I think it would be great if it would be possible to produce results from an affiliate search engine (such as goto.com or altavista.com) whenever there are not enough results in your own database. The end product would be similar to how Yahoo shows alternate results when they can't find a listing in their directory.

This way you could make money from your search engine, even if your collection of links is not that large. Of course you could just have a seperate search form, but automated results are much more convenient. =)

Has anyone implemented this before, or does anyone know a way that this could be done? It would be perfect for the search engine I plan on launching in the new year.



Rob Bartlett
AAA Internet Publishing, Inc.
http://www.AAAInternet.com

This is already built-in and has been available in all versions of LINKS, including Links 2.0, the flat file version.

Look in the search template files.

Regards,

Eliot Lee

I don't think you read my request entirely. I did look at the templates for both Links2.0 and SQL, and neither of them gives you the option to "automatically" query results from an affiliate search engine, similar to how a metasearch engine would work.

They give you the option to complete the search by clicking on a link, but this is not what I am asking for. The less clicking someone has to make, the more likely you will be to make money with the search engine.




Rob Bartlett
AAA Internet Publishing, Inc.
http://www.AAAInternet.com

Hi Rob,

This could be easily implemented as a plug in for the new version. We plan to do one once we tighten up the code a bit more. Basically, the plug in just hooks into the search, and does nothing if there are search results, otherwise queries another database (be it Altavista, or Goto, or Google) and displays those results.

Cheers,

Alex

--
Gossamer Threads Inc.

That is perfect. I am anxiously awaiting for that plugin to be released! =)

Rob Bartlett
AAA Internet Publishing, Inc.
http://www.AAAInternet.com

Hi Alex, just thought I would bring this up again. Do you guys have any idea when a meta search or affiliate search plug-in will be available? I am really anxious to see this type of plugin for SQL NG.

Looking forward to seeing the finished version of SQL2!

Thx


Rob Bartlett
AAA Internet Publishing, Inc.
http://www.AAAInternet.com

Has there been any progress on this metasearch option?

I like the idea of having an always results option. My site has a metasearch engine already installed but users must click when there aren´t results from links database. How can I avoid users to click one more time to make use of metasearch? Users will not notice if results are from links database or metasearch, searching results are transparent to users.

you can take a look at: http://www.avispanet.com/, try making a search with "zipolite" for example.

I will apreciate any ideas on how to do this.