One of the principal roles of the Search Engines is towards the research and retrieval of personal and academic information on the internet. The internet continues to be a host of numerous search engines that spring up each day. The sought after the question is the evaluation criteria that will validate an ideal search engine when it comes to its effectiveness regarding information accuracy, response time, and reliability as the mandated factors (Sun and Nancy 2014, 365).
Regarding response time and retrieval performance, Google is in the lead. However, it underperforms regarding information precision. The assessment clarifies the misconception that relates the quantity of data retrieved per Web search to the popularity and effectiveness of a Search Engine. The assessment suggests the possibility of a connection between the retrieved documents and dead links because the Universal Resource Locator (URL) indexes and stores the documents’ addresses in the Search Engine’s database (Lieberam-Schmidt 2010, 163-203)
It is only when a link to a document is active that the Search Engine will query through its indexed protocols to the latest version of the document, which is often corrupt, invalidated, or moved. Another possibility is the retrieval of advertising documents. They may not suit the Internet searcher’s precise needs at that moment based on his/her selectively timed criteria. However, the popularity of Google in organizations and institutions makes it a public preference. The Search Engine’s popularity is thus under exploit as a marketing platform by a vast number of marketing agencies, and this idealizes it for books and software products advertisement on the internet (Lieberam-Schmidt 2010, 163-203).
Yahoo is another popular Search Engine with a reputable profile that almost portrays a likening to that of Google. Its response time and document retrieval capacity are good. However, it’s score of 0.96 is very for an average precision. Yahoo’s advert content statistically supersedes that of Google. Thus, the purchase of online products and books or journal subscriptions is best served with the two search engines (Lieberam-Schmidt 2010, 163-203).
MSN, on the other hand, has slightly poorly rated document retrieval efficiency score. However, the retrieved documents are on the exactly anticipated level of accuracy which is very encouraging to the Search Engine’s Users. The Alta Vista Search Engine also has a recommendable score regarding the efficiency of its retrieved documents, precision and validity of the same documents. The statistics rank the MSN and the Alta Vista Search Engines among the top recommended Search Engines for retrieving relevant information and advertising (Sun and Nancy 2014, 365).
The performance of the 37.com Search Engine tails the queue about its response time to the user’s query and the number of documents retrieved per search. It is however ranked the highest under the factors of precision and relevance. Even though its document retrieval efficiency slopes in rank, the high score in precision and relevance of the Search Engine is solely on it’s customized and indexed information retrieval protocols that solely fortify for the retrieval of information within a specific domain area. The data makes 37.com a future consideration for researchers who only want to dwell on a particular realm of information or study (Sun and Nancy 2014, 365).
A survey by Li, Yali and Wei (2012, 163-202) concludes that Google, Yahoo, and MSN continue to be the most sought after Search Engines with MSN at 10.9%, Yahoo at 27.5% and Google at 48.2%. The survey concluded that the popularity of a Search Engine does not necessarily relate to its effectiveness regarding information retrieval and precision for its users.
Conclusion
The performance of a search engine should be a measure regarding the information and content precision, the advert content, the documents’ relevance, the response time, and the quantity of documents retrieved with relevance to the close examination of an estimated number of top pages returned per user’s search. The Search Engines Yahoo, Google, and MSN top the ranks regarding their quantity retrieval capacity for documents but however, they have a very low precision regarding their retrieval of relevant documents. The Alter Vista Search Engine is a preference for advertisement and relevance document retrieval. The low document quantity retrieval 37.com Search Engine with limited domain links will be quite relevant as an information base of a researcher.
In both the business and personal enterprise levels, the knowledge of the most effective Search Engines on the internet will be a satisfaction guarantee to an internet user’s need for information. However, the change in the nature and quality of the Search Engines about the users’ changing information needs continually affect the definition and the decision of the “best Search Engine”. Due to different users searching for different information, it is accordingly difficult to state the most effective Search Engine due to the differences in the users’ criteria. Thus, the user criteria should be the main basis towards the evaluation of the performance and popularity of a search engine (Vaughun 2004).
