Homework 1: Web Searching and Evaluating

CS 102

60 points, due Sept. 25, 1998

Conduct a Web search on any two topics of your choosing. Topics related to your major or a special interest are particularly relevant.

Use the Web to research your topics. Use a search engine to research one of the topics and a directory search tool for the other topic. When using the search engine, your goal is to reduce the number of page ``hits'' to no less than 5 and no more than 50. Note the search query you used.

For each topic, choose three of the Web pages you found and evaluate them using the criteria we developed in class and you own knowledge of the topic.

Write your results up as an MS Word document. For each topic, provide the following information:

1. The topic researched.

2. The URL and name of the directory search tool or search engine used. For the directory search, describe how to get to the directory. For the search engine, provide the query that you used.

3. The URLs and titles of the sites you chose in researching the topic and a brief evaluation, using the criteria we established in class, of each site.

I will be using the following criteria in evaluating your work:

• Academic merit of your topics. (Feel free to check with me as to the merit of the topics your propose to research.)

• The query you submitted to the search engine.

• The thoroughness of your site evaluations.

• Completeness, meaning that all the information I have requested is present.

• Spelling, grammar, and formatting. Correct spelling and grammar are obvious. The formatting of your document need not be fancy, but the document ought to be easy to read and structurally consistent.

E-mail your Word document to me (to the address kelliher or Send mail to kelliher AT DOMAIN goucher.edu) as an e-mail attachment. Your results are due by the beginning of class on the 25th.