Boat Building and Cruising Search Engine

[cac]

Today Google made available a new feature in their collection of search tools. It allows you to define what they call a "Custom Search Engine" that lets you provide a list of links which they either search exclusively, or give preference to. The idea is that you can search for things about your area of interest and get much more targeted results since somebody has already "vetted" the links that will be pulled from, and hopefully eliminated a lot of the "extras" we always find.

Leaving aside some people's dislike of Google (if you don't like them, don't use it... fine by me) and the fact that it has some ads, it looks to work fairly well. I have made up a "Boat Building and Cruising Search Engine" and started loading it up with a bunch of links/sites that I use.

Another advantage is the ability to "tag" a link with related terms. You see these terms at the top of the page and can click on them to narrow your search

Feel free to check it out and see if it helps.

I currently have it configured to "prefer" links on pages/sites that I entered, but other sites will still be found. If the database of links grows enough, I might change it to be more limited.

If you have links that you think would fit in this search configuration, please consider volunteering and submitting them. Otherwise feel free to email them to me and I'll add them.

Of course amateurboatbuilding.com is already included :-)

http://www.craftacraft.com/GoogleCustomSearch

Seems to work fairly well for me...

[kiwi]

You have competition :!: :twisted:

As soon as I get settled in my new home amateurboatbuilding.com will have this feature too.

You just can't get enough of a good thing!

Tony

[cac]

[quote=kiwi]You have competition :!: :twisted:

As soon as I get settled in my new home amateurboatbuilding.com will have this feature too.

You just can't get enough of a good thing!

Tony [/quote]

Bring it on!!! :D

Just joking!!!

I think there is definitely room for us both... more the merrier when trying to find something "out there".

Note that Google allows for the "sharing" of refinement labels. If you would like, I would be happy to send you and invitation to contribute to mine. That will allow the labels to "link" between our engines.

http://www.google.com/coop/docs/cse/refinements.html

[quote]Google Co-op allows you to collaborate with other users in creating your Custom Search Engine. If you invite someone to contribute, they will be given limited access to your search engine to add sites and apply existing refinement labels. Learn more.

Note that if you invite someone to collaborate who has created their own search engine, if they have any refinement labels with the same name as any of your refinement labels, relevant sites they have labeled will be included in your search engine's results as well. Learn more.[/quote]