Shave the Whales and Free Web Search Engines

[James Brigman]

Patti, et. al;

Jeremy did answer your question (and quite well), the only problem is that
the answer was wrapped around a question you did not ask. Here was Jeremy's
answer:

> There's really no reason to use a separate CGI script, unless you have
> other motives (such as logging what searches are done from your site).
> You can just have the form submit go directly to Google.  And, there are
> some neat options you can send Google to "brand" your search site a
> little bit -- like adding your own banner image.
>
> See http://www.google.com/faq_freewebsearch.html for all the gory
> details.

This is the part of his answer to a question you did not ask, which has to
do with searching the INTERnet, not your INTRAnet) If you look at the very
bottom of the link he gave, there's one little sentence that answered your
question, after a bunch of verbage you don't really care about.

> But, of course you're limited to public web sites and to the frequency
> of Google's indexing.  If you've got the big bucks, there's a Google
> Search Appliance you can buy that can do internal searches too.  Prices
> are not posted on the web site. :-)

This is the part of his answer which does go with the question you asked.
The link for that is http://www.google.com/appliance/

So: the free "piggyback" Google search, and the cgi script Jeremy posted,
will do external 'net searches but not internal searches on your intranet
(which I expect is well protected by your talented system admins there).
Also importantly, stuff like http://www.freefind.com/ will not do what you
asked either. To do so would require the external engine to be able to "see"
your intranet like a public 'net. In other words, not something you even
WANT to happen with your INTRAnet content.

The for-sale search engine that Jeremy mentioned will do what you need done.
He said "Search Appliance" because it's a Linux box completely packaged for
the task you describe. Although it costs money, it could be something your
system admins would enjoy installing, because it comes as a "top to bottom"
solution: properly configured CPU, RAM and disk, plus the requisite software
search engine pre-installed on the box. I've never administered one of those
myself, but that might be a good option if your department is having to beg
for resources from a central IT group: it would ensure you don't get stuck
on an old, problematic piece of hardware. Remember, too, a search engine
doesn't just "live": it needs to be fed and nurtured by an administrator or
webmaster. The search appliance comes with apps for that purpose.

On the other hand, if you have an admin handy who's just chomping at the bit
to roll you guys a search engine on generic PC hardware, from top to bottom,
then this might help: I went to http://www.google.com and did a search with
the phrase "free web search engine" (and I employed the double quotes to
make it literal) and one of the things I turned up looked like it might fall
in the realm of possibility for you: http://www.mnogosearch.org/ This engine
is GPL'ed, so you seem like the right audience/user for this type of
product. This is very similar to Itzok's suggestion of the free Java search
engine to be found at http://www.noviforum.si/ and
http://www.noviforum.si/press/press.jsp

Good luck!
JKB


> -----Original Message-----
> From: ncsa-discussion-admin@ncsysadmin.org
> [mailto:ncsa-discussion-admin@ncsysadmin.org]On Behalf Of Daniel E
> Singer
> Sent: Friday, October 04, 2002 11:52 AM
> To: ncsa-discussion@ncsysadmin.org
> Subject: Re: web search engine?
>
>
> On Fri, 4 Oct 2002, Patti Johnson wrote:
>
>  > only one question about the google searches - they can only hit the
>  > pages that are offered to the general public, not intranet-only
>  > pages... correct?
>
> I think Jeremy Portzer answered this question - and more - better than
> I could...
>
> Dan
>
>
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