Internet search engines started out as a feature for desktop searches but today, they rule our lives on the computer and our mobiles. RIDZWAN A. RAHIM writes.

REMEMBER when you first started using the Internet? Which search engines did you use?

If your online adventures began some time in the 1990s, you probably began with Yahoo, which was then a directory of Websites.

I would also venture forth and say you also used AltaVista, WebCrawler, Lycos, Infoseek and Ask Jeeves.

I used something called Search Cactus because some people told me it was an exotic search engine built by Red Indian programmers in a desert.
Search engines help us sift through the mountains of information available on the Internet. Ever since we discovered their usefulness, we use them every day.

Which is why we do not realise they have become older than our children.

Google, for example, turned 10 last month and it is a late-comer to the search business. I couldn’t believe it either when I heard it.

But then I looked back and was able to remember the first time I heard the G word (Google, not G-string).

It was early 2000, and I had just started working at the now-defunct Computimes Shopper Malaysia magazine as a product reviewer.

I had been given a bunch of computer peripherals to review, and was at a loss as to how to proceed.

So I visited an egghead whom I knew from my days interning at a software company in Technology Park Malaysia, hoping that he would write the reviews for me.

Abang Man refused. Maybe writing reviews about colourful computer mice was beneath him. But what he did was to recommend a new search engine: Google.

I tried it, and it seemed to return better results for my searches than what I had used before. It seemed able to anticipate what I was looking for.

I learnt afterwards that this was due to an innovation called PageRank which ranks pages based on their usefulness. My colourful mice assignment was completed thanks to Google.

Today, Google and Yahoo along with Microsoft’s MSN Search are about the only surviving members of the search engine fraternity.

These search engines have evolved into something a lot more complex too. You can do countless things with them: e-mail, instant message, customise homepages, share documents, look at maps and satellite images, blog, translate webpages, use software and make long distance calls for free.

Google has also ventured into the phone business with its G1 phone running its own Android software.

Soon, you won’t need a home computer to find the best price for a pair of shoes or a new camera; the G1 will tell you where the best price is in the nearest shop.

Search engines are here to stay although they may not be called search engines for long now. Google, for one, has become a verb.

New Straits Times

FORMULA One cars are allowed one penalty-free engine switch per season and McLaren’s Heikki Kovalainen opted for his ahead of qualifying for the Singapore Grand Prix yesterday.

Mercedes motorsport vice president Norbert Haug said they had noticed some wear and tear and with four races left this year decided to make the change.

“We have changed the engine in Heikki’s car as a precaution,” Haug told reporters.

“We saw a little bit of usage in the engine and this is a ‘joker’ engine, so there is no grid penalty applied.

“It is a critical time of the year and if you have it available you should use it.
“We have had very good reliability so far. If you see only a risk of one or two per cent maybe it is even less, then you should use it if you can.”

Kovalainen’s world championship leading teammate Lewis Hamilton has yet to make use of his backup engine.

A second engine switch in a season results in a 10-place grid penalty. — AFP

New Straits Times

SEOUL - South Korea Monday unveiled a plan to invest 99.4 trillion won (87.2 billion US dollars) in 22 new growth sectors over five years to boost the economy and create jobs.

The government will inject 7.9 trillion won with the rest coming from the private sector, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said in a statement.

The plan will start from next year, with the government investing 1.3 trillion won and 10.5 trillion coming from private firms, it said.

“If the plan is successful, a total of 880,000 new jobs could be created by 2013,” said Lee Dong-Geun, head of the ministry’ growth engine development office.

He said exports could reach 306.9 billion US dollars in 2013 from 120.8 billion expected for this year.

“Progress in such key industries may finally help South Korea make it into the top 10 of global economies after hovering at 12th, 13th place for the last 15 years,” Lee said.

The 22 projects have been divided into three phases. Development of media convergence, cultural contents, product design, software, next-generation semiconductors, information technology and marine industries is to be completed within five years.

Advanced mobile communications, fuel cells, light-emitting diodes, solar cells, radio frequency identification tags/ubiquitous sensor networks, nuclear reactors, displays and healthcare technology will be extensively developed within a decade.

Efforts to develop greenhouse gas retrieval and use, new medicine, industrial materials, robotics, marine biofuel, non-polluting coal and eco-friendly cars could take more than a decade.

The government expects a 2.4 trillion won investment over the next five years in the solar energy industry to help the country seize a 20 per cent market share by 2018.

South Korea was left in abject poverty after the 1950-53 war. Since then, the size of the economy has grown 750 times to become the world’s 13th largest.

But it is seeking new growth engines amid a rapidly ageing population and increasing competition in manufacturing from lower-cost China.

- AFP/ir

Channel News Asia