What is Dogpile?
Dogpile is a meta search engine, meaning that it gets results from multiple search engines and directories and then presents them combined to the user. Dogpile currently gets its results from Google, Yahoo, MSN Search, Ask , About, MIVA, LookSmart, and more.According to Dogpile, their metasearch technology "can search 50% more of the Web than any single search engine", as evaulated by "Greg Notess, an independent search engine expert, verified our methodology and validated that our metasearch technology can retrieve 50% or more additional results." Dogpile is powered by InfoSpace.
Dogpile Meta Search Home Page
You'll see Arfie on the front page, and get used to seeing this little pooch along with cutesy dog sayings everywhere ("go fetch"on the toolbar, for example). The home page is relatively clean and uncluttered, with a good choice of colors. The search bar is squarely in the middle of the home page, with textual tab choices right on top of that. Below Arfie, there are links to the Dogpile Toolbar, Joke of the Day (it's a popup), SearchSpy, a way to view either family-friendly or unfiltered real-time Web searches, Maps, Weather, Horoscope, and an option to add Dogpile Search to your site.There's also Favorite Fetches, with what looks to be the top six most searched for queries at any one time, although this list didn't seem to be completely accurate (dog flu is a most searched for query?). I found Arfie's Most Wanted to be a better indicator of what was being searched for by the most people on Dogpile.
Meta Search with Dogpile
For my test Web search, I chose terraced back yard, since that's on my mind these days. The search results page came back with combined results from the various search engines and directories that Dogpile pulls from, but there was another column to the right with the question "Are You Looking For..." that had MUCH better search queries and subsequently better results for a terraced back yard, including How to Terrace a Backyard, and Terrace a Steep Garden.You'll notice buttons at the top of your search results, including "Best of All Search Engines", "Google", "Yahoo Search", "MSN Search", etc. Click on any of those buttons and your search results will now highlight items that are specifically from that search engine in a column to the right. Unfortunately, this took away my Suggested Searches, and the only way I could get it back was to backtrack to my original search query.
Now, why would you want to single out a particular search engine? Because search engines will return dramatically different results for the same search query, and once you start comparing the results in Dogpile, you'll see what I mean. For example: I clicked all the buttons available to me and got four side by side columns, all with results for Terrace a Steep Garden, and very few of the search results actually overlapped. A nice feature that cuts down on Web hopping time.
Dogpile Image Search
Dogpile's Image Search brought back fantastic results, including my favorite feature on the far right to suggest to me better search queries.Dogpile Audio and Video Search
Audio Search surprisingly enough did NOT return audio results for terracing a steep garden (aren't you shocked!), but when I truncated it to "garden", I receieved stellar results from Yahoo Search, SingingFish, and more. Most of these audio results have a quick thirty-second preview, but quite a few of them were available full-length. Dogpile's Video Search is also powered by Yahoo Search, SingingFish, and more, and was similar to the Audio Search in previews and full-length results.Dogpile News Search
News Search was sortable by relevance and date, with search results returned from sources as varied as Fox News, ABC News, and Topix. The Yellow and White Pages searches are pretty standard, with fields to search by business name, individual name, etc. And throughout all these various searches (except for the Yellow and White Pages), the ubiquitous "Are You Looking For" feature was always there, steering me to better-worded search queries.This profile about meta search engine Dogpile is continued on page two.
