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Information Trapping RSS Feeds Page Monitors Email Alerts SMS Alerts Customized Search Information TrappingRegular search is good for one time queries mostly on static web pages (pages that don't change much). If you have an ongoing interest that you want to track or repeated searches on dynamic pages (pages that change regularly), your best bet is using trapping techniques. Here are some examples of how you could benefit from a trap: * Example 1: You want to monitor new books related to your topic of interest that arrive in the market or at your local library. * Example 2: You want to monitor hundreds of discussion groups, news websites, and blogs about your field without visiting each and every one of the sites. * Example 3: You want to track parcels on Canada Post or UPS without having to go into the site and typing your tracking number every single time. RSS FeedsRSS (Really Simple Syndication) can save you lots of time by showing you only new and updated content from websites. Instead of visiting say a hundred sites on your topic of interest, you can set an RSS feed reader to do it for you in a fraction of a second and provide a summary of the updates. There are many ways you can find websites that offer RS: * On the site itself Look for the RSS icon and click.
* On RSS feed directories As the name suggests, these are directories of websites offering RSS. You can find these by running the query "RSS feed directories" on Google. Here are some examples to get you started: * Syndic8 * Feedage * In RSS searchable subject indexes These are RSS directories that are divided by subject categories and subcategories. As in Feed Directories, you can find subject indexes by searching for them on Google. Here are a couple of famous indexes: * 2RSS In order to receive and read RSS feeds, you need an RSS Reader. There are three types of readers to choose from based on your needs and taste.
Almost all browsers support RSS these days. Clicking on the RSS icon will take you to the feed subscription page.
There are several web-based RSS readers. The advantage of these readers is that you can access your feeds from anywhere as long as you have internet access. Here are some examples of web-based readers: Bloglines, Google Reader , Netvibes
There are also readers that you can download to your computer. This type is good for people who don't need to carry their feeds or want to able to read their feeds later without an internet connection. I personally use this type more. My favourite is Feedreader which is free. A good paid feed reader is Feed Demon. You could also use Microsoft Outlook 2007 or above as a resident feed reader. Sample Uses of RSS
Page MonitorsDespite the growing popularity of RSS, there are still many sites that don't offer RSS. If you plan to monitor pages on such websites, you might want to use Page Monitors. A page monitor watches the page's HTML code for changes and reports them to you. As with RSS readers, you can use web based or downloadable monitors. Some Web-based Monitors: * Watchthatpage (free) * Trackengine (paid with some free functionality) * Webminder (Paid-30 day trial) * Changedetect (free for 5 pages) Some Downloadable Page Monitors: * Website-Watcher For Windows only (paid) * Web Watcher For Mac only (paid) Email AlertsThe only drawbacks for page monitors are the possibility of false alarms as a result of generic changes done by automatic services such as date generators and the one-page-at-a-time monitoring limitation. If you want to monitor a whole website rather than just one page or are tired of false alarms, use email alert services. These services monitor the entire websites you specify for keywords or changes and email the results to you. Here are some famous services: * Yahoo Alerts (searches the entire web) * Google Alert (searches the entire web) * googlealert.com (small company, not related to Google Alert) Keyword search * Tracer Lock (paid with free trial) SMS AlertsFinally, for those who are away from their computers and on the go, there is the SMS alert system. Many websites offer alerts to your cell phone when there is breaking news or important updates. Example: CBC SMS Customized SearchThe web is full of unreliable information. Any search term on Google returns hundreds of thousands to millions of results most of which are useless. To get better results you can limit your search to a certain number of reliable websites. For this purpose you can customize your search engine and limit the search, let's say to one hundred academic websites in your domain. Try Google's customized search: http://www.google.com/cse/
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