Lycos offers a Web search engine, a subject directories, and several other services. In April 1999, it made its main directory a version of the Open Directory. In terms of general searching, Lycos made significant changes during the summer of 1997, tossing out their old search system for a new one. Then in January 2000, their advanced search switched again to the Fast database, one of the largest Web page databases. Use the table of contents on the left to navigate this review.
Databases: Lycos has several databases from which it delivers search results. The First and Fast section displays links from the Lycos Guide and other high profile links. Then, the categories and Web site listings are from the Lycos version of the Open Directory. Lycos' modifications to the Open Directory include the addition of records for searchable databases from the Invisible Web Catalog. These listings are followed by hits from the Lycos News and Media database of pictures, Reuters news wires, and news Web site stories. After all of these entries come the Web Pages section which is the Lycos database of Web pages, the primary database reviewed here. In the Web Pages section, the top ten hits will come from the Direct Hit database if there are any matches there. Both the regular Lycos and Lycos Pro, their advanced search, use the Fast database as their search engine database. Lycos also offers access to several other databases from Fast: FTP search, MP3 search, and Rich Media (pictures & sounds).
Strengths:
* Additional access point to the Fast database
* Some advanced features
* Extensive portal content
Weaknesses:
* No full Boolean searching
* Sometimes has an older version of Fast database than All the Web
Default Operation:
Multiple search terms are processed as an AND operation in both the regular and advanced search.
Boolean Searching: Lycos allows only the use of a + for AND and - for NOT, but no Boolean operators. The advanced search has a drop down menu with choices for "all of the words," "any of the words," or "the exact phrase." If no + or - marks are used and the drop down menu is not changed, the search will run an automatic AND operation on the standard search screen.
Proximity Searching: In both regular Lycos and Lycos Pro, phrase searching is available by using "double quotes" around a phrase. In Lycos Pro, it is also available by choosing "the exact phrase" from the drop down menu.
The old Lycos Pro (before 2000) supported the fullest array of other proximity operators. While that help file was still available in May 2001, the functions were not.
Truncation: Lycos originally automatically truncated search terms, and then switched in the summer of 1999 to no support for truncation. With the Fast database, there continues to be no truncation capabilities.
Case Sensitivity: Lycos is not case sensitive. All search terms look for a match regardless of upper and lower case are searched.
Field Searching: The following command field searches are available. In the advanced search (Lycos Pro), they are also available under the Page Field section.
| Field | Explanation |
|---|---|
| title: or t: | Hits have the term(s) in the HTML title element. |
| url: or u: | Pages have the term(s) somewhere in the URL (host name, path, or filename). |
| host: or h: | Pages have that specific terms within the domain portion of the URL (the host such as name.com or whatever.org). |
These other are available under Link Referrals:
| Field | Explanation |
|---|---|
| ml: or Your URL | Can be any URL and searches for pages that link to that URL or portion of the URL. The ml: can be used from any command box. The rest are most easily used via the form. |
| Only this Host | Pages have that specific domain. |
| Exclude this Host | Excludes pages from the specified domain. |
Limits: None in regular Lycos. In Lycos Pro, there are the field searches mentioned above and 25 language limits. Only one language limit at a time can be used. Unlike on Fast at All the Web, a language limit cannot be combined with a field search. Here is the full list as of May 2001:
- Bulgarian
- Catalan
- Czech
- Danish
- Dutch
- English
- Estonian
- Finnish
- French
- German
- Greek
- Hebrew
- Hungarian
- Icelandic
- Italian
- Latvian
- Lithuanian
- Norwegian
- Polish
- Portuguese
- Romanian
- Russian
- Slovenian
- Spanish
- Swedish
Stop Words: Lycos does not have stop words and common words can be searched.
Sorting: Sites are sorted by relevance score. There are no options for sorting alphabetically, by site, or by date.
Display: Only ten hits at a time are displayed. For more than that (at least from the Fast database) try the advanced search at All the Web. Both regular Lycos and Lycos Pro display the title, an extract, and the URL. No date, language, or file size information is available. As some point in Spring 2001, Lycos added a translation capability, with a link after each record and directly at translation.lycos.com. It uses the same Systan software that AltaVista uses.
Directory: Lycos moved to its own version of the Open Directory from Open Directory Project in April 1999. Its former directories were Sites by Subject (formerly known as a2z and now no longer available) and Top 5% Sites (formerly Point). On June 7, 1999, Lycos added records for 7,000 searchable databases to its licensed version of the Open Directory. The searchable database records (from IntelliSeek's Invisible Web Catalog) show up under Reference / Databases, but the individual database are not searchable from within Lycos, only the record for each database.
Documentation:
Lycos Search Documentation (still includes some of the old documentation about Boolean searching that is no longer accurate, as of May 2001).
Press Releases