Basic Definition: A compiliation of web site locations assembled by human editors. The web information is placed into categories and is often also searchable.
While robot-generated databases (Computer-Generated Web Indeces) may succeed in being comprehensive, the quality of the references returned for any particular query is often inconsistent. Machines cannot exercise discrimination as can human editors, nor can they draw inferences. Thus indexes assembled by experts, while not comprehensive, frequently yield more interesting results. Human editors can develop sophisticated subject headings and categories that present information in a more easily digestible form. The following are a few of the major human indexes of Internet resources.
The Whole Internet Catalog
The Whole Internet Catalog first appeared as a section of Ed Krol's best-selling The Whole Internet User's Guide and Catalog. An online version debuted in conjunction with the launch of the Global Network Navigator in 1993. The Whole Internet Catalog (WIC), available at http://nearnet.gnn.com/gnn/wic/, presents a hand-picked collection of 1,200 Web listings that, in the opinion of its editors, represent the best the Internet has to offer.
WIC editors garner potential sites from suggestions, other directories, announcements, "sites of the day" pages and surfing. The editorial team carefully reviews each new page and categorizes it by subject headings. The goal is to generate a small, high-quality online reference library. Qualifications for inclusion include: rate of updates, effective design, demonstrated feel for Web culture and low cost. The WIC page contains a What's New, Top 50 and Celebrity hot lists. Visitors are encouraged to submit suggestions for new sites.
Yahoo!
Yahoo! is a hierarchical subject-oriented guide for the World Wide Web and
the Internet. Available at http://www.yahoo.com/, Yahoo! is a database of
links to other sites. It lists sites and categorizes them into appropriate
subject categories.
Yahoo! gets its links in two ways. Users are encouraged to submit links
directly by clicking on the "Add URL" function on the page's menu bar.
Submissions comprise the vast majority of Yahoo! entries. Yahoo! also
receives links from automated search robots that check for new
announcements at various places.
Yahoo! has an excellent search engine. Links can by searched by keyword.
Boolean logical operators are fully supported. Yahoo! is also searchable
from the CUI W3 search engine (see below).
Galaxy
Galaxy, available at http://galaxy.einet.net/, is a guide to the Internet
provided as a public service by TradeWave and individual guest editors.
Resources are gathered by editors, who volunteer their time and effort to
provide the Internet community with valuable information concerning the
topics in which they are expert. The site contains several databases:
Galaxy Pages, Galaxy Entries, Gopher, Hytelnet, World Wide Web full texts
and World Wide Web links.
Galaxy organizes its information into subject "pages." These are
collections of subject references authored by guest editors. The pages,
organized as outlines, provide links to information across the length and
breadth of the Net. The pages may be visited in turn or full-text searched
by keyword. The Galaxy Entries index contains the titles of information
references in the Galaxy pages, which facilitates searching for very
specific references.
Galaxy's Gopher index contains the titles of gopher menus from much of
Gopherspace. To improve search quality, only the sites referenced in the
famous list of resources, "Gopher Jewels," are included. Galaxy's Hytelnet
index is a descriptive database of information available via telnet.
Searchable by keyword, each Galaxy page contains links to several thousand
sites. The Galaxy World Wide Web Text database contains the full text of
each of the thousands of Web pages referenced in the Galaxy Pages. The
Galaxy World Wide Web Links is a smaller index of over 175,000 links found
in these same Web pages.
All Galaxy databases support keyword searches employing all Boolean logical
operators: "and," "or" and "not." The Galaxy WAIS search engine, moreover,
employs "stemming," which collects all the permutations of any keyword by
reducing searching for its stem. The databases can be searched concurrently
or individually. Galaxy also allows the user to limit the number of hits
returned.
City Net & The Virtual Tourist
City Net, located at http://www.city.net/, combines the features of an
atlas, gazetteer, and almanac, plus the best of local guide books and
newspapers. Using its unique touch-sensitive global map
(http://wings.buffalo.edu/world/vt2/) or a simple text interface, you can
locate information on communities around the world. Incorporating a wide
variety of different sites for each locality, City Net provides a range of
different perspectives on each community.
City Net, which claims to be "the most comprehensive guide to communities
around the world," adds an average of five new cities a day. New sites are
garnered from both submissions and Net surfing.
Ever wanted to know if Web sites exist in Tasmania? The Virtual Tourist,
http://wings.buffalo.edu/world provides a comprehensive geographic
directory of World Wide Web servers around the world. The directory is
accessible from a sophisticated touch-sensitive map or via a textual
interface.
The Clearinghouse for Subject-Oriented Internet Guides
The Clearinghouse for Subject-Oriented Internet Resource Guides, located at
http://www.lib.umich.edu/chhome.html, provides a central access point for
topical guides to the Net. These guides identify, describe and evaluate
Internet-based information resources. Organized by subject category, their
full texts are keyword searchable. The site is jointly sponsored by Argus
Associates and the University of Michigan.
CUIs W3 Catalog
The Centre Universitaire d'Informatique of the University of Geneva (CUI)
provides a large subject catalogue of World Wide Web (W3) resources at
http://cuiwww.unige.ch/cgi-bin/w3catalog. Perhaps the most famous resource
of its kind, CUI's W3 catalog is a huge daily blend of several famous
edited directories including: NCSA's "What's New List," NCSA's Starting
Points, CERN's W3 Virtual Library Subject Catalog, ALIWEB, Scott Yanoff's
Internet Services List, Simon Gibbs' list of Multimedia Information
Sources, John December's list of Computer-Mediated Communication
Information Sources, The Internet Tools Summary and Marcus Speh's User
Documents for DESY and HEP. The catalog is keyword searchable. The search
engine is case insensitive and does not support Boolean operators.
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