Glossary: directory
A directory is a database of Web pages laboriously constructed the old-fashioned
way by human beings who manually input information about the pages.
This is different than a
search engine,
which uses software to automatically scan the Web. Advocates of directories claim
they're superior because a trained human who looks at your site can better understand
it than a software program. Advocates of search engines claim they're superior because
they can far more rapidly index far more sites than anything maintained by hand.
We're neutral in this dispute, ;-).
Surfers like you use the thing in either of two ways. They can enter search terms into
a box on the directory's Web page.
Some software blazes through the database, and lists the Web pages which it believes
are the best matches for your search. Or, you can navigate a menu of links which
divide the directory into categories of sites.
There used to be just one mega-directory,
Yahoo.
Nowadays there are two, as the
Open Directory Project
is rapidly surpassing Yahoo in size and importance. We find them both useful.
There are also many thousands of smaller directories focused on single categories of
Web sites. For instance, there are a couple of dozen little directories listing
blog
sites. You'll often require the services of one of the bigger directories to find
these little ones. But once you do, they many times have databases that are more
comprehensive and up to date for their category than the mega-directories are.
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If you're working on a Web site, you'll want to list it with Google. See our short
article
"List your site with the search engines and directories"
for simple instructions.
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