A good Killfile is the best way of saving time when running a search. Each URL is checked against the Killfile prior to being downloaded, and if any Killfile text is found in the URL, it is not downloaded. As can be seen in the above screenshot, the text need not be a complete URL.
Enter text in the input field and press Add to add it. Select an item from the list and press Remove to remove it. Press Save to save the updates, and Close to close the window.
The theory goes that the more a site is linked to, the better it might be. Of course there are those who create all kinds of dummy pages with links to their main page to increase their chances on the big search engines, so one must excercise some discretion.
When Sgt. Zondi finds a web page that matches your search, he records the links on the page. Once a search is done, you can use the Links button on the main screen to see a summary of these links sorted by frequency. This can at times help to identify good sites. The Link list can be saved for reference.
Sgt. Zondi uses ( where possible ) the Sherlock parameter files for the search engines used in the Easy Search.
If you do not have a system with Sherlock, Sgt. Zondi will use the default parameter file included in the program archive. It might, however, happen that one of the search engines changes its output format. On systems with Sherlock, merely do a Sherlock Internet Search, and Sherlock will update its parameter files. On systems without Sherlock, if you find problems running an Easy Search, please contact us to update the default file.
NOTE: Sherlock itself, even with all its auto-updating, is sometimes not current. It has been my experience that the Sherlock search engine parameter files, though updated from Apple, were incorrect for a period over the Hotbot move to Lycos.
It is often a good idea when unfamiliar with a search topic, to start with an Easy Search to find some of the main sites. You can then drag the URLs from the main window into the Seed URLs table in the Query window, and refine your search by formulating a full query.
It is sometimes desirable to see which new sites have been created, or which sites have been updated since the last time you ran a query. In this case, choose to limit the age in days in your query, and, for example, run a saved search every week. Please note that not all web servers will return the modification date of a URL - in this case the URL is included in the search results.
Sgt. Zondi is not a tool that gives instant gratification - searching web pages takes time. When you use one of the big search engines, it will already have previously catalogued millions of websites ( many possibly no longer available ), and is therefore able to present the results within seconds. Sgt. Zondi, however, in order to bring you up-to-date fresh URLs, checks them at the time of your search. So please give him some time - he will reward you with current sites!
The basic mechanism is as follows:
- Does this page match the search
- If not, discard and ignore links
- If it does, extract all the links and put them in the link queue
This is very simple, but it works. Every URL presented to you has therefore been loaded and checked - the URLs are live and current.
If you are struggling to get Zondi to produce results from an Advanced Query it is a good idea to provide more Seed URLs. If you do not know of any, then try to use a simple search to find some good seed sites. If you can seed the Advanced Query with 5-10 vaguely relevant sites the likelihood of better results will improve.
Last updated on 12-03-2000