On the Web, mindshare is a function of density of interconnection. A site that attracts lots of links is clearly enjoying a sizable mindshare, just as a scientific paper that rates highly in the citation index is clearly popular and important. One method of measuring mindshare involves Perl, AltaVista, and Yahoo.
A handy feature of AltaVista's advanced query syntax, not widely known, is you can ask for the number of pages in its index that link to a specified site. For example, the syntax:
link:www.byte.com -url:byte.com
returns the answer:
AltaVista found about 11,093 Web pages for you.
The link: bit asks for pages pointing to www.byte.com. The -URL: bit excludes those of www.byte.com's own pages that refer to www.byte.c
In this volume of Best of BYTE, we explore the emergence of some heuristic algorithms. Although we have only scratched the surface of this intriguing subject, we hope we've suggested the potential of the synthesis of heuristics and algorithms.
