Searching the Web, Wirelessly?

[Janak Parekh]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3023514.stm

The above-linked article got me thinking about searching on Pocket PCs.

"The web is making people picky and impatient, a US study has found. Researchers from the Penn State School of Information Sciences and Technology (IST) found that people are getting frustrated with search engines and making snap judgements about websites. Typically surfers visit only the first three results from a query, with one in five spending one minute or less on a linked web document."

However, it's even worse if you're connected over a GPRS link on the street, trying to find the address of a restaurant or venue (that is, unless you have Vindigo). I usually use Google's Pocket IE search page, type in a few words, and cross my fingers and hope it works. Fortunately, it has, but it's still torturous, especially due to GPRS's pokey speeds and due to PDAs' small screens. Thunderhawk is a bit better, but it's generally too much work for me to hold my Pocket PC phone horizontally and boot up Thunderhawk when I want an answer in a few seconds.

If you use your PDA on the spur of the moment wirelessly, how do you find information quickly?

[Janak Parekh]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3023514.stm

The above-linked article got me thinking about searching on Pocket PCs.

"The web is making people picky and impatient, a US study has found. Researchers from the Penn State School of Information Sciences and Technology (IST) found that people are getting frustrated with search engines and making snap judgements about websites. Typically surfers visit only the first three results from a query, with one in five spending one minute or less on a linked web document."

However, it's even worse if you're connected over a GPRS link on the street, trying to find the address of a restaurant or venue (that is, unless you have Vindigo). I usually use Google's Pocket IE search page, type in a few words, and cross my fingers and hope it works. Fortunately, it has, but it's still torturous, especially due to GPRS's pokey speeds and due to PDAs' small screens. Thunderhawk is a bit better, but it's generally too much work for me to hold my Pocket PC phone horizontally and boot up Thunderhawk when I want an answer in a few seconds.

If you use your PDA on the spur of the moment wirelessly, how do you find information quickly?

[seeker]

When I search, I use Google either on the desktop, laptop, or on the PocketPC....

[tewmgd]

yes it's always difficult to browse on internet with pdas, but because there's few interfaces optimized for it (pocketpcthoughts saves us with mobile version :wink: ) . It's not very hard to have a web site easy to read on pda screen, see www.nota-bene.org with a pda (it's use only css technology, but there's other ways to achieve thid)... I use google too and also wap, for example to search phone numbers with the wap version of the yellowpages ("les pages jaunes"). But I'm searching a good online map service for pda...

Matthieu

[MultiMatt]

If I need to find something quickly, Google still suits me best. If I'm wanting to check really quickly, I'll turn off the pictures, but that only helps a little with huge sites...
I just deal with it, and delight that I have the ability to do such stuff with my iPAQ! Sometimes, I feel like I could have called 411 for information faster than I get it on my device, but admit - it's so cool to do it that way!

:mrgreen:

Matt

[mashtim]

Vindigo is still the way to go. To easy to use and no connection worries.

[dean_shan]

I use google sor my searching needs. It is fast and to the point. When I am on my PPC I use the palm version of Google. I made a portal page for my home and have a google search field on it.

[freitasm]

The big problem is that you can use Google to find, but when you go to any of the result links you'll probably have a non-PDA friendly page.

I use my PPC to check my e-mail (and that's great), but when I want to check what's on the movies tonight I just call the cinema. Actually I've put the local ones in my mobile phonebook to save time.

Hell, GPRS and CDMA are awfully slow.
:evil:

[mike6024]

I don't anymore. When I switched my cell phone service I didn't reactivate the data line. The pain and humiliation of the slow service and small screen (even if I did find what I was looking for) wasn't worth the 'cool' factor anymore, and that's saying a lot coming from a guy like me.

[Pony99CA]

Originally Posted by achille

That study does NOT Mean Nothing, If you read closely, the study does not evaluate the quality of the information given to each user.
It is just saying that each user only clicked on the first 3 links.

Actually, that does say a lot. First, it says that search engine placement is critical. Second, it says that users are "lazy". I'm lazy, but I usually look at the first page of results, and sometimes the second page.

Originally Posted by achille

Modern day search engines have highly sophisticated search enginges that give you what you were looking for in the first lines of the result. If the information requested is not visible in the first page of results, chances are that you have chosen the wrong keywords to look for and that you need to re-type the search with different keywords.I use google and I'm proud to say I usually get what I'm looking for in the first 3 search results!

Search engines employ sophisticated algorithms, but they aren't a match for a human for deciding relevance. Until we have true artificial intelligence, the "highly sophisticated" engines you speak of will only be good at guessing.

Also, it's easy to blame the user for picking "bad" search terms, but the user obviously thought they were good choices. For example, if I'm searching for information on 512 MB Secure Digital cards, should I type "SD" or "Secure Digital"? If I'm searching for information on the iPAQ 2210, I'd likely also be interested in results about the 2215. A human would know to match both, but a search engine would require a user to use a Boolean search.

Another issue is page formatting and sentence placement. If I want to find reviews of the iPAQ 2215, and type "iPAQ 2215" review, I would get sites that had "iPAQ 2215" and "review" on the same page, even if they weren't related (but missing "iPAQ h2215", of course). I could narrow it by specifying "iPAQ 2215" NEAR review, but I'd still get pages that said something like, "To review, the iPAQ 2215, 1945, 5155 and 5555 were announced today." I suppose you can blame the author for picking "bad" terms when writing, though. :roll:

Steve

[achille]