New Google functions, including patent searching

Via Lifehacker -- Google has launched a beta version of Google Patent Search.

Results include the entire collection of the United States Patent and Trademark Office from the 1790s through mid-2006 (~ 7M patents total). The documentation notes that each result includes:

1. Patent Title: The title of each entry in the search results is the title of that specific patent.
2. U.S. Patent Number: The patent office assigns a unique number to each patent.
3. Filing Date: The filing date is the date on which the patent was filed with the USPTO. The filing date is when the inventors applied for the patent and should not be confused with the issue date, which is the date the patent office granted the patent. If we don’t have a filing date for a patent, this field will be blank.
4. Assignee name: The assignee is the person or organization to which the rights of the patent are assigned. If we don’t have an assignee for a patent, this field will be blank.
5. Patent snippet: We include a snippet of text from the patent to show where the specific search terms were found.

Only US patents are included at this time and the interface is only available in English. More information here and here.

And also via Lifehacker, "15 unusual ways to use Google," including tips on how to use Google more effectively an encyclopedia/reference tool, track packages, etc.

Another cool search engine: PageBull

Came across the PageBull search engine via Lifehacker and I've been doing a little test searching today - it displays search results in a more visually oriented way than some of the engines, tiling images of the pages it retrieves for your search, so that you can get a better idea of what kind of hits it's returning.

Just tried this search on sensitivity and specificity and it seemed like it might be a better shortcut for this search than trying to figure out from the Google snippets what the pages actually cover. Results load a little slowly but it's an interesting concept. Plus I really dig the cute little PageBull icon :)

Some have suggested that this type of engine might be helpful in researching people - with the inclusion of the Varmus papers in the National Library of Medicine's Profiles in Science site this week, I tried a quick PageBull search for Harold Varmus, and was pretty satisfied with the results.

Another new search engine: SearchMash

SearchMash is a new search interface from Google (a little bit hidden, disclosed on the Privacy page). The Features page lists the current features of the engine:

- when you click a URL in the search results, you have a few options that are similar to the links below a search result entry in the original Google (open a cached copy, more from this site, results similar to this page)
- it automatically displays a few images for each search
- no ads
- you can drag and drop results to change the order
- instead of clicking to a new page to see more results, they open in the same window, adding below the previously viewed results (can either click "more web pages" or use your space bar)

I tried a few searches and it worked fine; didn't seem dramatically different from the same results in the original Google. I kind of like seeing a few image results but some have found it irritating and an abuse of bandwidth (e.g. the DaveN post linked below).

More description and commentary:
- Information Week: "Google launches experimental search engine "
- Search Engine Guide: "Google's SearchMash"
- Search Engine Watch: "Google's new SearchMash test site"
- Inside Google: "Google running SearchMash"
- DaveN: "Google's worst ever product"
- More via Google's BlogSearch and Technorati

New search engine: Ms.Dewey

Found this via Lifehacker - "Ms. Dewey: The saucy search-engine librarian"

Just tried a few general searches - doesn't seem suited for practical use (which I guess is pretty obvious once you get started with a search query) and it takes a long time to load but "Ms. Dewey's" on screen comments and gestures were amusing. Not sure if it's still in the testing/refinement stage - could definitely hear set noises (things falling, directions from the director, etc).

Others' commentary:
- Library Garden: "Ms. Dewey Search Engine"
- Geekologie: "Ms. Dewey is an angry search engine"
- Tech Digest: "Ms. Dewey: Search engine with a really annoying personality"
- Trend Hunter: "Human Search Engine - Ms Dewey is Better Looking Than Jeeves"

Update:
Ms. Dewey revealed to be part of a Microsoft "awareness campaign" ("Ms. Dewey Married to Microsoft" - WebProNews)
- More commentary via Library Cloud and devinreams.com (who comments "I think this is a pretty simplistic attempt at something ‘viral’ and so far it’s worked. But who did this, and why would they?")

New site: Helium

Article in yesterday's Search Engine Journal, "Helium.com : About, Yahoo Answers & Wikipedia All Rolled Into One", posted by Loren Baker. It will be interesting to see how/if this one develops. Quoting from the Helium.com description of the site's vision:

“Helium is different because it takes the chaos of user-contributed content and orders it with a trusted ranking system that dramatically improves the quality and accessibility of collective wisdom for the knowledge-seeker,” said Mark Ranalli, President and CEO of Helium. “At Helium, multiple quality responses to conversational subjects such as ‘Which Aruba resort is better?’, or ‘Tips for buying antique furniture’ are provided in rank order, making it simple to efficiently consider more than one perspective.”

The site: Helium: where knowledge rules

Will the peer review and aggregation that they describe be enough to prevent the wildly varying content quality in Yahoo! Answers that Rachel discusses?

Commentary on the site:
- ContentBlogger: "Peer review meets About.com - Helium floats an old model in a new space"
- Symbolic Order: "Helium just doesn't feel right"
- Ray Deo: "Helium: compare other people's gas"
- A Little Class on the Internet: "Helium - not just something that makes your voice sound funny"
- more via a Google blog search