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infoGIST: In the Business of Bots

By Brian Proffitt


In the world of bots, diversification is not a very common thing. If a company makes a certain kind of bot, such as a shopping bot, then it tends to stick with that particular genre.

This is a generalization, of course, and like any sweeping statement, it's bound to get struck down by exceptions now and again.

The exception in this case is the infoGIST line of bots from Intelligent Algorithms Enterprises, Ltd., where not one four bot types exist in the form of six separate, yet interrelated products.

The bots under the infoGIST brand are varied in the results they are trying to produce, but they all share the same interface and the same name, as they are all known as infoFinders.

The interface on each of these infoFinders is pretty straightforward. On the top of the application is a row of action buttons that start the tools you need to begin your search.

In the Resume infoFinder, for instance, clicking on the Search Free Sites button starts a dialog box that allows you to enter the search parameters, dates of resumes, and the sites you want to poll. Resume infoFinder queries free resume sites, while Resume infoFinder Gold hits free and pay resume repositories.

Search results appear in the left frame of the infoFinder and are graded for relevancy even as the rest of the sites are being queried. One nice feature was that once a found entry was graded, you could click on it and view it in the large viewer pane of the interface, even while the rest of the search was going on. Clicking on the information in the viewer immediately opens the Web page that contains the resume in your default browser.

Another thing I think recruiters will like about this bot is the ability to search your own PC's directories for the files that contain what you want.

I also downloaded and tried the Web infoFinder. Again, the interface is exactly the same as the other infoFinders: only the action buttons are slightly different. Search categories include: Search the Web, Search News, and Search Usenet, to name a few. I found this to be a pretty good search engine, since it taped into so many existing search tools and presented the results in a clean and consistent manner.

One other cool feature about all of these bots: they are all able to automatically check for updates to their search source databases, a seamless operation that takes a lot of hassle away from the user.

None of the infoGIST infoFinders are free, but they are available for a 14-day trial download for user review. The infoGIST bots include:

  • Biz infoFinder ($49.95 US) searches specific business information sites.
  • Career infoFinder ($29.95 for three-month subscription) searches "job banks, news and Web search engines, company sites, and Usenet for the best job leads and information the Internet has to offer."
  • PR infoFinder ($49.95 US) "uncovers breaking news from leading Internet newswires, subscription services, Web search engines, and Usenet newsgroups."
  • Resume infoFinder (subscription-based license) "lets you instantly and simultaneously search top resume sources; and preview, speed-read, refine, save, and e-mail candidates."
  • Resume infoFinder Gold (subscription-based license) has the same features as the standard edition, as well as giving access to pay resume sources.
  • Web infoFinder ($29.95) searches the Web and Usenet sections of the Internet for information. It also features targeted searches on education-oriented sites.