a category or you can search by entering your query in Froogle's search box. Interested in buying a watch for a child? Try searching on Froogle for [ watches children ].

The results included the verb "watch" and pages selling children's jewelry. Study results to get ideas for more effective search terms. Consider searching for specific brands.

Search for specific types of watches.

When Froogle finds more than one product from a site, it includes the link "See all results from vendor." Limiting the number of results from a given site to just one ensures products from a single vendor won't dominate your search results and that Froogle provides pages from a variety of sites.

Want products with prices in a specified range? Enter a price range just above the results or fill in a field in Froogle's advanced search form. Access the advanced search form by clicking on the Advanced Froogle Search link next to the search box on a Froogle page or visiting froogle.google.com/froogle_advanced_search.