Nothing is more frustrating than not being able to find what you're looking for online. No search engine has catalogued more than 15 % of all the information online, and that number decreases daily. The more information - and the better quality of that information - you can provide a search engine with, the better your results will be.

Note: Words in italics are actual search engine entries.

• Use quotation marks around phrases. When searching for a phrase, quotation marks will limit your results to only pages that include all words in the order you've typed them. For example, when you enter Danielle Steel into a search engine, it looks for every page that has Danielle as well as every page that has Steel at any place on the page. Typing "Danielle Steel" will result only in pages that contain both words and in that order.
• Advanced and boolean searches improve results. Boolean words (AND, AND NOT, OR) allow you to refine what you're looking for further. For example: "Danielle Steel" AND novels would look for pages that include both Danielle Steel's name and the word novels.
• Other search shortcuts, + and -. The + sign works like AND - it indicates a word must be included. Example: "jazz fest"+"new orleans" The - sign indicates a word should not be included. Example: python -monty would be useful if you were looking for information about the snakes and not the comedy group.