AltaVista - Basic Help

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Different Types of Searches
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Basic Web search tips

AltaVista invites you to search its digital content collection containing billions of Web pages, data resources and multimedia files by simply typing a query and clicking the Search button.

When you type multiple words in the search box, AltaVista looks for Web pages that contain all of the words.
Be as specific as you can. (Example: Baltimore Ravens instead of just Ravens)
Enter words that you think will appear on the Web page you want.
To search for an exact phrase, put it in quotes (Example: "to be or not to be").
Uppercase and lowercase are treated the same.
Words with punctuation between them are treated as if they are surrounded in quotes.
If you include an accent in a query word, AltaVista only matches words with that particular accent.

To help focus your search further, use Advanced Web Search or Special search terms.

Types of Web results

Doing different types of searches

AltaVista's search tabs, located on top of the search box, allow you to instantly search in different areas: Web, Images, Audio, Video, Directory or News.

To try a different type of search, just click a tab. AltaVista takes the words that are currently in the search box and automatically perform the search for you.

Features in your Web search results page

Translate: This link lets you easily translate a Web page into any of nine languages. When you translate a page, AltaVista automatically translates all of the pages you link to from that page.

More pages from [this site]: When a site contains multiple pages that closely match your query, clicking on this link lets you see all of them.

PDF files: AltaVista searches various types of files in response to your queries. When a relevant PDF file is found you will see a note saying "File Format: PDF".

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