Roll your own

Sometimes when searching the web, the results list of your search engine is cluttered with websites that aren’t relevant. For example, if you are searching for historical information about your suburb, you may find the results filled with real estate sites mentioning houses for sale in your area.

One way to overcome this in Google is to add a minus sign in front of words you want to exclude from your search. For example, searching for “Kirwan –real –estate” should help weed out unwanted websites.

Another way to overcome this is to build your own search engine, and include only the sites you want to search. Rollyo is just one of many free services that you can use to create a personalised search engine.

Click the ‘Create Searchroll’ link on the Rollyo homepage and then fill in the form. You can add up to 25 web addresses that you would like to search. Once completed, your personal search tool can be used in a number of ways. All of your search rolls are saved to a dashboard, so you can create a number of different ones depending on your hobbies, job or study.

If you have your own blog or website, you can add your new search tool to your site. Rollyo can provide the HTML code which you can paste on your website, which will produce a search box just like a search engine.

Rollyo already has quite a few search rolls prepared which you are free to use. These include topics like golf, cars, news and computer games.

Another similar service to try is the Google Custom Search Engine.


Need help searching the web? Contact your local CityLibrary branch:

CityLibrary Aitkenvale 4727 8312
CityLibrary Flinders Mall 4727 9665
CityLibrary Thuringowa 4773 8601 or infodesk@townsville.qld.gov.au