Navigating the Internet & Search Engines

The mechanics of finding information online — from what a URL actually is, to using logical search operators effectively.

WWW (World Wide Web): The system of interlinked hypertext documents (web pages) accessed via the Internet — a service that runs on top of the Internet, not the Internet itself.
URL (Uniform Resource Locator): The full web address used to locate a specific resource on the web, e.g. https://www.example.co.za/page.html — it specifies the protocol, domain and (optionally) the exact page/file.
Search engine: A tool that indexes web content and allows users to search for information using keywords, e.g. Google, Bing.

Applying Boolean logic to search criteria (also see 10.4.4) lets you narrow or broaden search results precisely:

Operator	Effect	Example
AND	Both terms must appear	cats AND dogs
OR	Either term may appear	cats OR dogs
NOT	Excludes a term	cats NOT dogs

Example

Searching 'python NOT snake' on a search engine returns results about the programming language while filtering out results about the reptile.

💡 Exam Tip

Boolean logic here directly reuses the AND/OR/NOT concepts from 10.4.4 (Solution Development) — if you understand it there, you already understand it here.