If you spend any time looking for information on the internet, you are hopefully already familiar with some of the major search engines. A search engine is a website with built-in programming to look at and interpret in-formation on web pages. You specify what you are looking for, such as “New Jersey Lawyer,” and it provides a list of sites that include that text. The list will be based on relevancy so sites with that phrase in more prominent locations will appear high on the list. Each search engine does its analysis differently. Some engines look at the “metatags,” keywords placed at the top of a web page, while others look at the text on the pages. Others weigh their results based on the number of linked sites connected to a specific website and even others give preference to paid advertisers. When evaluating the credibility of the results of a particular search, it is important to be aware of the criteria used by the search engine.

One of my favorite sites is google.com. From other internet search engines such as yahoo.com, altavista.com and webcrawler.com, you can find all sorts of useful information. It’s always a good idea to check more than one search engine if you are doing client-related research. Although, if you learn the tips and tricks of using Google, you may save time by using it for general research.

Legal research

For legal research, you are still better off checking out lexisnexis.com, westlaw.com, loislaw.com or one of the smaller sites that offers similar materials. You’ll be surprised at the differences among the websites since they use different criteria to evaluate web page content. Check out searchengines.com for other search engines and information about how to make your firm’s website come up as the top hit when a prospective client searches for “New Jersey attorney.”

There also are legal-specific “portal” sites. These are essentially pre-defined search engines organized to focus on legal source material on the World Wide Web. The best-known le-gal portal sites are findlaw.com and lexisone.com.

Many of the search-engine sites like yahoo.com (which actually uses the Google search engine) offer free e-mail accounts. Even if you already have an e-mail account through your office and at home, a free account can be handy when you are traveling or to funnel specific, more critical messages to you while you are away.

Assuming you have mastered basic searches through Google, you may now be ready for some tips and tricks. Even if you are a beginner, you may find these tips will help locate information more efficiently.

There are more than 3 billion web pages on the World Wide Web. Every day, thousands more are added. Google takes a snapshot of each page it examines as it crawls the web and makes a copy, called a cache, in case the original page is unavailable. When searching on Google, you may see the option to click the “cached” link to see the web page when it was indexed by the Google search engine. In addition to showing cached pages, you can click on Similar Pages to display similar sites based on content. For example, if you are looking for product in-formation, the similar pages will show you competitors’ pages for making comparisons. This technique is also good for paring down the sites you want to explore.

Ready, set, google

When you start at google.com, you are set to do a web search. If you aren’t getting the results you want, read the advice about using its Advanced Search. After typing in your search phrase, clicking on search will bring up a weighted results list with the most likely candidates at the top. Pressing the “I’m Feeling Lucky” but-ton brings you to the first site on that list.

You may not have realized that when you search Google, you have a dictionary at your fingertips. If Google has the term you are searching in its dictionary, you will see a summary of your results (e.g. “Google results 1-100 or about 67,000 for lawyer. Search took 0.22 seconds). If you click on the underlined word, you will see a dictionary definition. You can even hear the word pronounced. You also can limit your search to specific file types such as word documents (.doc) or adobe files (.pdf). To limit your search, type “filetype:pdf” to the end of your search. For example, to search for the pdf version of the IRS 1040 form, your search might be “form 1040 file-type:pdf”.

If you locate a page relevant to your search in a foreign language, click on the Translate button for Google to translate the page. Currently, Google’s translations are limited to Italian, French, Spanish, German and Por-tugese. If you look under Services & Tools, scroll down under Search help, you will find an option to customize Google results. Among the options are over 80 languages in which to show your search results, ranging from the serious options such as Afrikaans and Zulu to the humorous ones such as Pig Latin, Klingon (from Star Trek), Elmer Fudd or even Bork, Bork, Bork! (the language used by the Swedish chef on the Muppets).

While some may find it intrusive, Google offers a toolbar to aid your searches. You can access the toolbar setup through Services & Tools or go directly to toolbar.google.com. The toolbar lets you use Google search tools on any site you visit; limit your search to the site you are visiting; see the ranking of the page within your search and highlight the search terms within the sites you visit. The Page Rank lets you know how credible a site may be. The folks at Google are sent a list of sites you visit which, in turn, helps them rank sites in their searches to provide better results. Take the time to read the agreement before installing the toolbar to be sure you are comfort-able with the terms.

Cataloging

In addition to searching web pages, you can click on Images above the search box and look for graphic files across the internet. Be careful not to violate copyright laws in using these images. Google claims to catalog over 425 million images. Speaking of catalogs, did you know you can search and browse mail order catalogs by going to www.catalogs.google.com. Google recently added froogle.google.com, which helps find sale products available on the web. The name is a play on the words “google” and “frugal.”

The Groups option on the main Google page lets you search for text in Usenet discussion forums. Topics in these forums range from architecture to zoology and everything in between. The Directory button links to a page organized by topic. For those of you who prefer Yahoo, this may be a more familiar way to locate data. The News feature of Google provides a search of more than 4,500 continuously updated news sources. I used this feature recently to find obituaries about a prominent member of my community. For lawyers, this can be a convenient way to see articles about your clients or their adversaries.

If you are having trouble locating the information you need, check out answers.google.com to have a human do your search for fees starting at $2.50.

Need to locate a person or phone number? Either type the name or telephone number into the search box or specify rphonebook: or bphonebook: followed by the number to limit your search to the residential or business pages. Bet you didn’t realize you can use Google as a reverse lookup tool.

Google also recently added map features so that when it locates a per-son’s data, it can show you their location on a map. Click on the telephone icon for instructions to remove your information from their site if you prefer. However, be aware that removing it from Google is only the tip of the internet iceberg. You’ll need to re-move yourself from the many online phone directories.

Since Google and many other search engines weigh their results based on the number of links to a web-site, you may want to see who is linking to your site. In the Google search box type “link:www.yourdomainname.com.”

While not affiliated with Google, touchgraph.com and visualgoogle.com will display the links to a particular website. Both provide a fascinating way to look at the web and its inter-connections.

Futuristic

The labs section of Google, which can be accessed under the Services link near the bottom of the main search page or at labs.google.com, will take you to its playground. Here, you will find projects that may become part of the main site in the future. Among the more interesting items is a search engine in which you speak your search.

Happy hunting!

Carol L. Schlein is president of Law Office Systems in Montclair, a training and consulting firm specializing in law firm automation. Copies of previous columns can be found on her company website, losinc.com. For details about her quarterly meetings for Time Mat-ters users, e-mail info@losinc.com. Schlein formerly chaired the Computer and Technology Division of the ABA Law Practice Management Section and can be reached at carol@losinc.com.