Software and Other Search Tools

Anyone who has spent time browsing on the Internet will tell you that there are many ways to search for information and resources. Most sites offer at least one selection for searching the resources within that site and another that allows users to move on to different but related sites. The problem is knowing where to start your search. We have identified a number of sites with excellent mathematics resources in the Illustrative Cases section of this Critical Issue Summary. But, don't stop there. We encourage you to browse the Internet on your own. A few useful search tools for K-12 educators include:

• The World Wide Web's Virtual Library at http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/DataSources/bySubject

• Galaxy at http//galaxy.einet.net/GJ/education.html

• Internet Resources for Mathematics, Science, and Technology Education at http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Edu/MSTE/resources.html

Other Internet sites allow you to download useful software for free (freeware) or for a minimal charge (shareware). Charm List (http.//www.charm.net/ppp.html) is one of the best one-stop shopping locations for software and technical explanations.

In Distance Education Resources on the Internet (1994, Draft), Bruce Barker describes a few of the most popular tools for searching the Internet:

• NCSA Mosaic: The National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois has created NCSA Mosaic, an interactive hypermedia interface for accessing and using the Internet. Mosaic is a user-friendly program that allows users to browse through the wealth of information on the Internet. It enables the user to search through a large number of information servers without consciously moving between different search tools. Hence, without too much difficulty, the user can discover, use, and share information via the Internet using Mosaic. With Mosaic, the Internet "traveler" is able to search for documents by browsing through file menus and indexes, by "pointing and clicking" on icons and key words using a mouse, and by using search tools, such as "web crawler," that rapidly scan the Internet for files containing key words specified by the user. When the user finds a database or server that he or she would like to return to in the future, Mosaic makes it easy to add that location to a drop-down menu called a "hot list," which allows the user to go directly to his or her favorite places without having to remember where they are located on the Net.

  Other popular search and retrieval tools for finding information on the Internet are Archie, Gopher, and WAIS. Each tool has its strengths and limitations. Archie (which searches through "archives" of data maintained on the Net) is most suited for finding free software. It is not, however, a useful tool for downloading the software to the user's computer. FTP (file transfer protocol) is generally used to download software or other data files to the user's computer.

• Gopher is an excellent tool for finding text files. Gopher derives its name from the small mammal that burrows from one place to another, from the term "go-fer" (as in "go for information"), and from the place where gopher originated - the University of Minnesota, home of the Golden Gophers. Gopher allows the user to browse through "gopher servers," which are essentially directories or menus that list text and data files in an organizational hierarchy (much like the directories or menus used to organize files on a hard drive or floppy disk). These directories also contain "links" or "pointers" to other gopher servers that may be of interest to the user. The number of gopher servers on the Net is growing continuously, and nearly all contain links to other gophers. The Internet "traveler" browses through a gopher server searching for topics or files of interest, then clicks on the file using a mouse to retrieve the text document. Gopher searches also can be conducted by typing in a "search string" containing key words of interest to the user; the gopher then "go-fers" until it finds a database or title containing the key words.

• WAIS stands for Wide Area Information Server, and it is yet another tool for retrieving information from the Net. With WAIS, the user types in words describing the information that he or she needs (much like a search string) and specifies particular areas of the Net to search. WAIS searches those areas for documents that match the request. One advantage of WAIS is that it looks at the content of documents rather than just the titles.

References