Search engines are programs that allow users to browse the internet. Search engines can also find information on local file systems, but that's another story, the ones that I'm referring to are search engines for online browsing over the World Wide Web.

A search engine allows a user to type in specific criteria, keywords, a question or other information and it gives back results that match that criteria. Search engines have database backends and keep their search engine information content fresh so that their database of websites and files are up to date for the user to find.

Most search engines operate using algorithms. They use their programmed algorithms to match the keywords that the user placed into the search box and retreive results that are specific to the query that the user entered.

Popular search engines used today include Google, Yahoo, Dogpile, WebCrawler, Infoseek, Lycos, AltaVista, Ask.com, Teoma and MSN. There are many more search engines that I did not list, as you can see people use many different search engines.

Websites are updated quite regularly which causes a challenge for search engines. Search engines have to index websites regularly so that they are kept up to date in their databases. People that create websites that are dynamically updated cause other issues for search engines to index as dynamic information sometimes needs user interaction for content to be displayed which makes the search engines unable to display their content.

Some search engines have paid listings. This means that the paid inclusion websites are listed in the results before any free listings.

Knowing how search engines work will help you design your website and be able to optimize your website so that it gets the best results in the search engines as possible.

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