On this page there is a variety of links to sites that will aid you in searching
the web for  information that may not show up using traditional search sources
They are in no particular order, and some articles may be outdated with information or links.
Also - some of the resource links may also be located/duplicated on other pages of LibrarySupportStaff.com
Such as the Online Reference Resources page

Also see the Search News Page with links to various Search Engines
and a feed from Magportal with the Latest Search Engine News.

Searchiblity.com
Quoted from website:
Guides To Specialized Search Engines
The complete list of guides (with descriptions) to thousands of search engines 
covering hundreds of subjects. 
Listed in approximate order of size, specificity of subject categories, 
and some aspects of search engine collection quality.
http://www.searchability.com/
 

InvisibleWeb.com
http://invisibleweb.com/

The Invisible Web
"There's a big problem with most search engines, and it's one
most people aren't even aware of. 
The problem is that vast expanses of the 
Web are completely invisible to search engines. 
Even worse, this "Invisible Web" is in all likelihood 
growing significantly faster than the visible Web you're familiar with. 
The Invisible Web is made up of information stored in databases. 
Unlike pages on the visible Web, information in 
databases is generally inaccessible to the 
software spiders and crawlers that compile search engine indexes". 
Read the rest of this story at:  www.websearch.about.com
http://www.websearch.about.com/internet/websearch/library/weekly/aa061199.htm

From Virtual Chase:
Internet Trainers Stop & Swap 
INVISIBLE WEB TREASURE HUNT 
Locate as many Invisible Web resources as possible during the time allowed for this training exercise. To keep this document as a future reference sheet, record the resource name and Web location. 
http://www.virtualchase.com/trainers/treasure_hunt.html

21st Century Literacies
Excerpt Quoted from website:
Lesson: Searching Specialized Databases: The Invisible Web 
Description 
The purpose of this lesson is three-fold: 
to introduce students to a substantial and useful portion of information that is available
on the World Wide Web, namely, information found on the "invisible web" 
to help them think critically about information that is available to them 
to help them choose the best sources of information. 
http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/21stcent/lsearch2.html

Those Dark Hiding Places: 
The Invisible Web Revealed
Robert J. Lackie, Assistant Professor-Librarian, Rider University
Excerpt quoted from website:
"If only I had known!" was the bitter cry of the searcher who relied just on search engines to search the Web. Although many popular search engines boast about their ability to index information on the Web, more of it (dynamically-generated pages, certain file formats, and information held within numerous databases) is becoming invisible to their searching spiders. Much of the Web is hiding information from us, but we can access this hidden content! Learn how you can reveal the secrets of these dark, hiding places. 
http://library.rider.edu/scholarly/rlackie/Invisible/Inv_Web.html

Invisible Web - tutorial
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/InvisibleWeb.html

Florida Community College - LIS 2004
Lesson 4: Specialized Search Engines and Subject Directories
http://lscc.cc.fl.us/library/lis2004/4_intro.htm

Stay current with the latest search engine news
Subscribe to SearchDay Newsletter
Test this New Search Engine (opened Jan 2002)
Quigo, a search engine currently in beta that strives to index the Hidden Web

  Fagan Finder > Invisible Web  
http://www.faganfinder.com/invis/index.shtml

Those Dark Hiding Places: 
The Invisible Web Revealed
Robert J. Lackie, Assistant Professor-Librarian, Rider University
http://library.rider.edu/scholarly/rlackie/Invisible/Inv_Web.html

If you can't find information or a website because the url has changed or moved and you don't know the new sites
url - simple put the "url" that you last saw the information in the WayBack Machine, and you most likely will find
a copy of the page archived. (NOTE: many sites, no longer have images included as they would be linking to pages no longer within a archived pages index or directories)
http://www.archive.org

Examples of some search engines and resources for finding information
via the "Hidden Web" 
Please NOTE: some of these sites may also be found with the other Specialty Search Utilities
that I list on the Reference Resource page

Invisible Web Directory
www.invisible-web.net

InvisibleWeb.com
http://www.invisibleweb.com/

Fossick.com - the WebSearch Alliance Directory, 
is a selective collection of over 3,000 specialist search engines and topical guides. 

Internets.com
Global link to over 1000 databases
http://www.internets.com/

Complete Planet
http://www.completeplanet.com/index.asp

Incy Wincy
The Invisible Web Search Engine
http://www.incywincy.com/

Profusion
http://beta.profusion.com/

Bright Planet - 
WHITE PAPER:
The Deep Web: Surfacing Hidden Value
by MICHAEL K. BERGMAN 
http://www.brightplanet.com/deepcontent/tutorials/DeepWeb/index.asp

Pandia
http://www.pandia.com

SearchPDF from Adobe
Quoted from site
Now there's a way to search through more than a million summaries 
of Adobe® Portable Document Format (PDF) files on the Web. 
Your search results will allow you to see the summaries before 
deciding to view the original Adobe PDF.
http://searchpdf.adobe.com/

Ebsco's Bibliographic & Full Text Databases
http://www.epnet.com/freeres.asp

JAKE jointly administered knowledge environment
http://jake-db.org/

GPO (Government Printing Office) Access
Multi Data Base search
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/multidb.html

State & Local Government - Resources on the Net
http://www.statelocalgov.net/index.cfm

Infospace
Government  
 Search for government offices 
http://www.infospace.com/info/govt/officialsrch.htm
 
National Register 
http://www.nr.nps.gov/

Smithsonian Libraries
http://www.sil.si.edu/
Tools for the Researcher
http://www.sil.si.edu/research/index.htm

MedBio World
With 25,000 links, Medbioworld is the largest medical reference site,
including all medical journals and medical associations,
and similar resources in the biological sciences. 
Links include 6,000 medical journals in 80 subspecialties, and the home pages of 4,000 medical associations. 

MedlinePro - Now - MEDNDX.Com
Free search service for medical and health professionals
http://www.netndx.com/medline/

About.com
What you need to know about

Chubba - What you seek
http://chubba.whatuseek.com/

Google's FROOGLE
All the world's products in one place
Quoted from website
Froogle is a new service from Google that makes it easy to find information about products for sale online. By focusing entirely on product search, Froogle applies the power of Google's search technology to a very specific task: locating stores that sell the item you want to find and pointing you directly to the place where you can make a purchase. 
http://froogle.google.com/froogle

Related - see price comparison & coupon codes weblinks
on my Shopping for the Library Lover page

U-Can-Do-It Specialist Search Engines
http://www.ucandoit.org.uk/information/specialsearch.html

Zoos
The Good Zoo Guide Online (goodzoos.com), the essential guide to the best zoos, 
wildlife parks and animal collections on the planet
http://www.goodzoos.com

Online Article:
The Invisible Web - Where Search Engines Fear to Go
http://www.powerhomebiz.com/vol25/invisible.htm

Eric Digest
October 2001 EDO-IR-2001-02 
Uncovering the Hidden Web, Part I: 
Finding What the Search Engines Don’t 
by Marcia Mardis 
http://www.ericit.org/digests/EDO-IR-2001-02.shtml
 

Searching the Invisible / Hidden Web 
http://www.websearch.about.com/internet/websearch/cs/invisibleweb1/

Direct Search
Excerpt from website:
http://www.freepint.com/gary/direct.htm
direct search is a growing compilation of links to the search interfaces of resources that contain data not easily or entirely searchable/accessible from general search tools like Alta Vista, Google, or Hotbot. Although these "general" tools are essential for the retrieval of Internet based data, searchers often fail to realize that a massive amount of information is not easily or entirely searchable/accessible via these search tools.  Material "hidden" from the general search tools is said to reside on the Invisible Web. 
 

Hidden Webs, Specialty Webs and Invisible Databases
The search tools you need to Search Thousands of  Hidden Webs, 
Invisible Databases and Special Indexes 
http://www.fastboot.com/hidden_web.html

Invisible Web.net
http://www.invisible-web.net/

The Complete Web - CompletePlanet
http://www.completeplanet.com/index.asp
The source for Search engines and databases

Flipper.com - Deep Web Search engine
http://www.flipper.com/

IncyWincy - Invisible Web Search Engine
http://www.incywincy.com/

Pandia.com

Profusion.com

Researchville
http://www.researchville.com/

Searchability
http://www.searchability.com

Online resources - 
search the invisible web
http://www.infed.org/hp-invisible.htm

Invisible Web Search Engines
http://library.trinity.wa.edu.au/library/invis/invisible.htm

SearchSystems.com
Now over 10772 Free Searchable Public Record Databases!

Listing of Hidden Web Resources from Biddle Law Library
http://www.law.upenn.edu/bll/searchengines/hidden.htm

Fossick.com
Excerpt quoted from website
Fossick.com - the WebSearch Alliance Directory, is a selective collection of over 3,000 specialist search engines and topical guides. 
There are thousands of search engines on the Internet. Most of them can provide much more detailed searches within their specialist field than the general search engines. Fossick.com aims to help users locate the best search tools for their search needs, resulting in faster and more accurate search results. 

Search Adobe PDF Online
Quoted from website
Now there's a way to search through more than a million summaries of Adobe® Portable Document Format (PDF) files on the Web. Your search results will allow you to see the summaries before deciding to view the original Adobe PDF.
http://searchpdf.adobe.com/

Related see more Specialty Search Engines on the Reference on the Net Resources page

BlueWeb'n
For Schools:
Blue Web'n is an online library of 1700+ outstanding
Internet sites categorized by subject, grade level, and format 
(lessons, activities, projects, resources, references, & tools). 
http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/bluewebn/

Virtual Learning Resource Center
http://www.virtuallrc.com/

LibrarySpot Resources
http://www.libraryspot.com/features/invisibleweb.htm

Find pages that no longer exist:
using the WAYBACK Machine
Just type in the URL that you have for the page
and check to see if it has been archived by the Wayback Machine.
Over 10 Billion pages have been - since 1996.

And when doing Google searches - if you find a site
not there any longer or not accessible
- go back to search results and click on "cache"
for a cached version of the site - the last time Google indexed it.

Article: Searcher c.2001
Web Search Engine FAQS: Questions, Answers and Issues.
Author/s: Gary Price
Issue: Oct, 2001

Visit : Search Engine Guide
http://www.searchengineguide.com/
 

And Internets.com
Search Engines, Databases and Newswires
www.internets.com/

Visit the InfoMine
infomine.ucr.edu/

Quoted From:
www.notrain-nogain.org/tech/hidden.asp
The Hidden Web: What Search Engines Won't Find
(and how to find them yourself)
The major search sites on the World Wide Web (like Yahoo!, AltaVista, Go, HotBot, Northern Light, etc.) are incredible resources. But even the best of them index less than ¼ of the web pages available. There is a “hidden” net that can hold some of the best resources and most helpful information. This presentation goes into the secret info stashes to be aware of, how you can locate them, and how to use them.

Journalism Resources 
www.notrain-nogain.org/train/links/report/jlinks.asp

The spider goes out, sees a web page, indexes it and
puts information about the page in its database.
You come along and do a search. 
The search results have what sounds like the perfect page for you. 
Click on the link with great anticipation and get a 
“404 File not found” message. 
Because of the time lag involved in the process of scanning, 
indexing and entry into the database, pages that 
were there when the spider came through might 
have been pulled by the time you do a search. 
Tough luck…. 
Except when you search the web using 
Google: http://www.google.com
Do a search in Google and if you come to a link 
that is no longer there, 
click the “cached” link at the end of the entry. 
Google will retrieve a copy of the page as 
indexed from its cached page archive! 
Remember too, you can now search at Google for:
Images | Groups | Directory Links | News

Search WWW Search librarysupportstaff.com

A useful listing of resources for Journalists / who often are not sure
"how" to research certain topics or use the most useful 
databases or search tools.
http://www.notrain-nogain.org/Tech/Links/Net/JRNLINK.asp

Many of the Commercial pages with data/articles/facts and figures, etc. 
will not show up in Online Searches - or if they do - 
when the person tries to access the page - it will ask for authentication:
So the data is not accessible unless you "pay" for it, 
or subscribe to the "service"

Commercial Information Services on the Web
The stand-alone information services have migrated to the web
and been joined by competitive web start-ups. 
These huge information stores provide one-search 
shopping in archives of newspapers, magazines,
transcripts of television and radio programs.
Their material dates back to the early 80s, even before. 
The contents of these services don’t get indexed by web search engines 

Electric Library: http://www.elibrary.com Search the text of articles from magazines, newspapers, books and transcripts from around the world. Set fee allows unlimited searching and article downloading. 

Northern Light: http://www.northernlight.com This is a combination spider search of web pages and a “special collections” database with articles from publications. Abstracts are free but there is a fee of $1 - $4 for full downloads of selected articles. 

DIALOG: http://www.dialogweb.com (if you have an account)(for info: http://www.dialog.com) 500 databases covering business, news, patents, trademarks, science and government. More than 100 U.S. papers. 221 unique files that don't appear anywhere else. 

DOW JONES: http://www.dj.com 80-million articles from 6,000 publications, plus market research, analyst reports and historical market data. Data can be output in variety of formats, including spreadsheets. 

LEXIS-NEXIS: http://www.lexis-nexis.com 1.4-billion news stories, legal documents, financial and market reports, legislative materials and more from 22,000 sources arranged into nearly 10,000 databases. Adds 4.6-million documents a week. 
Read the remainder of this  webpage's helpful leads on mining the hidden web
http://www.notrain-nogain.org/Tech/Links/Net/hidden.asp

Read:
BrightPlanet’s 41-page white paper on the deep Web. 
This first-ever study describes the nature of the deep Web, 
and quantifies its size, importance and quality. 
Major sections deal with study methodology, findings, and implications. 
The paper has been written according to peer-reviewable standards. 
It contains 7 figures and 10 tables, with complete references and citations. 
http://www.completeplanet.com/Tutorials/DeepWeb/index.asp

I use the following described method of finding "hiddenpages"
Using URL Cracking to find hidden Web pages
http://bloodhound.www4.50megs.com/urlcrack.html

Back to>>> Reference Resources