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1. Topic-Oriented Directories
Using topic-oriented directories is very much like browsing a library. You look for the shelves that hold books about the subject for which you are looking. Then you search those shelves for the book on your specific topic of interest and perhaps subtopics within that.
Topic-oriented directories organize Internet resources logically, by subject. They organize the resources in a hierarchical structure providing a list of general subjects, each subject leading to a list of topics within that subject, each topic leading to sub-topics, and usually to more subtopics. Eventually, you are presented with a list of web pages, each related to the final subtopic that you selected.
A Sample Search
Yahoo is perhaps the first topic-oriented
tool that comes to mind. This valuable and popular search tool has been around for many
years. Let's use Yahoo to search for web pages about Monarch Butterflies. We will begin by
going to the Yahoo front page at: http://www.yahoo.com
During this topic-oriented search, we click on Science from the list of general subjects. This reveals a page with a list of science topics, including Life Science. When we click on Life Science, we get a list of topics within that topic, including Zoology. Clicking on Zoology brings up a new list of subtopics, one of which is Entomology, the study of insects. Entomology leads to one more page of subtopics. Here we click on Butterflies and Moths.
After clicking Butterflies and Moths, we are presented with a small list of Web sites, all of them about butterflies and moths.
Section : Finding Digital Resources
Page 1: Topic-Oriented Directories
a: Advantages of TODs
Page 2: Search Engines
Page 3: Net-Smarts -- or becoming Netwise
Page 4: S.E.A.R.C.H.
