Included with Seeker should be the Seeker 1.0 Documentation application and a folder named "For Navigator 3.0.x Users." If your copy of Seeker is missing any of these items, please send me a message at mailto:stefan@antioch-college.edu.
 
Welcome to Seeker!
Welcome to Seeker!
In short, Seeker is a $15 shareware web search utility that effectively cuts your web search time in half.
Here's a practical example. To search Yahoo's web directory for sites containing information on knitting patterns, you would normally go to Yahoo's search page at http://www.yahoo.com/. After waiting for the page to load you would enter "knitting patterns" and type Return or click the Search button.
Seeker eliminates the first step entirely. When Seeker is running, simply enter "yahoo:knitting patterns" into the Navigator Location bar (also known as the "Go To box" or "Netsite box") and Netscape Navigator is magically transported directly to Yahoo's search results page at http://search.yahoo.com/bin/search?p=knitting%20patterns.
Seeker 1.0 supports all the major commercial search engines and literally dozens of other web directories and site-specific search engines (107 in total). For a complete list, I invite you to read the Supported Protocols chapter.
Getting Started with Seeker
Getting Started with Seeker
Before using Seeker, please read the chapter on the Terms of Use and Distribution.
That said, it would also be good to consult the chapter on Supported Protocols to confirm that Seeker is familiar with your favorite search engine. There is a good chance that Seeker is.
To begin a search, Seeker must first have registered its protocols with your copy of Navigator. If you open the Seeker application in the Finder, Seeker will offer to launch Navigator and register its protocols if Seeker detects that Navigator isn't already running.
Once Seeker has registered its protocols, simply enter into the Navigator Location bar the name of the search engine, website or search service (for example, "altavista" for AltaVista's search engine), a colon, and then the text you wish to search for.
 
When you perform a search you probably won't even realize Seeker is there helping you. Seeker does all of its work in the background, completely transparent to the user.
Seeker will also quit when it detects that Netscape Navigator is no longer running. A nice touch!
Remember, for Seeker to be automatically launched when you perform a search, Seeker must have been launched at least once in order to register its protocols with Navigator. If Seeker hasn't been launched before then your copy of Navigator will refuse to cooperate, returning a "Location URL" error.
Seeker will also quit when it detects that Netscape Navigator is no longer running. A nice touch!
Remember, you can visit the Seeker home page at any time by entering "seeker:" into the Navigator Location bar or by pointing your browser to http://antioch-college.edu/~stefan/seeker.html.
System Requirements
System Requirements
Seeker will run on any machine running System 7.0 or later, but AppleScript must be installed. If you don't have a copy, you can download AppleScript from Gaea at ftp://gaea.scriptweb.com/pfterry/applescript/.
You will also need Chuck Shotten's free Encode URL scripting addition. A copy can be downloaded from the ScriptWeb website at http://www.scriptweb.com/osaxen/encode_url.html or directly from Gaea at ftp://mirror.apple.com/mirrors/gaea.scriptweb.com/applescript/osaxen/EncodeURL.sit.hqx.
To install the scripting addition, it must be present in your Scripting Additions folder, which is in the Extensions folder of the System Folder of your startup disk (try saying that ten times fast!). A simple way to install Encode URL is by dragging a copy of it onto your System Folder and letting the Finder put it where it belongs.
Seeker supports all versions of Netscape Navigator from version 2.0 and higher but doesn't support any other browsers. More on this can be found in the Frequently Asked Questions chapter.
Similar Utilities
Similar Utilities
There are several other programs available today that perform similarly to Seeker. These are Netscape Communicator, Rhythmic Sphere's SiteMarker and ClearWay's Web Archer.
In my opinion, Seeker is a better web search utility for several reasons. For one, Seeker supports more search engines than Communicator, SiteMarker and Web Archer - this version of Seeker alone supports 107 different protocols.
Another reason is price. Seeker is only $15 shareware, while SiteMarker is a commercial program that costs $25 and Web Archer carries a price of $20.
Most importantly, Seeker is much more powerful. Web Archer and Netscape Communicator both send you to search engines seemingly at random while Seeker takes you exactly where you want to go.
I also say half-jokingly that Seeker has better support than Netscape Communicator. Support for Seeker is faster and more personal.
ClearWay Software's website is at http://www.clearway.com/pages/clearway-home.html, Netscape Communications is at http://www.netscape.com/ and Rhythmic Sphere is at http://www.rsphere.com/.
Seeker is Shareware
Seeker is Shareware
Yes, Seeker is indeed shareware. Hundreds of hours have been spent working on Seeker and by releasing Seeker to the public, I'm committing myself to spending many more.
By registering you'll receive cheerful technical support and free updates when they become available.
Also, in the near future you'll be able to request support for your favorite search engines when a plug-in-type architecture is added to Seeker. Registered users can receive by email a plug-in that can be placed into a Seeker Plug-ins folder.
When you're ready to register, read the Registering Seeker chapter.
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgements
I'd like to thank Eric Iverson for initially starting Seeker's development and by putting out his similar Flypaper utility, which uses a "flyp:" protocol to run scripts embedded in web pages. More information on Flypaper can be found at Eric's website at http://www.pass.wayne.edu/~eric/.
Thanks also go to Walter Ian Kaye for posting his AppleScript examples for all to see at http://www.natural-innovations.com/as/snippets.html.
Lastly, I want to thank Microsoft (eh?) for adding a "find" command to Internet Explorer, which was where the idea for Seeker first started. Microsoft is a perfect example of a company doing a few things right but for all the wrong reasons.
