Seeker

We explain what an Internet search engine is, its history, types and which are the most used. Also, differences with a browser.

What is a search engine?

In the field of the Internet, a search engine or search engine (from English search engine) is a computer tool that Tracks and locates files stored on web servers around the world based on some keyword or a series of them entered by the user.

That is, these are digital information recovery programs that operate automatically, sorting and classifying the identifying labels of the content available on the Internet and in other online storage services. Nowadays, they are a fundamental instrument for any Internet user, since serve as a link between the available information and those who require it.

Search engines didn't always exist. During its early years, the Internet experience depended on users memorizing specific addresses, or manually searching online directories, which functioned essentially like a telephone book.

This system was not only cumbersome, but also slow, which went against the agile and fast spirit that we associate with the World Wide Web today. So the appearance of search engines solved the need for faster and more focused information retrieval on the desired topic.

History of search engines

The first search engines emerged during the 90s when the Internet began to expand and become popular throughout the world. The growth dynamics of the World Wide Web made them necessary and mandatory. In fact, the first initiative to emerge was “Wandex”, an index made by a mapping robot (the World Wide Web Wanderer) developed at MIT in 1993.

But The first search engine on the Internet was WebCrawler still in operation since its launch in 1994. Its key feature was that it allowed any set of words to be located on a web page, something that later became the norm for all search engines.

That same year, Lycos, a project from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, United States, appeared, and almost immediately many other search engines such as Excite, Infoseek, Inktomi, or Altavista appeared. There were also popular directories, such as Yahoo!, with which many of these search engines were later integrated.

In 1996, the most successful search engine in history, Google, appeared. The result of Larry Page and Sergey Brin, this new search engine, initially called BackRub, had a simple and agile interface, but its great virtue was its ability to organize the results it presented to the user according to a priority criterion: the number of links. received to each web page.

In that way, Their results were much more reliable (at least in terms of popularity) and there was a higher probability of showing the user what they were looking for among the first results.

Its success was such that Google launched its PageRank: a ranking of web pages prepared by an algorithm that measured the relevance of a page with a score from 1 to 10, according to the searches of its users. Since then, the way search engines operate changed forever, focusing much more on the relevance of results and providing the user with an almost personalized search experience.

Types of search engines

Search engines can be of several different types:

• Hierarchical search engines. So called because they have a prior classification of the most relevant web pages for each search, which is reviewed and updated from time to time to keep up to date. This list receives priority when displaying the results, and is possible thanks to the action of a set of applets that continuously explore the network, called spiders (spiderin English), who prepare said database.
• Directories. Technologically simple, although in need of greater support and human work. Directories allow simpler searches, since they do not review all web pages (as spiders do), but organize them based on their topic and publication date, without worrying about their relevance. They are typical for specialized searches.
• Metasearch engines. That instead of storing the information of the web pages that are relevant to the search, they contain the records of different search engines on the web, thus proceeding to enter the keywords in each one and doing a “metasearch”, that is, a search of search engine results. The results thus obtained are filtered and then presented to the user.
• Vertical search engines. Generally dedicated to a very specialized sector, they provide the user with advanced search tools, and use specialized indexes, instead of the bulk of the World Wide Web. There are as many types of vertical search engines as there are specialized interests: music, science, clothing, among thousands.

Difference between a search engine and a browser

The difference between an Internet search engine and an Internet browser (browserin English) is essential. For a start, Search engines are services available on the Internet which are offered through the web. This means that, to use a search engine, we need to already be connected to the Internet. That's where browsers or browsers are necessary.. A browser is software that allows us to browse websites

A browser is a piece of software that, installed on our computer, opens a window to the Internet, so to speak, allowing us to access any URL we want: that of a search engine, for example, to start a search, or that of any other web page.

Most used Internet search engines

The official ranking of the five most used search engines in the world is, according to 2019 data from NetMarkerShare, the following:

• Google (81% of the total). The so-called king of the Internet is not only the most used search engine in the world, but it also offers email services, immediate translation, geolocation, and a huge etcetera.
• Baidu (10.11% of the total). Search engine launched in 2000 and that concentrates searches in the Chinese market. It is part of the largest Artificial Intelligence company on the planet and its website is the fourth most searched on the entire Internet, according to the Alexa ranking.
• Bing (5.09% of the total) Microsoft's attempt to compete with Google is the default search engine on all Windows-branded computers and smartphones. Its launch occurred in 2009, after the failure of Live Search.
• Yahoo! (2.04% of the total). Web portal and email service provider, it is a company with a long history, whose search engine until 2015 used the results of Bing itself. From then on, instead, he started using Google's.
• Yandex (0.83% of the total) Created in 1997, it is the most popular search engine in Russia and several Eastern European countries, where it accounts for 65% of the web search market.

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References

• “Search engine” on Wikipedia.
• “What are search engines, what types exist and what is each of them for?” on Rockcontent.
• “The search engines that existed before Google and how the king of the internet managed to defeat them” on BBC Mundo.
• “What does Search Engine mean?” in Techopedia.