To make a pinpointing search successful, you need to know a lot about how the search engine finds documents. What the engine is looking for. What items are included. What it does not include. The discussion that follows will make a lot more sense if you do.
Search engines appear to work by magic.
You type in a few words, hit enter, and viola, there is the answer to your query. You start to review the results and many times find exactly what you are looking for. After you using them awhile, you will discover different engines don't return the same results, in the same order, and some of the items returned have absolutely nothing to do with what you wanted. Three components make search engines work. First, there is the actual search software program, second is the database that the software is searching, and third are the computer programs that enter find information for the database.