Source: http://issfw.palomar.edu/Library/TGSEARCH.HTM
How to Search the Web: A Guide To Search Tools, July 96. Terry A. Gray.

Summary of Search Engine Features

The following table summarizes some of the common features of the search engines discussed above. Boldfaced elements mean that, in my opinion, this search engine makes the best implementation of this feature. The Internet Sleuth and Magellan are not included, since their features are so different from the others here considered. The names at the head of the columns are hot.

Internet Search Engines

Category	AltaVista	Excite	WebCrawler	Lycos	OpenText	InfoSeek	Yahoo!	NlightN
Case Sensitive?	Y	N	N	N	N	Y	N	N
Considers Phrases?	Y	N	Y	N	Y	Y	N	Y
Required Term Operator	+	+	N	N	N	+	N	N
Prohibited Term Operator	-	-	N	N	N	-	N	N
Wildcard Expander	*	N	N	$	N	N	N	N
Limiting Character	N	N	N	.	N	N	N	N
Results Ranking?	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	N	N
Controllable Results Ranking?	Y	N	N	Y	N	N	N	N
Booleans Allowed?	Y	Y	Y	N	Y	N	N	Y
Proximity Operators Allowed?	Y(10)	N	Y(range)	N	Y(80)	Y(100)	N	N
Subject (Directory) Searching?	N	Y	Y	Y	N	Y	Y	N
Refine Based On First Search?	N	Y	N	N	Y	N	N	N
Controllable Display Format?	Y	N	Y	Y	N	N	N	N

Source: http://www.onlineinc.com/onlinemag/MayOL/zorn5.html
Advanced Searching: Tricks of the Trade. May 96. Zorn, Emanoil, Marshall, Panek.

	Alta Vista	InfoSeek	Lycos	Open Text
Approximate # of URLs	16 million	1 million	10.75 million	1 million
Documentation	Excellent; includes details and search examples for both Simple and Advanced queries.	Lengthy; somewhat difficult to locate.	Fair, not as thorough as it could be.	Excellent, explains all features in detail.
Duplicate Detection	No	Yes	No	Yes
Field Searching	Yes	No	No	Yes, choose field limits from pull-down menus.
Indexing	Full-text	Full-text	URLs, also choice of other parts of pages and text.	Full-text
Multiple Search Sets	No	No	No	No, but allows up to four Boolean or proximity operators per query.
Nested Boolean	Yes	No	No	No
Proximity Searching	Yes, ensures both terms are within ten words (or phrases if terms are enclosed in quotes).	Yes	Yes, choose match type (loose, fair, etc.) from pull-down menu.	Yes, choose operators from pull-down menu.
Relevancy Ranking	Yes, can specify which terms to weight first in retrieval display.	Yes	Yes	Yes
Truncation	Yes, can use an asterisk on word stems longer than three letters.	No	Yes, automatic.	Yes, automatic.

Source: http://www.qcfurball.com/iworld/showdown.html
Search Engine Showdown: IW Labs Tests Seven Internet Search Tools, May 96. Gus Venditto.

Web Search Engines IW LABS COMPARISON CHART
	Alta Vista	Excite	InfoSeek Guide	Lycos	Open Text	Web- Crawler	WWW Worm
DATABASE
Type & magnitude of contents	Full text of over 21 million Web pages	Full text of about 1.5 million Web pages	Full text of about 1 million Web pages	Summaries of over 19 million Web pages	Full text of about 1.5 million Web pages	Full text of about 515,000 Web pages	URL's and titles of about 3 million Web sites
FTP sites included?	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Gopher sites included?	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Newsgroups included?	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No
	Alta Vista	Excite	InfoSeek Guide	Lycos	Open Text	Web- Crawler	WWW Worm
SEARCHING
Can refine search results?	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No	No
Case-sensitive searching?	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	No
Advanced / enhanced search?	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	No	No
Uses Boolean or similar operators?	Yes	No	No	Yes*	Yes	Yes*	Yes*
Descriptions display with results?	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
	Alta Vista	Excite	InfoSeek Guide	Lycos	Open Text	Web- Crawler	WWW Worm
EXTENDED FEATURES
Offers directory of Web sites by category?	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Saves search results as bookmark?	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No
Offers reviews of Web sites?	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No

Source: http://www.asis.org/annual-96/ElectronicProceedings/chu.html
Search Engines for the World Wide Web: A Comparative Study and Evaluation Methodology, July 96. Chu and Rosenthal.

Table 1 Precision (P) Chart for Three Web Search Engines

Table 2 An Evaluation Methodology of Web Search Engines

Source: http://www.ballehs.dk/PCWorld_links.html
Searching is My Business: A Gumshoe's Guide to the Web, Dec 96. PC World Communications.

The Simple Art of Searching
Search Site	Summary	Pro	Con
All-In-One Search Page	A huge collection of search and reference tools gathered on one page.	If it's a search tool, it's probably here.	Page can be hard to use due to its length; you can submit only one query at a time.
Best Bet AltaVista	One of the largest and fastest search engines around.	Fast; large index returns many hits; most-sophisticated options for advanced searching.	Poor relevancy ranking1
DejaNews	Most sophisticated Usenet search engine.	Lots of options with Power Search; useful filters for refining searches.	Boolean search syntax only a C++ programmer could love.
Excite	Fast, big search engine with site reviews and travel guides.	Concept search technology does good relevancy ranking; good personalization options.	Site reviews cover less of the Web than Yahoo or Magellan.
Eye on the Web	Web directory with an attitude.	Can be personalized; attractive graphics.	Thin on content--few sites compared to other directories.
HotBot	Very fast using Inktomi search engine technology.	Speedy; clean interface; point-and-click construction of advanced queries.	Relatively small index; creating complicated searches is laborious.
Infoseek	Easy-to-use search engine, plus Web directory with site reviews.	Wide scope; many helpful auxiliary tools; custom news page through InfoSeek Personal.	Doesn't return as many hits as other search engines; cluttered interface.
Internet Public Library	A public library for the global village.	Reference desk staffed by actual humans who answer research questions for free; helpful FAQ file.	Slow; graphics-intensive pages.
Lycos	One of the first search engines on the Web, it has been surpassed by AltaVista and Excite.	Large index covers much of the Web; A2Z directory lists and reviews many sites.	Slow; hits are often out-of-date.
Magellan	Family-oriented Web directory and search engine.	Lots of reviewed and rated sites; green light icon indicates sites acceptable for minors; available in French and German.	Slow; limited advanced query options.
MetaCrawler	Fast search-consolidation engine.	Rapid searches; easy-to-read hit summaries.	Not as comprehensive or as configurable as SavvySearch.
Best Bet SavvySearch	Search consolidator that simultaneously submits your query to several search engines.	Many options for refining searches; clever system for querying related groups of search engines.	Can be slow; limited to 50 hits per search engine.
Spider's Apprentice	Useful guide for beginning searchers.	Detailed how-to's; news and evaluations of search engines.	Not a search engine itself; text-heavy.
WebCrawler	Search engine plus site reviews.	Easy to use; relatively fast.	Smaller database of sites than other search engines.
WiseWire	Innovative agent that uses artificial intelligence technology to find sites based on your preferences.	U-Zines present custom content and use your feedback to return more-relevant hits.	U-Zines are hard to configure; agent needs time to ""learn"" your preferences.
World Wide Web Virtual Library	A volunteer effort to organize the World Wide Web by subject, with an academic bent.	Where else can you find authoritative link lists on topics like solar aeronomy or mycology?	No search engine; patience required when navigating subject catalog.
Yahoo	Web directory combined with full-text Web searching from AltaVista.	Comprehensive category listing; easy to search.	Links aren't always up-to-date.
1Relevancy ranking determines the order in which search engines display results. Pages containing the most frequent occurrence of the search words are ranked highest and displayed first. More-sophisticated relevancy methods, such as the use of synonyms, are available on very few sites.