Proteus Internet Search services are designed to help you get the most out of your Internet research, hyperlinking you to the best search engines on the web. Access Internet guides and the best search engines on the web, as well as their help pages quickly and easily from a central location.

True to its name, the interface known as Proteus shapeshifts, evolving to help users meet their information needs by providing unique functions and user assistance found in no other "integrated" search service.

With Proteus' "Type Once, Search Everywhere" ^(SM) interface, you simply type what you what to search for in the input box and select a search engine to submit your query to by clicking one of the blue buttons below the input box. If results from one search engine aren't sufficient, click the BACK button on your browser and resubmit your search to another search engine. If you still have no luck finding what you need, reevaluate your search terms. Also try the recommended web guides for more leads to information.

Below the text input box, where you type in your search terms, you will see a number of buttons. Each has a purpose, either to assist you in constructing your search or refine it.

The Proteus Virtual KeyBoard can be brought up by clicking the VKB button. This allows you to enter search terms without a keyboard as well as access special international characters not readily accessible through standard keyboards.

Other buttons, such as the + (or "plus") button insert a plus sign before all search terms, flagging them as required terms in search engines supporting that syntax. The +/- (crossed-out) button removes all +, - and "" characters. The quotes button places quotation marks around search terms, converting search terms into a phrase. The A>a button converts search terms with capital letters to lowercase, a handy feature as many search engines are "case-sensitive," providing different results for capitalized and lowercase names, words or possibly acronyms.

RAND randomly submits your search to one of several search engines; if you're feeling indecisive, this button might help. SPELL submits *one* word to an online dictionary for you to check the spelling and its meaning. SYN submits *one* word to an online thesaurus, where you might find alternative words to use in your search.

EVAL is an interesting button. After entering some search terms and clicking this button, your query is evaluated in a variety of ways designed to alert you how search engines may or may not produce the best possible results based on your search terms. Everything from stop words and capitalization to punctuation and Boolean operations are covered here in the Proteus Query Evaluator.

There are other buttons yet in the Proteus Toolbar reserved for advanced queries involving Boolean operations that work with only certain search engines. OR and AND, for example, work with AltaVista Advanced and Hot Bot. Other search engines have different search syntaxes. Visit the help pages below for more on other search engines and they operate.

Proteus retains a temporarily list of recent searches in a history window at the bottom the search screen. This feature requires cookies to be enabled. See your browser's documention for more on cookies. These searches are purged automatically when you fully exit the web browser (closing ALL browser windows) or if you click "clear history." To resume an earlier search, select terms from the search history box (scroll down if necessary) and click Retrieve. Your terms will be inserted into the search term input box, after which you may resubmit them to another search engine.