Digital's 'Super Spider' Becomes Internet's Fastest-Growing Search Tool
In Less than a Month, Digital Equipment's Hot Technology Surges Past Two Million Hits Daily
Company Considers Licensing, Advertising Offers
MAYNARD, Mass., January 11, 1996 -- Within weeks of its introduction, Digital Equipment Corporation's advanced "super spider" technology has become the fastest-growing information search and indexing capability on the Internet's World Wide Web, the company said today. Paralleling the technology's phenomenal climb to more than two million "hits" or transactions per day is the keen interest from leading Internet companies seeking to negotiate business agreements."It has become clear that Digital has built the better 'cyber mousetrap' for capturing all of the information on the World Wide Web," said Samuel H. Fuller, vice president of Corporate Research. "Inquiries from firms doing business on the Internet have risen on the same steep curve as user interest in the technology. They are seeking to license the technology, use it internally, or advertise products and services on its home page. We will give careful consideration to all of these potential opportunities," he said, "before making final decisions in the coming months."
User Commentary
"Web users who have tried the Internet's first super spider software that we code-named Alta Vista are astounded by its speed and comprehensive response to their information queries," Fuller added.
Internet-savvy newspaper columnists have strongly recommended that readers put the technology through its paces, as they have. "The results, I promise, will blow you away," said David Plotnikoff, writing in the San Jose Mercury News in the heart of Silicon Valley. "Digital Equipment Corporation's Alta Vista is less than a week old, and it's already made its way to the top of my hotlist," he added. Norfolk Virginian-Pilot DoubleClick columnists Roger A. and Richard A. Grimes found Alta Vista "...hands down the best search engine... and it's simple to use." Richard also selected it for InfoNet's "Cool-Site-of-the-Day," which he maintains, just days after it was officially launched. In his "Postcard from Cyberspace" column in the Los Angeles Times, Daniel Akst called Alta Vista "...my favorite new Internet search engine...Searches are surprisingly fast and reasonably accurate, and search results are presented quite coherently."
From England, Jack Schofield, computer editor of The Guardian comments, "...Alta Vista is my favourite word-search engine....It is the power and speed of the searching that makes it great. It can do searches nothing else can manage."
"I tried it and was boggled by its speed and depth...This site blows the socks off all other Web search engines," said Nathan Sovik, Ph.D., University of Michigan. Phenix Management International's Al Doran of North York, Ontario, comments that Alta Vista "...may be the hot site of the year! You will find just about anything you are looking for with this search engine." And Dr. Tony Mace of Management Accountancy & Computer Education in Sussex, UK, said, "It's very good for picking up obscure pages which other search engines miss."
Digital is continuing its public test of the technology. Web users can access Digital's super spider and provide feedback through Digital's Internet address at: http://altavista.digital.com
Researchers at Digital's Palo Alto facility have documented daily usage since the technology's introduction on December 15, when 300,000 hits were logged. The number doubled on Monday, December 18. By Wednesday, December 20, it had jumped to 1.5 million. Following the holiday period, the number reached more than two million daily, beginning January 4.
Quadrupled Capacity
The technology's super spider and super indexer employ next- generation software and advanced networking, powered by Digital's top-of-the-line AlphaServer 8400 system. The scalable hardware already has been upgraded to quadruple its original capacity -- from two to eight processors, and double the memory -- to keep pace with demand. AlphaServer 8400 systems can be upgraded incrementally to 12 processors in a single system and as many as 96 processors in a cluster of Alpha computers.
Most Comprehensive Search
Digital's super spider technology surpasses the limitations of current information services by delivering the most complete, precise, and up-to-date information of the Web's entire text. It conducts the most comprehensive search of the entire Web orders of magnitude faster than spiders used in conventional information search services. The super spider creates and dispatches a "brood of spiders" that crawls the entire Web. Second-generation scalable software simultaneously locates and indexes text as it finds Web pages. A powerful search engine enables Web users to conduct precise searches for specific information by looking for phrases, specifying key words, using case-sensitive matches, and restricting searches to titles or other parts of a document.
The super spider has crawled the Web at up to 2.5 million pages per day, finding and indexing more information than any other spider or crawling service. It is enroute to finding every page and indexing every word of text on the Web.
Digital Equipment Corporation is the world's leader in open client/server solutions from personal computing to integrated worldwide information systems. Digital's scalable Alpha platforms, storage, networking, software and services, together with industry- focused solutions from business partners, help organizations compete and win in today's global marketplace. Specific information on Digital's Alpha and Intel platforms, storage, networking, software, and services is available on the Internet and can be accessed through the Digital home page: http://www.digital.com
Note to Editors: Digital, the Digital logo, and AlphaServer are
trademarks of Digital Equipment Corporation.
A "hit" is commonly used to define a transaction
at a Web site or area, and is a standard
measurement of Internet activity.
David Plotnikoff San Jose Mercury News plotnikoff@aol.com
Roger A. Grimes Norfolk Virginian-Pilot groger@infi.net
Richard A. Grimes Norfolk Virginian-Pilot rgrimes@infi.net
Daniel Akst Los Angeles Times akstd@news.latimes.com
Jack Schofield The Guardian jack@cix.compulink.co.uk
Nathan Sovik, Ph.D. University of Michigan nsovik@umich.edu
Al Doran Phenix Management Intl. pmi@io.org
Dr. Tony Mace Management Accountancy TonyMace@mace.demon.co.uk
& Computer Education